🏕 a love letter to camp cooking

feeding our souls just as much as our bodies

Howdy folks,

Hope you’re enjoying the start to your summer. This is a quick one about something I love dearly, and serves as a broader reminder I believe we can all benefit from. Let’s dive in.

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I’m lucky to have two camping trips under my belt so far this season — one with my little girls and one with a couple close friends. Each trip was more uplifting than anticipated. Man is it great to be outside.

One part of camping I’ve learned to love more and more is the preparation. It’s quite rewarding to have your storage system dialed in, your checklists in order, and an optimized packing strategy that allows you to bring along those delightful perishables you wouldn’t have thought possible.

While I was sitting around the campfire with friends, we opened up a cookbook I brought along, The Pendleton Field Guide to Campfire Cooking.

We were so blown away with how well the foreword captured the experience we were literally having in that moment, we passed it around for all to read.

I’ve been thinking of that piece since I returned and I wanted to share a part of that. Here it is… (bold emphasis mine):

The best thing about campfire cooking is the connections we make. Gather around a fire with friends and family, set in nature’s landscapes, we tap into the great outdoors with all five senses. These opportunities remind us to be present and appreciate the land for all it offers.

Presence is a lifelong study with many teachers, made evident by breathtaking scenery, fresh air, clear water, and a wild abundance of flora and fauna. Camping is an exercise in finding balance. These connections to our world and our campmates offer us a break from everyday stressors and annoyances, bringing us back into the moment and offering peace in our existence without all the extra stuff. Connecting with presence out there — soaking up the visuals, the scents, the sounds — helps us find peace when we’re not out there.

For us, presence is both the process and the goal of camping: It is almost impossible to camp without some constant acknowledgement of the moment. From the detailed preparation of the trip to setting up camp just right to planning and preparing meals, the rituals and rhythms of camping connect us to the present, giving us ample opportunities to create the moments we take with us as memories when we pack out again.

Camping is elemental, peeling away the layers of modern living to help us enjoy the simplest of practices for exactly what they are. In it, we exercise our need for freedom, taking ourselves outside of cities, schedules, and screens. Out there, the only real schedule we’re bound to is the sun’s path across the sky. Our to-do lists contain only camp chores, recreation, leisure, meals, and snacks. With little pressure to do anything other than be present, we’re able to sit around the campfire — wrapped in warm wool blankets — mesmerized by a chorus of smoke, crackles, and sparks. We keenly equip ourselves with necessities and practical comforts, balancing our wants and needs within our cargo space. We make any campsite our home for the time being. We sleep deeply and rise early. We run, play, hike, swim, labor, and rest. And, boy, do we eat. We cook as much to entertain ourselves as to fill our bellies and warm our hearts.

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I think this describes perfectly what many of us so badly need in today’s overly connected and thus deeply disconnected world. To slow down and experience the depth and breadth of each moment, every moment all around us, outside of heads.

I know camping isn’t for everyone (Yet, i’d argue. You just need the right crew and setting), but I hope you enjoy yourself outdoors this summer—around a fire, with friends and family, or in solitude—and experience each of those five senses as profoundly as you are capable.

Here are a few highlights from the trip (and no, sorry, I won’t tell where it is 🤐)

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I didn’t capture a pic, but another big time highlight was definitely a peach cobbler in the dutch oven inspired by Old Time Hawkey’s peach crisp. Topped with hand shaken mason jar whipped cream, walnuts and maple syrup, was a real treat.

What are some of your favorite outdoor meals? Where you heading this season?

Cheers to a great summer y’all!

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scratching my niches: #12

Spring cleaning your goals

Hello friends, what a Good Friday! I hope you are well, really I do.

We are now 3 months into 2024. That New Year buzz is fading and all the new life of spring is popping. 

But how are those goals, resolutions, habits, or intentions coming along? Have they been replaced by what’s more important? Or are they staring you in the face asking “when are you gonna get moving on this?”

However you keep track of what you’re after each year, I think a little periodic reflection and recalibration can always do some good, and today I’m going through a piece of that process for me.

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☝️ Quick Announcements 📢

I was recently invited to be a guest on the Parenting with Impact podcast and had a great time talking about learning styles and embracing movement.

