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A Work in Progress — Healing from All the Things​

A warmly lit room with an open closet, hanging clothes, photographs, books, keepsakes, boxes, and a ceramic mug surrounding a scattered pile of personal belongings. The image includes the quote, "Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know," by Pema Chödrön.

Making Sense of Life Through Patterns

August 5, 2026

With all of the therapy, writing, reading, reflection, and somatic work, a lot is coming up for me. Memories. Patterns. Correlations that I had not previously made. I am finding that this process is much less like the discovery of something new and much more like noticing something that has been there all along. I would describe it as so much stuff from the past lying in a tangled heap on a closet floor, too overwhelming to tackle or ignore. Slowly, I am making order of it, identifying items and events, and putting them in their places. The tangled mess shrinks, and the grip of it all is loosening. I am also discovering that memory is a strange thing. I don’t trust every detail, every conversation, or every interpretation. But I do trust patterns, especially those that repeat themselves in what seems like perpetuity. I am trying very hard to engage this with humility, admitting my blind spots. I recognize that other people have had different experiences and interpretations. I can’t know intent or motivation, but only I can name the impact they have had on me.

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Black-and-white illustration of a smiling priest holding someone underwater during a baptism. A crowd admires him while a concerned girl notices the harm.

Perception vs. Reality

August 5, 2026

There is a scene in Boardwalk Empire in which a priest is standing in a river performing a baptism. He is wearing white robes. He is smiling. He occupies a position of moral authority. He presents as a good man offering salvation. The priest is holding the man beneath the water, while keeping a calmly arranged placid smile on his face, his confidence in plausible deniability. Here is a man cloaked in goodness, purity, and authority, protected by the very role that allows him to publicly and confidently carry out something profoundly sinister. People see the robes, the smile, the holy father offering salvation. His authority goes unchecked because the story has already been written. The role itself pre-decides what is possible to notice. In that way, the people witnessing from the shore become part of the story as well. The disturbance is not confined to the harm itself. It is also the protection, restoration, accommodation, and assumption of goodness that surround it. It is the way the narratives that shape our understanding pre-decide what is possible to notice.

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A warmly lit room with an open closet, hanging clothes, photographs, books, keepsakes, boxes, and a ceramic mug surrounding a scattered pile of personal belongings. The image includes the quote, "Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know," by Pema Chödrön.

Making Sense of Life Through Patterns

August 5, 2026

With all of the therapy, writing, reading, reflection, and somatic work, a lot is coming up for me. Memories. Patterns. Correlations that I had not previously made. I am finding that this process is much less like the discovery of something new and much more like noticing something that has been there all along. I would describe it as so much stuff from the past lying in a tangled heap on a closet floor, too overwhelming to tackle or ignore. Slowly, I am making order of it, identifying items and events, and putting them in their places. The tangled mess shrinks, and the grip of it all is loosening. I am also discovering that memory is a strange thing. I don’t trust every detail, every conversation, or every interpretation. But I do trust patterns, especially those that repeat themselves in what seems like perpetuity. I am trying very hard to engage this with humility, admitting my blind spots. I recognize that other people have had different experiences and interpretations. I can’t know intent or motivation, but only I can name the impact they have had on me.

Read More
Black-and-white illustration of a smiling priest holding someone underwater during a baptism. A crowd admires him while a concerned girl notices the harm.

Perception vs. Reality

August 5, 2026

There is a scene in Boardwalk Empire in which a priest is standing in a river performing a baptism. He is wearing white robes. He is smiling. He occupies a position of moral authority. He presents as a good man offering salvation. The priest is holding the man beneath the water, while keeping a calmly arranged placid smile on his face, his confidence in plausible deniability. Here is a man cloaked in goodness, purity, and authority, protected by the very role that allows him to publicly and confidently carry out something profoundly sinister. People see the robes, the smile, the holy father offering salvation. His authority goes unchecked because the story has already been written. The role itself pre-decides what is possible to notice. In that way, the people witnessing from the shore become part of the story as well. The disturbance is not confined to the harm itself. It is also the protection, restoration, accommodation, and assumption of goodness that surround it. It is the way the narratives that shape our understanding pre-decide what is possible to notice.

Read More