Clarity, Hope, and Luck Blog

This was the scene from my home office just now.

I noticed this squirrel gnawing away at a black walnut from the tree in my backyard. The squirrel was focused, furiously chewing through the tough, green rind. Just as it seemed close to its reward, the squirrel froze, its sharp little eyes darting around. I followed its gaze and saw a second squirrel darting into the yard, sniffing curiously.

Without hesitation, the first squirrel grabbed its walnut, scurried over to a pile of leaves, and frantically buried it, hiding it under layers of old, crunchy leaves. (Don't judge, I'm planning to use them as mulch.) Satisfied with its camouflage, it turned and confronted the intruder.

But the encounter took an unexpected turn. Rather than making a beeline to challenge or steal the nut, the second squirrel glanced casually at the pile of leaves and, seeming unfazed, wandered off. Not two seconds later, it found its own black walnut lying nearby and scampered off to enjoy it. It had no need to take what wasn’t its own; there was plenty to go around.

Watching this, I was struck by how easily this “squirreling away” scene challenged the very stereotype we impose on squirrels—and ourselves. We often see squirrels as symbols of scarcity, forever gathering and hiding as if everything is in limited supply. Yet, here was a moment of pure abundance: a yard full of walnuts, enough for every squirrel who happened by, at least until I clean up my yard, but I digress...

If squirrels can break free from the scarcity-driven instinct to hoard, then definitely humans can, too. Often, we cling to the idea that if we don’t grab or guard everything within reach, there won’t be enough. We might hoard our time, ideas, or resources, driven by a deep-seated fear of losing out and getting beaten.

But if we shift from this mindset and open ourselves to the idea that opportunities, resources, and joy are abundant, we could live amongst our fellow humans more easily. When we look around and realize there are enough “black walnuts” for everyone, we might find that abundance simply walks into our lives when we’re open to it.

If you've made it this far, congratulations. I wanted to share something that gave me hope today.

Friendly reminder to those managing their websites and webpages and frolicking through the www fields. You may experience roadblocks, warnings, or other nudges by browsers or web CMS platforms that discourage the use of http, in favor of https. For reference, read the Chromium Blog on Toward HTTPS by default. 

I’ve recently noticed that web CMS platforms, such as Tumblr and Hubspot, actively provide warnings or more extreme measures of controls if you have any references of http in your site code. Keep this in mind, especially if you are using old themes and templates that need updating. This also goes for referencing or linking to old content that may still have a hard coded link to an http page or other web source.

I’m sharing some real-life examples that I’ve recently uncovered in my day-to-day. 

• I was making long overdue edits to my Kicking Down Doors band website, hosted on Tumblr with an old theme from 2013 or so, and was not able to save any of my new changes without removing all links to http sources. 
• On my Hubspot-hosted website, I pasted some referenced copy that contained links to http pages and was surprised (to put it mildly) when my site returned a 404 error that I had to troubleshoot very quickly while having heart palpitations. 

I hope this is helpful!

Are we ready to seriously admit to ourselves how seriously social media is affecting our health? When I saw this article from The Verge this morning in my Flipboard app, I went through a rapid succession of thoughts: denial, acceptance, then I yelled "FINALLY, LET'S ADDRESS THE MADNESS IN THE METAVERSE!" And then I recorded a video for my LinkedIn post. And then I announced my new consulting practice and why this topic is one of the reasons I'm doing this work.

Because I know what it feels like to lie awake in bed at night, dreading what I'll read when I open my Facebook app. I've felt the stomach pains when reading negative comments on Instagram. I've felt the panic of having to hit "Post" on a controversial statement. I've felt the hopelessness of watching people react to misinformation and disinformation.

I've actually held my phone, trembling while refreshing a post, wondering how much engagement it will receive and how many people will need to be blocked/reported and whether that will cause more negative comments that will need to be managed.

Anyway, I'm in favor of a shift in mindset and frank discussion of how we support folks who are affected by their social networks, EVERY SINGLE DAY. I'd be happy to discuss it with you, too.

Exploring the process of testing a blog with a curious mindset after a sleepless night.

The Impact of Sleep Deprivation on Blog Testing

Sleep deprivation can have a significant impact on various aspects of our lives, including the testing of a blog. Testing a blog requires attention to detail and the ability to identify any issues or bugs that may affect its functionality. However, when we are sleep-deprived, our attention span decreases, and our ability to concentrate on complex tasks is compromised. This is why I enlisted the help of AI to create this test post.