Diane and Elaine are extremely knowledgeable in the world of neurodiversity and very passionate about what they do — their podcast has been a tremendous resource as both a parent and a coach, so it was a real honor to be a guest.

Have a listen via you preferred podcast links → Spotify | Apple | all other podcast players

If you’re interested in learning strategies for raising confident, independent kids, and how you can leverage a coach approach, I’d strongly urge you to check out their work.

Ok, back to it…

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To goal or not to goal

Goals can be a polarizing topic. I’ve read countless compelling arguments over the years in support of goal setting and those that are against it, but I’m not going into all that (James Clear provides a nice in-depth take here if that interests you).

I will say that I’ve found when I write down a goal, a force is set in motion and it’s not taking up space in my head anymore. My brain and body are on to the next step — IF that next step is important. And if not, the space is freed up and I can move on.

Of course the opposite of this is true as well.

Those nagging desires to improve something, or that enlivened curiosity to explore something new (now left unattended or ignored), carry an increasingly heavy weight.

For my goal setting process, it hasn’t always been super clear and consistent, but it’s been improving each year. 

Typically I’ll start with a big list of “ideas & goals” — some vague, some more specific — and then adjust or tweak throughout January to see what’s realistic, only to get caught up in whatever is urgent by February, and then just roll with it from there.

Goals without a system to support them will likely fall apart somewhere along the way. Like those pesky ideals like “floss more” that you can’t quite make a habit just by wanting to do it more.

But it’s also quite amazing to see the things that DO get accomplished without realizing it like “experiment with extended alcohol break” or “reconnect with lacrosse teammates” — oh yeah I wrote that down…  

Spring cleaning to find the how and why

So with ‘the what’ (the goals) in place, I’m using this spring checkpoint to freshen them up a bit, to refine ‘the how’ (the system), and go deeper on ‘the why’ (what do I want to feel?). 

The point here is to question the intention behind these goals and more importantly, to believe that they support the vision of who I want to be.

Going through this process allowed me to do a couple things. 

One, I was able to simplify the goals into a few core focus areas, which serve as a reminder each day what I’m working towards. It helps keep distractions and shiny objects at bay. If they take away from the greater vision, they can safely be ignored or filed away for another time.

Synthesizing into core areas also makes it feel more manageable — it ties all habits, behaviors, and daily practices back to the core. It allows me to see what I want to work on as an ongoing process rather than an outcome. 

Here’s each core area along with some brief notes around what each means for me… 

1. Self — charge up ⚡️ to best serve others. Strive for balance between self-improvement and self-acceptance. How can I get 1% better each day and enjoy the process? 

2. Service — embrace intensity and overcome resistance to create. Focus on my craft and unique abilities to make an impact on those around me. How can my contributions improve the lives of others?

3. Exploration — create space to follow my curiosities and feel alive. What would it look like to follow the fun? How does this interest increase my capacity to serve others and my capacity for joy? 

The second thing this process allowed me to do was to see goals from a different angle than I originally intended, and more clearly define what I really want. 

Uncovering what’s underneath

First, let’s take the general “goal” be a better parent.

What about parenting do I want to improve on? What can I do more of? What can I do less of? 

I want to create lasting memories and appreciate everyday moments. I want them to feel supported and help educate them.

I want to help them develop skills for regulating emotions and managing difficult situations…

Ok. How can I do that?

I could talk to them about it, read some books with them, watch some videos, ask more questions, disseminate information and tell them what to try.

Or…

I could show them.

By gaining more control over my own reactions to frustrating situations and talking about the tools I’m using to do so, I can model a way to manage these kinds of moments.

So the real goal here that’s revealed is emotional regulation of the self, in service of their emotional growth. Reframing this way allows me to focus on where change can occur and what’s really within my control.

And tying it back to the core area helps me prioritize. I can choose to read that book about our central nervous system and continue my rabbit hole exploration into breathing techniques because they all serve the greater purpose of this core area and goal. 

But Why?

Another example of where I did some deep cleaning was around a subcategory of goals I think we can all relate to — health & wellness.

I had a ton of goals listed and knew I wouldn’t do all of them, but what became clear was there was no real benchmark for success beyond a few outcomes.

