Skip to content

Matt Hogan's Blog Posts

Takeaways And Insights Unshared

Published on March 23, 2026

One of my tasks as a writer is to convert experiences into words.

…Share some of the takeaways and insights of life in a way that others can utilize and download into their own worldviews.

And in this way, the tide that raises the boat of my understanding gets shared into the tide that might also raise the boat of their understanding as well.

Because in some ways, takeaways and insights unshared become water held on board the boat. And rather than getting added to the tide that raise the boats of all, it becomes a weight that pulls the level of their boat down.

…Which isn’t to say every takeaway and insight needs to be shared.

It’s simply to say, being the only person around with takeaways and insights becomes a sort of weight rather than achievement.

Takeaways and insights are meant to be shared so that those around can, not only deepen their understanding (and ability to connect more deeply with you), but contribute back takeaways and insights of their own (and add back to the tide you both share).

The tide won’t raise on its own.

We’ll Never Know

Published on March 22, 2026

I found out yesterday my 90-something year old neighbor passed away a couple weeks ago.

It was apparently of natural causes and while she was asleep.

And while I was just writing about how Lisa Lux was devoting all of her energy towards healing and squeezing every drop of presence out of life with what little time she had left… my 90-something year old neighbor apparently was frequently wondering what was taking so long.

Her husband had apparently passed away in the late 1970s and she eventually got to a point where she would ask her daughter… why do you think I’ve lived as long as I have? Why me? Why not my husband? Why not my grandchild—who died in his 20s? Why not somebody else?

And the truth is: we’ll never know.

What makes this life so very special is that we’ll never know.

And it’s the knowing this… the keeping death close in our minds… and not the opposite… that turns time into memories… energy into experiences… life into legacy…

Plastic Gold Coins

Published on March 22, 2026

Yesterday, as I was reflecting on the loss of my friend Lisa Lux, as I meditated closely on the thin line that separates life and death—me from death; her from life; and each of us from the opposite—and carefully allowed myself to enter that empathetic space of feeling what she might’ve felt and what I was surely feeling… I got abruptly interrupted three times.

…And each was by a different co-worker to talk to me about plastic gold coins.

See there was an event we were hosting at our martial arts school where the students could play arcade-style martial arts games to win plastic gold coins that they could turn in for prizes. And we didn’t have enough gold coins for the night. So my co-workers and I were scrambling to find solutions. Long story short, we were checking out and calling every local place that might sell them and keeping each other updated so we didn’t overlap efforts.

In no way was I upset about this.

But I did find it to be such a powerful analogy for the ways in which death hides behind life.

There I was… there we were (all of my co-workers knew Lisa Lux as well)… mourning the loss of our friend… except we weren’t able to because we kept getting ripped back to the urgent reality—the one where death ceases to exist—by one of the most trivial, insignificant, worthless of items here on this earth… plastic gold coins.

And if plastic gold coins can keep us from thinking about our mortality and death… just think about what even slightly more “important,” “significant,” and “worthy” things can do…

RIP Lisa Lux

Published on March 20, 2026

“Lux” was exactly right.

She was a light.

She was warm, vibrant, and kept away the dark.

She texted me, not even a month ago and said, “Hey I wanted to give you a health update. We came back from our family trip and I had routine scans. They ended up admitting me. Long story short there is nothin left they can do for me and that I don’t have much time left.”

I went and saw her that afternoon.

And even then… even after that text… as she laid there in that hospital bed…

She smiled. She talked about her plans for healing. She commented on how what we were watching was her favorite show.

She cried when we spoke of her son—as a stream of warm wax might run down the side of a well lit candle. His innocence and pure heart meeting the cold, cruel, and dark.

…But only because the world he knew—the one his mom worked so hard to build—was so much the opposite. Her wick touching the wicks of so many around them that what resulted was a brilliance of light—one that even the most cunning of darknesses struggled to fight.

But what was most brilliant about Lisa Lux… is that it was never a fight.

Not light vs darkness. Not us vs. them. Not her vs. cancer.

“Because when you fight, it fights back.” She said.

No.

It was simply an overflowing of warmth, vibrance, and light. From her to her son and husband… her to her friends and loved ones… her to acquaintances and even strangers.

Not to build an army. But to build beautiful light.

RIP. 🙏🏼

The Consequences Of Freedom

Published on March 19, 2026

You’re free to log-in to Facebook—but you’re not free from its algorithmic feed.

You might log-in with the intention of checking in on friends, but what results is a firehose of content that each carefully analyzes your every touch of your finger—down to the pixel—so as to craftfully, cunningly, with an incomprehensible amount of precision… guide you into a rabbit hole… featuring content that keeps you logged in, swiping and scrolling, vegetating and droning for as long as it can manage.

See what we need to realize is that in so many cases in life, we’re free to make whatever choice(s) we want, but we’re not free from the consequences of those choices.

Logging into social media apps is a free choice, but what we get shown is no longer completely up to us.

Hanging out with certain people is a free choice, but what gets done, discussed, and experienced is no longer completely up to us.

Choosing where we spend our time is a free choice, but who we run into, the vibes of the environments, the types of experiences we’re prone to having are no longer completely up to us.

Which is why it’s more important than ever to take control of our free choices and choose to act in ways that minimize the potential downside and maximize the upside.

Rather than log-in to social media apps, maybe we choose to log-in to reading apps instead.

Rather than hang out with toxic types, we make more space for and hang out with healthy types.

Rather than choose to spend our time at bars/clubs, maybe we spend more time at gyms/cafes.

Freedom has consequences… choose wisely.

Work Will Eat All Your Time If You Let It

Published on March 18, 2026

The busier I get, the more tempted I am to steal time from other priorities.

I’ve noticed that I’ve been eating time away from my lunch breaks…

I’ve been staying later into the evenings, pulling extra minutes from my editing, reading, sleeping time…

I’ve even noticed that my thinking is more and more work oriented—most noticeably when I sit down to write… I end up circling work thoughts for longer than usual before I’m able to deviate into other trains of thought.

For some, this is how it goes. And work continues to creep further and further into everyday life and steal more and more from everything else—you know, the things that keep you balanced.

But as the old adage goes, we meditate when we’re free… and when we’re busy, we should meditate twice as long.

Resist the urge to steal time from other priorities. Fight for balance. Too much work and not enough play, remember, isn’t even good for work anyway.

“I Don’t Know How You Do That Sober?”

Published on March 17, 2026

…Somebody said to me after an evening of dancing.

And the short reply is that I learned how to mostly stop caring what other people think. I’m not fully immune or perfect at this, but I’ve come a long way.

The longer reply is: I used to wonder the same thing!

I would become so overly critical about how I looked or of what people thought of me that would I typically stand paralyzed in a corner watching others. And it wasn’t until I had a few drinks that I felt like I could loosen up and move more freely.

Then I read something that said something along the lines of: Why do people drink anyway? It’s to change their state… so that they can give themselves permission to act silly, be bold, or dance uncaringly. But this is simply a mindset skill. One that can be learned. And once you can learn how to change your state without the drinking… you can become unstoppable.

…Or an uncaring, dancing machine.

And so I practiced this. I went a full decade completely sober. Not even a sip of alcohol once. And I practiced changing my state. Being more silly and authentically myself. Being bold and confident and decisive. And dancing as uncaringly as I was able.

There are still times when I hesitate or catch myself too much in my head. And like anything in life, it’s a process. One that still has many iterations of improvement yet to go. But one that has taken me many iterations forward from where I was.

And so can it be for you.