In Honor of My Dad's Birthday, I Googled to See If He's Dead Also: How do people sleep at night?

A look at parental estrangement and waiting up for your kids when they’re out late.

Everything Wrong With the Job Hunt Process There's got to be a better way.

This one probably isn't going to land me a job, but honestly, this process sucks.

An Update From Last Week On moving forward in spite of it all.

I was having a really rough time of things last week. I took some steps to try to right the ship. Here’s what helped.

Tomorrow Is Another Day On emotional breakdowns and magical haircuts, needing an agent and needing a job.

When everything feels like too much and you’re not sure what you need to change but it’s definitely something, you get a haircut and hope maybe things will be better tomorrow.

I’m also throwing my needs out into the universe in the hopes that the right person sees and it propels where I need to go.

Short and Sweet Because I'm short on time.

Short and Sweet Super short post with a couple random updates because I’m short on time this week. Plus there’s a cute picture of my favorite stray cat ever.

Some Dates Loom My mom died fifteen years ago today.

My mom died 15 years ago today. I wrote this piece about her, the end of her life, and my choice (not that it really was one) to remove life support.

Too much chatter in your brain because there's too much to do and too much to think about? Try relaxing and slowing down. I know it sounds counterintuitive. But I have it on good authority that it works.

open.substack.com/pub/themiche...

Someday I'll Look Back and Laugh Or not. I don't actually know.

When you don’t know what you don’t know, sometimes hope is your best friend.

Guilt and Shame And the random video that reminded me of Snackwell cookies and Diet Sprite.

This week, I’m writing about guilt and shame, how the origin of them matters, and why maybe you should let them go.

Does Your Face Hurt? Because it's killing me! (jk. It's my face that's killing me.)

You know what's not fun? Parotid duct obstruction. At least I avoided the emergency room.

Sorry I didn't see this until just now! 🤦 Having good friends truly makes all the difference!

I Crowdsourced This Post I get by with a little help from my friends.

I couldn’t think of anything to write for yesterday’s post, and I was having a tough couple days in general. I talked with some friends and ended up getting help with both my problems.

open.substack.com/pub/themiche...

The Office Makeover Weekend It's not just about cleaning a room.

Being stuck sucks. Getting unstuck is hard. For me, the state of my office was getting in the way of me getting stuff done, so I decided to take action.

Maybe my success will inspire you. Plus I’ve included some tips I think are important to hitting goals.

A Solid Suggestion for Reducing Worry Sometimes you read the right thing at the right time.

A little story about what worrying looks like for me and where it comes from, plus a tip I read about how to manage it.

open.substack.com/pub/themiche...

I love that you did that for yourself! It feels so hard to shed off a piece of identity that no longer suits us, but I’m realizing how necessary it is!

Because I Don't Want To Isn't that all the reason I need?

I’ve been thinking a lot about doing less.

“Most of my life, I’ve been someone who does things because she has to. And it’s only lately that I’ve realized how often I actually do not have to.
And if I don’t have to or want to, why should I?”

themichellelongo.substack.com/p/because-i-...

Betting on Myself Why would I do anything else?

Betting on Myself Not trying won’t save me from heartache, so I might as well keep putting myself out there.

ha! Very, very fair.

Finding Compassion for My Inner Child How martial arts, a friend, and Facebook helped me have a breakthrough.

Asking for help when I was a kid didn’t usually result in me getting help. I often ended up feeling guilty I couldn’t manage everything on my own. After needing help last week and getting it, I’m looking at things in a new way.

The Current State of Affairs Managing anxiety in times of uncertainty.

Anxiety? PTSD? Yeah, me too. This week, I'm reminding myself (and you, if you need it) that we can recover and move forward.

It IS way too much! Good luck to you.

Reinvention A little bit about what's new.

In this week's newsletter, I shared a bit about my next adventure. Read all about it here.
themichellelongo.substack.com/p/reinvention

This is my first real work day of the new year, and my focus is on sticking to my timeblock schedule. This is my designated social media time, which feels weird to even have. But here we are. What's your focus this week?

I'm Tired of Being Responsible So I'm flipping the script on what that means.

A little bit of my responsibility origin story and a little bit of personal growth. My latest post:

How Are You Supposed to Feel on Your Dead Mother's Birthday? I don't know, but I can tell you how I felt on mine.

What's a good topic for my first actual post? I know! My dead mom and an unfortunately cropped photo!

This is a tough one, folks, but I know you've got this. It's just ONE thing. And it's already in your mind - you don't have to choose, just the one that burns you up when you think of it. Just that one, or one step toward it.

For the full mission write-up: medium.com/@fendruadin/...