I listed out the outcome goals and worked backwards to see what I’d need to do to get there. Then looked at them from a systems perspective to see what else needs to be in place for that to happen. And lastly, I thought about some alignment questions to check in with along the way. Here’s a small piece of that:

Outcome goals

• Stay healthy, build and maintain endurance fitness on the road to completing Ironman 70.3 in June.

• Flexibility — be able to do a front split and a back bridge (meaning need to do hip opening and hamstring flexibility everyday, and backbends) 

• Create a guided Breathwork video (put learnings into practice)

• Dunk two handed (meaning need to maintain mobility and flexibility routine, AND strength training AND mix in some play/gym time)

• A stretch goal for 2nd half of year — compete as a blue belt in jiu jitsu competition (meaning stay healthy and get back to training at least two months relatively pain free)

Systems goals

• Targeting 3x per week each Swim, Bike, and Run – which means 5 days a week waking up early to complete a workout before the kids are awake, and long workouts on weekends.

• Maintain daily stretching and mobility habits — morning movement, movements snacks throughout the day, and an evening extensive wind down stretch.

  • Practice 1 of 3 stretch/mobility routines (short, medium, long) for variety and to use repeatedly, include deep lunge and backbend

• Continue breathwork every day

• Transition to a heavy focus on yoga, mobility and strength training in July, get back to jiu jitsu training by August/September

Alignment questions:

• What’s the most manageable minimum mandatory I can maintain? (say that 5 times fast)

• How can I embrace play as a mindset? (why do we give this up in young adulthood?)

• Where can I ease up and relax? 

This was helpful and I could see what I needed to do. But it was still too much to keep track of. Sure I can focus on the workouts and stretching, but to what end?

And when I’m tired or unmotivated or feel like drifting towards all the modern comforts and distractions at our fingertips, how can I remind myself why?

What do I want to feel?

I want to feel healthy and capable this year. I want to get stronger, physically and mentally, while staying open and flexible.

Ultimately, I want to feel lighter in my body and mind. 

I’m not getting any younger, so this isn’t going to come easy. But I’m playing the long game. I better get to work.

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Thanks for reading! I hope this little self exploration was interesting or insightful to you. If so, let me know what resonated. I’m still working on it. I’d love to hear what works for you!

Until next time 👋

Derek

scratching my niches: #11

let's move

Greetings friends 🪩 🥶

Final soak of the year, post Slide Mountain hike with a fellow reader. Catskills, December 2023

It’s a cool, crisp new year and I’m excited to dive in.

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Embracing and leveraging constraints is atop my list of aspirational principles to experiment with, and I’ve given myself an hour to sit down and write this (spoiler: I failed).

I’ve been working through a bigger piece that started quite small but kept evolving, and far more than an hour went into it.

At first, it was simply to reflect on these magical moments of parenthood I’ve been blessed with during this sadadical year — the laughs, the ups and downs, how much I’ve learned about myself in the process…

But it soon became necessary to describe how through this opportunity and corresponding challenge came such clarity that it was the right path. How it informed, guided and helped conceive my coaching practice (which needed a proper announcement and explanation).

To talk about that, I’d have to unpack the process of leaving behind the corporate world I was familiar with — where I had a clear and accepted identity, but a perpetual feeling of misalignment.

Oh, and I still didn’t capture the messy middle of the actual transition, this shift from a known to unknown, or even scratch the surface on the internal tension of why am I so tied to even needing an identity…

Confused yet?

All I knew for certain was that the stacks of paper and piles of notes were getting thicker and thicker.

Casual introspection and gratitude turned into pretty intense self-exploration, and I was soon revisiting (and questioning) nearly every major milestone of my life since childhood. The urge to consider all of it in order to find certainty became impossible.

As I stewed in this tension, while it felt so hard to explain, it was far easier to feel. And though I didn’t distill it down perfectly into words, I felt the realization of what might be missing.

It was something around letting go of the need to find an answer/explain, and surrendering to a belief. But what answer am I seeking? And a belief in what?

Instead of trying to figure out, I tried just to focus on that feeling and how and where it was moving through me. The idea of doing this seemed so illogical and nonsensical, the skeptic in me thought I was losing it…

“feel it? wtf do you even mean?”

