Any highlights you guys wanna share from the past week/weekend? Anything you're looking forward to this upcoming week? Here's a picture of the sunrise I got to catch this morning. It was SO cold, but so beautiful and worth it.

In the last two days we spoke about the first 2 principles of success as described in "The Rhythm of Life" by Matthew Kelly (more here : principles-of-success-day-1-purpose; principles-of-success-day-2-priorities ). Today we delve into the third principle: Balance (Just a small but important note, the term success here can be applied to many areas of life, and ultimately, it's really just about intentionally becoming the best version of yourself.) Principle 3: BALANCE “Life demands balance; without it, even success becomes destructive.” "Work-life balance was a mistake from the start. Because we don't really want balance. We want satisfaction" Balance is the rhythm that sustains success. We tend to function best when we are within a 'window of tolerance'. When we're outside that window we feel overwhelmed and numb and start losing flexibility, empathy, and clarity. When this happens progress in one area begins to erode another (health/relationships/peace/meaning). Balance doesn't mean equal time for everything, but rather appropriate attention (and discernment) over time. Trying to give everything equal weight at all times becomes an unrealistic endeavour so this calls us to sacrifice some things, BUT, it's asking us to sacrifice some things consciously rather than driven by fearr/guilt/compulsion. Maybe a better way of saying this is is that it calls us to prioritize some things over others. Balance is about looking at the season that we're actually in and tending to the things that benefit from our attention in that season not the season we wish we were in. QUESTIONS for reflection: Which area of life feels overworked and which feels neglected? POLL: Which best describes your current state? ACTION: -Track energy levels for 7 days--and ask yourself at the end "What did my system need more or less of...and did I listen?"

January asks us to sit with a sense of emptiness that can feel deeply uncomfortable. What we label as stagnation often takes a very practical form. Things are left undone. Decisions are put off. We hesitate to act. But what if this is not a failure. What if it is information. What if delaying is not a flaw in our character, but a moment of intelligence at work. January is a pause between movements. Nothing has truly begun, yet nothing has fully ended. The mind may already be racing ahead, full of plans and expectations, while the body remains slower, still attuned to winter, still conserving energy. Out of this mismatch arise moments so small they are easy to miss. A quiet inner nudge that slightly alters direction. A brief sense of clarity. A conversation, a gesture, a seemingly minor act that suddenly restores momentum. These are the moments we might call miracles, not because they are dramatic, but because they are precise. Seen this way, postponement is not obstruction. It is feedback. The system is checking whether purpose, safety and direction are actually aligned. What feels like resistance is often a protective response, a signal from the nervous system saying that something has not yet settled. Not yet. January, in particular, carries this unfinished quality. The old still has weight. The new has not yet found its shape. Before meaningful action can occur, a certain inner steadiness has to form. What looks like doing nothing is not an enemy of progress, but part of how coherence develops. When this phase is bypassed, the result is often more strain, more fatigue, more internal friction. When it is respected, something else becomes visible. The boundaries that are being defended. The needs that have not yet been acknowledged. The assumptions that remain unexamined. The sense of safety that is still incomplete. Real agency does not come from pushing harder. It grows where orientation deepens. Where body, thought and emotion begin to move in the same direction again. Where small, well-timed steps replace grand intentions that ask too much too soon.

This past week we stealthily crossed the 100 member milestone and I'm so so excited for it! A couple of you reached out about it (thank you!!) and @Chris Wendt 's post here100-members means so so much to me... This milestone belongs to all of you! It truly does! Thank you for showing up, contributing your voices, sharing your experiences, and helping create this space into what it is today. I never anticipated how this little corner of skool was going to take shape and I am so so truly thankful for it and for you all. A gift that I never knew was needed and didn't see coming. My heart is overflowing with joy. The connections formed and nurtured, the conversations sparked, and the growth truly wouldn’t exist without your willingness to engage and support one another and me. This community is possible because of you-your presence, insight, and energy matter more than you know. Thank you for making it the special space that it is. Here’s to what we’ve built together so far, and to everything still ahead!!!!💛 Excited!!!!!

I'm not a man, so I'm not going to pretend that I understand or know what it's like to be a man. I also don't want to give ANY impression that masculinity or masculine traits are bad or less than. The world NEEDS masculine traits...I think we're in desperate need actually. It's been interesting to see the shift from unhealthy masculinity to the complete oppression of masculinity... Ultimately though, I think that we need humans that can embody a level of wholeness. (the post below mainly focuses on one aspect of this...but there's always more) I work with men and I love them. I love humanity--with all it's beauty, with all it's ick, with all it's wrestling in the mud...But i think that there's a special place in my heart for men. I can only speak from my experience with interacting with men...so while I'm not a man and can't get the full scope, I'm thankful for being allowed in spaces where they've shared their experiences... In working with men, I get to see the pain that's there, the striving, the need for connection, the fear of failure and fear of not living up to their potential, the things left unsaid or unaddressed because there are certain expectations or there are certain societal waves at play that don't leave a place for men to really speak up without repercussions. Other men experience the opposite--where there's less striving, less leading, less masculine traits presented and they also suffer-from a lack of direction, effectiveness. Some have direction/clarity but the current societal environment doesn't necessarily allow for it. The current environment around how some men are treated is also fascinating and appears to be damaging..A lot of shame can arise in any of these cases. Sometimes some of the men deny that these things even exist in their lives but more often than not, over time there's a realization. Something that doesn’t get talked about enough is how many high-achieving men end up sabotaging themselves because of the version of masculinity that helped them succeed. The grind, the emotional shutdown, the “handle it alone” mentality--it kinda works, you know? Until it doesn't. Using pain as a fuel source can be really motivating and can feel like "fire under the a$$" but when it seeps in other areas of life, it ends up being messy, painful, harmful. On the other side of the spectrum there are individuals that are lacking clarity in vision/direction and there's little striving/less leading and this contributes to feelings of ineffectiveness, lack of purpose, depression. There are also groups of men that are feeling limited in their ability to move forward due to the current stance of society..