July 2026 - A Fulcrum

The Real Test of Love Isn’t a Crisis. It’s Good News.

Performative care is when someone shows up brilliantly for your emergencies and disappears from your ordinary life. They arrive for the breakup, the diagnosis, the redundancy, and then go quiet for months once the crisis passes. It looks like love because it involves effort and presence at a dramatic moment. It usually is not.… Read the rest

I Stopped Renting My Own Mind (a Dead Emperor Fixed It for Free)

A rented mind never really rests. The going rate for calm is $200 an hour. Marcus Aurelius wrote the manual in a tent, on campaign, and never charged a soul. Some debts never show up on a statement. This is one of them.

A shorter version of this ran on Medium, and there’s a video walkthrough on YouTube if you’d rather watch it than read it.… Read the rest “I Stopped Renting My Own Mind (a Dead Emperor Fixed It for Free)”

I Built the “Perfect” Website and Heard Crickets: Why the Open Web is a Ghost Town

Borrowed gravity is the reason almost nobody read this page. I spent six weeks agonizing over a domain name.

I am not exaggerating for the sake of a relatable opening hook. I built a shortlist. I cross-referenced a spreadsheet of available top-level domains. I applied a weighted scoring system based on memorability, brevity, brand potential, and lack of hyphenation.… Read the rest “I Built the “Perfect” Website and Heard Crickets: Why the Open Web is a Ghost Town”

I Quit the 5 AM Club and My Career Moved Faster (Seneca Saw This Coming)

Watch the short companion video on YouTube, or read on for the full essay. This piece also lives on Medium.

I used to be a proud member of the 5 AM club. At 11:43 PM on a Tuesday, I was answering emails that could have waited until Thursday.… Read the rest “I Quit the 5 AM Club and My Career Moved Faster (Seneca Saw This Coming)”

I Stopped Being a ‘Low-Maintenance’ Friend and Nearly Lost My Best Friend Over a Heart Emoji

A reply six days late, a heart emoji, and the two-month experiment that cured me of being everyone’s low-maintenance friend.

Last Thursday, I finally answered a text that had been sitting in my inbox for six days.

It was from Jess. A decade ago, I’d have called her my closest friend without needing to think about it.… Read the rest “I Stopped Being a ‘Low-Maintenance’ Friend and Nearly Lost My Best Friend Over a Heart Emoji”