“just sit down and write and be content with what comes out.”

“dude, you’re diving into the woowoo deepend.”

“stop overcomplicating it. brief story on what drove you to change, and what you’re doing now. go.”

“what are you resisting? where is the tension?”

Fast forward a few weeks, it’s the eve of my 37th birthday and I planned to spend the entire day writing — I even got a remote cabin in the woods.

The task at hand was writing my bio and story for my website, which to me felt like the static culmination of all of this tension.

Most of the morning I thought about how much I hate bios. We’re not a list of nouns or accomplishments. We are verbs, constantly evolving. How could I capture that?

The cynical side of me saw bios as simply made up stories we want others to believe are true. I couldn’t do that, it had to feel authentic, and every variation up to this point didn’t.

How can I write what feels true when I still don’t know it yet!? I was still stuck so I went for a hike.

When I got back to the cabin and cleaned up, I thought an early dinner and change of scenery would do me good. I ditched the notes, grabbed a few blank sheets of paper instead, and went to a tavern down the road.

I sat down in the corner and took in the scene around me — woodsy vibes with plenty of taxidermied animals, portraits of frontiersmen and alpinists, lively groups of friends and families, and a couple fellow lone rangers at the bar.

After I placed my order and returned the menu, I looked up to this ceramic deer gazing into my eyes.

My barside writing companion, Buford the buck 🦌

Once I stopped laughing, I snagged this pic, and grabbed my pen.

Finally, I felt the tension start moving.

“What am I selling?” was the first thing I wrote, and the rest poured out.

I won’t detail the full unraveling, but it certainly wasn’t a static, linear, singular process. Here are some bullet points:

• What I’m Selling = My Process = My Story

  • Process of development and growth

  • Recognizing strengths and weaknesses

• Having a hard time selling because….

  • I don’t fully believe in myself yet

  • BUT I believe in the process & journey

• Successful, whole-hearted, confident selling hinges upon…

  • Commitment, Trust, and Belief in SELF

  • But I am still living with the doubts

• Why the lack of trust in myself historically?

  • Starts with acceptance, but instead I’ve been trying to fix or overcome

  • Since a young age was told i’m moving too much

  • impulsive outbursts in attempt to be funny, be liked, connect

  • learned how important is was to please others and control what was “wrong with me”

  • Trying to be something else for a long time, rejecting parts that are core to who I am

  • worked hard to stay on a forward path, but with a constant questioning of everything I did

• Everything I feel I need to write is convincing myself that I’m enough

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The completed, static bio wasn’t finished that night. I didn’t need to go through each preceding step leading up to that and describe them all in detail either.

As soon as I opened that box it wasn’t just one story, but a thousand little stories that created me and there will be a thousand more as we go.

I don't need to make them all smaller and in a distinct way in order to sell you something. That's what I did for years as the masked avenger in corporate america (jk kinda).

Now I'm just committed to the evolving and unfolding and dynamic nature of it all. In myself, in my clients, everything.

Through this process I remembered I'm not a static person. I've never been static person since the day I entered this world. I've been constantly moving.

It felt like a big realization — “I want to talk about this one thing. Let me open this static box and describe it…” then boom, I’m flooded with connections. All these pieces moving around.

“If I could only contain that…”

No. If I could just let it move.

What if all the movement — that I’ve been subconsciously suppressing in so many ways — is what made me better?

I could embrace that intensity, curiosity, drive, creativity, speed, love, strength, adventure, movement… and channel it into how I live and appreciate my life.

Experience all of it, gratefully — the struggle because I choose it; the joy because I pause to feel it.

Here’s to moving from these static boxes of our bios, of who we are, or what we're creating, and into the dynamic living and evolving that is available for all of us.

It was my time with my girls, all the learnings from this great year and beyond that showed me this. Discovering there’s a lot of creative tension inside with a lot to say.

I'm excited to take you down the many different rabbit holes traveled, and I hope you’ll join me here.

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For those that don’t yet know, I’m coaching adults and teenagers with ADHD and I’ve started my own small practice, currently working with a few clients.

I’ve also joined an incredible team at Along Their Way that I’m so excited to continue to learn and grow with. They offer a wider variety of services including parent coaching, internal family systems (IFS) work, couples — if interested, check it out!

Lastly, I’m going to be opening up availability for two new coaching slots — one will be 1:1 work, and the other will be group coaching. If you know anyone that may be interested, I would love to connect! Or if you passed this along to anyone you know 🙏

Thanks so much for reading, I appreciate you! Cheers to 2024.

scratching my niches: #10

dusting off the 'ol compass

from our summer adventuring in pure michigan. seeking out the ghost town of singapore, michigan.

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Hi folks 👋

During this transitional phase I’ve been blessed with (spending time with my kids as a stay-at-home dad), I’ve been thinking a lot about values, principles, and the beliefs that have been guiding me throughout this life. 

Though my moments of contemplation – thinking, questioning, challenging – have been persistent, the time and energy to make sense of those beliefs have been in shorter supply. 

Surprisingly, learning to be OK with not DOing something, or making sense of everything, and just BEing has been one of the greatest gifts of this whole experience. 

In this space of BEing greater clarity emerged, and the impact and insights derived from these fleeting moments felt meaningful, critical to capture, and both important and urgent to act on.

The actionable emphasis in all of this for me has been a deeper dive into principles – both existing and aspirational – and recognizing the unspoken or unseen principles I may or may not align with.

Starting with a solid foundation – the basics and fundamentals – is where the majority of growth, progress, and value comes from. We all intuitively know this. Start with the fundamentals, show up consistently, the growth compounds and you build leverage. 

If I’m not starting with principles and fundamentals, I’m just hacking my way through life... and I don't want to do that. I needed to revisit why principles are important, because they guide me.

So here we are, living my 1st principle: write it down, so you don’t forget.

What are principles and what do they mean to me? 

I was reminded to “wrestle with my principles” while listening to this great podcast a few months back. It talks about how principles drive decision-making and shape our lives – whether we're aware of them or not. The hosts distinguish between principles and values and examine what gives a set of principles their clarifying power. They also talk about how they’re used personally and within a business. 

As Ray Dalio defines in his excellent book of the same name, “Principles are fundamental truths that serve as the foundations for behavior that gets you what you want out of life.”

I see them as the guiding beliefs of what’s important, the reminders to stay true to who I am and want to be. They represent a mental model for how to approach a given challenge or get back on track. And when looking back, they help me appreciate the moments of living authentically. 

And why does that matter? 

Because this helps create a more enduring benchmark for success. 

My benchmark before this sadadical was primarily influenced by the expectations of others and external validation. In short, results-oriented. And while that served me financially, with prestige and a linear career progression, it wasn’t supporting the quality and growth of my life in other important ways. 

It wasn’t allowing me to be truly present with my kids, or anyone for that matter. It was causing me to always feel busy – hundreds of open loops hanging over my head every moment that mattered far less than the present moment I was in. I felt constantly pulled away in so many directions that I wasn’t maintaining my core principles. And it wasn’t sustainable for growth – it was draining. 

I was playing someone else’s game, not one I felt I could win or enjoy. I wanted to lean into my values and what piqued my interest. 

This new benchmark for success, literally being defined now, is measured by impact and value, quality of attention, and interest and energy. In short, presence and process-oriented. 

The desire for presence or mindfulness comes naturally to me, but to be honest, my ADHD makes actually BEing mindful an especially challenging task. I believe this is where my devotion to principles comes from, working so hard to be intentional and focused because I need it. Without the reminders, I’ll inevitably gravitate towards the urgent or novel.

Here are some of the principles I’m currently using:

• Write it down, so we won’t forget (explored here)

• How you do anything is how you do everything (more background here)

• Embrace intensity & resistance

• Movement is medicine 

• Live the questions / embrace uncertainty (started exploring here)

Here are a few areas for growth, or the aspirational principles I’m working to incorporate:

• Constraints breed creativity (combat perfectionism)

• Breathing is the essence of all life (breathwork practices and reset protocols)

• Consistency > Quantity (commitment to practice, progress, experimentation)

Ultimately, principles have helped me focus on the pursuit of happiness and contentment vs. focusing on outcomes and external validation.

This is a work in progress, always. But living the questions and unknowns, and embracing the resistance that comes up are all part of the game I want to play. So I’m recalibrating this anchor and compass to navigate not just this transitional voyage but the rest of my life. 

And as a parent, I think the best tool/skill we all hope to model and give our kids is their own internal compass to navigate both the world and themselves. 

~ ~ ~

That’s all folks. Thanks for dusting off your compasses with me. Maybe I’ll do a deeper dive on some of these in the future. So if that’s interesting to you, let me know. 

Have you thought about how principles play a role in your life?

What’s worked well for you?

What are some of your principles? 

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If you’re interested in diving deeper, the links mentioned above along with a couple others here… 

• Art of Accomplishment podcast episode

  • It’s less about having the principles and more about the process… “Process of learning, not a process of knowing”

• Principles by Ray Dalio 

  • “Pain + Reflection = Progress”

• The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson

  • So many nuggets craftily curated, distilling a ton of ideas down to practical advice and principles for happiness, wealth creation, decision-making, and personal growth. 

• VIA Character Strengths Survey

  • Interested in diving into values but don’t know where to begin? Character strengths are a great starting point. This free resource only takes about 15 minutes and there’s a ton of support content to interpret your results. This is also a core foundation of my coaching practice. 

scratching my niches #9

Why I left Accenture to be a stay at home dad

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👋 Hello dear reader, 

It’s good to see you again. Here’s a brief look at what’s inside:

• What I worked on at Accenture

• Becoming too good at asking questions

• Taking the leap into a SaDADical

Let’s dive in. 

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I wrote an entire intro about backend IT infrastructure but then deleted it because I want you to actually read this piece. 

In January 2021, while the rest of the world was still spinning from COVID, I was lucky enough to land a job in the fastest growing market at that time. Every company was trying to become a digital first business, and fast. And those that needed to transform the most were, well, very slow.  

Think of the traditional behemoths like major utility companies servicing large metropolitan areas, massive industrials and commodity producers like steel manufacturers, multinational banks, telecom providers, and global CPG conglomerates with complex supply chains – they’ve been in operation for decades, have uniquely complicated and interconnected systems, but aren’t always on the cutting edge of technology. 

Hopefully I haven’t lost you.

The gist of my deleted “Cloud Computing & Global Systems Integrators 101” is I had to learn everything I could about a complex technology with a vast number of ecosystem players, partners, and competitors, and try to make sense of the enormous impact happening across every market in the world (in a short time).

And it turns out, breaking down a complex new market and discovering where to make a big impact is what made me sought after in the firm – and why I moved to four projects across three technology partners in less than two years. I didn’t need to know how to build the technology, I just needed to know what problems organizations were facing, the impact it was having, and what could potentially alleviate that pain. 

But why am I telling you all this? 

Because working at Accenture helped me understand what I’m really good at. I realized that my curiosity and ability to think outside specialized bubbles allowed me to make connections and detect patterns others may miss. 

Frankly, there are plenty of “solutions'' out there, and most roles (sales, marketing, product) in large Enterprise companies are geared toward spreading the gospel of their solution to everyone. But when you’re hammering a solution, everything you encounter looks like a nail. 

By digging deeper I developed a process for asking questions that revealed where problem areas and pain were being felt. Only then did I earn the right to offer up solutions.

Asking WHY and probing deeper with thoughtful questions to get to the root of a problem/opportunity, and only then building a compelling story that both captured attention and incited action became my core specialty.  

But why am I telling you what I’m good at? 

Because as every fairy tale goes, the hero’s secret talent is also their greatest weakness.

Turns out:

☑️ I can’t not think about big questions

☑️ I can’t not see the patterns – even when I don’t like what I’m seeing

As the novelty of a new project wore off and I ventured deeper into the work we were doing, I couldn’t ignore the recurring questions…

💭 Is the cutting-edge tech we’re rolling out en mass a net positive for the world, humanity, and even tech itself? 

💭 Is the huge impact our work is having globally a positive? What are the unintended consequences?

💭 Are these decisions being made purely from a technologist’s or economist’s POV? Or are we looking at this through a philosophical and existential lens?

💭 Are we considering the potential 2nd and 3rd order effects of these massive short term moves, or is the pull to hit individual targets or quarterly profits too strong? 

💭 What about all this concern for the environment – is it genuine when our needs for computing power and capacity are growing exponentially?

💭 Is it just me, or does it feel impossible to maintain real focus and attention when on Teams/Zoom calls back to back for 9+ hours? 

💭 Isn’t my body meant to move and not be stationary staring at a screen for 9+ hours, and then attached to a phone for notifications the rest of my waking hours?

💭 Do I have more to give the world than what I’m currently offering?  *Yes* And knowing that’s true… Is it selfish of me to keep chasing paper and not reorient my life and work?

💭 When is enough really enough?

I didn’t have an answer to any of these questions (still don’t, for most of them). But a few things I began to notice really stuck with me. 

What I noticed…

I felt demoralized. I’d be on a video call with 12 other people that were all multitasking and hardly paying attention until maybe their name was mentioned, and the whole time I’m worried my kids are going to barge into the office. I knew I wasn’t adding any value here, nor were half the others. 

I was annoyed. Mostly at myself for being annoyed at my kids – but also at parts of the work that didn’t feel necessary. I was annoyed by not living in a way that felt aligned with my values, and for not doing something about it. 

I clearly struggled building my life around work, and I know I’m not alone there. I was grateful to have a job, to be able to work from home and be around my kids, but I could see how much this misalignment was draining the little focus, attention, time, and energy I had. 

Childcare had been a pretty steady challenge since our kids were born and still was, and the pull to be more involved at home was stronger than ever.

I began to realize how much my sense of identity and meaning was tied up in work – and how this was clouding my vision to see what was right in front of me. 

Something I deeply knew clearly revealed itself: 

The only thing I ever really knew I wanted to be was a dad. 

So, in September 2022, I stepped back from work and fully into fatherhood. 

With gratitude, excitement, doubt, fear, and ultimately conviction, I chose to leave a prestigious firm with a great salary, benefits, and downtime on zoom calls for nonstop negotiations with toddlers, endless snack demands, and mommy daddy & me dance classes.

Going from structure and dependability to endless free time (that certainly isn’t free) was a terrifying collision of two worlds, but one that’s brought a lot of change and adventure. 

So what am I learning & how’s it going..? 

• It’s hard AF! Shout out to all moms (stay at home, working, and single moms) who have been primary caregivers by default for all these years. 

• I spend most of the day making meals that I’ll later beg my kids to eat, and then finish myself. 

• We all have more time than we think. This is of course easier to realize when your mind and schedule are clear of obligations or deliverables. It still takes real effort but the time is there, and it was there before, too. Once I realized this, everything became a little easier.

• Waking up early to have time to myself is absolutely critical for my mental and physical health. My energy is low at the end of the day, so I have to prioritize getting what I need early to sustain energy throughout the day. I’m able to run, stretch/yoga, practice jiu jitsu, write, and take weekly guitar lessons – all between 5-7am.

Choosing the unknown over the known is almost always the scarier choice even if it can bring about a brighter future. 

We detest the unknown while we also go out of our way to seek novelty, passion, excitement, adventure – we long for these meaning-making dopamine hits that redefine our self identity. But we fear exclusion, failure, rejection, and ultimately death. 

That tension is the source of all life and growth, and I may not be climbing Everest but it feels like a massive undertaking, this saDADical. 

An undertaking that I’m beyond grateful to embark on. Grateful for my wife and how hard she’s worked (both as a mother and an entrepreneur) so we can make this transition. Grateful for the career I’ve had and incredible people I’ve worked with up to this point. 

And grateful for the impermanence of these beautiful moments I’ll get with my kids (as I wrote about before) during their “magic years” that I can never get back. 

Certainly this was not the easy path but I am certain it’s all worth it. Most days 😉

❄️ Enjoying our only snow day of the year… on a Wednesday! Pure joy.

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Thank YOU for joining me on this journey!

I hope you’ll keep an eye out for what else is next – more on that soon. 

And if you know someone that might enjoy this, I’d love it if you shared! 

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That’s all folks ✌️

I love you,

Derek