Category Archives: writing

NaBloPoMo 2025: Love Notes For November

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“If it’s safe, tell people you love them… Even if it’s not safe, do it anyway.
Because what is love if not brave? onward! :)” cc, 5-21-2025

OH, I love how ideas emerge, evolve and execute!

After my tenth year doing the 30 day, daily blogging challenge that was National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) last year, I thought I might stop. Ten is a nice, round number, a milestone achieved, a good ending. But then I had a light bulb moment.

I’ve written jar smiles, we could call them Chenger Cheers, most days for about 18 months now. There are now 29 jars out in the world, across the United States and one overseas. Some have been refilled multiple times. Every note is hand written and all but a handful are my original thoughts in real time. I cannot express how fun and loving, connecting and joyful it feels to write them, and occasionally actually see them bring smiles.

Originally for this year’s daily blogging challenge, I thought I’d write for individual people I know: 30 notes, one person a day. I’d make it anonymous but identifiable, with nicknames. For instance Hubs would be The Provider. Then I thought, ‘that note could apply to any/all providers.’ Then I thought, ‘I could write a note for any role. The friend. The parent. The advocate.’

30 roles or identities. Love for each.

I could invite readers to try on each identity, see how it fits. Can you relate? Step out of your own perspective and receive others?

I could include identities that I myself would not readily claim, like anti-abortion advocate! How could I see opposition as an identity to love? How would I love it? How do I love it already? Love THEM? Hmmmm…. This thought progression occurred all in the space of a few minutes, and I saved these notes as a draft earlier this month.

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Then it all evolved further yesterday, as I bounced Book ideas around with loving friends. What if I wrote ten notes a day, each around a certain theme, like courage, fun, fear, leadership, and laundry? What if they could be printed into a little booklet with an index at the front, so someone could turn to the page for the love they seek for that reason, that day/hour/moment? What if each note were perforated, meant to be torn out and shared, fortune cookie style? What if a carbon copy of each note remained in the book, with space underneath to record the date, the recipient, and additional love notations by the giver? 300 love notes, pocketbook style, that could be carried around at all times, ready to drop a little love on any unsuspecting human who could use a smile. If I could manage to write twelve decent ones each day in November, that’d make 360, almost one for each day of a year. Then I could just add five special, maybe surprise ones, to round out 365.

Twelve love notes a day, each day a different theme. I feel butterflies of challenge and anticipation in my belly already. This could be fun. Let’s see how it goes, yes?

Please feel free to request a theme, dear readers! I’m open to almost anything, I think, and of course I reserve the right to decline or defer. 😉

T-minus 2 days, my friends. Let’s go.

Ten Years :)

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*sigh*

How satisfying. I achieved my goal of maintaining a blog for one year. Ten times. 🙂 Who knows how much longer this will last? Honestly everything after this is frosting… I feel truly liberated–no obligations, no restrictions, no pressure; only fun and joy.

What happens in ten years?
How do we evolve and not?
How does society turn and change, and not?

What will everything be like ten years from now?
We could erradicate cervical cancer in my lifetime with a vaccine. Wild.
Humans may soon populate another planet, or annihilate this one–or both, I suppose–maybe not in my lifetime, but in the foreseeable future.

How many years (weeks) do you estimate you have left in this mortal life?
What will you do with them?

Oh, I just realized: This blog birthday coincides with my nest emptying soon. Another liberation! A milestone, another set of occasions to celebrate. How fun and exciting!

Home late from the office today, I thought I might forgo posting here–until I realized today is the blog’s actual birthday! Ten years: Mark it! But no need to be loud about it. Work was busy and long, and in the best way, as usual. So much connection. Wow. How lucky I am. I’m excellent at what I do. It’s recognized, appreciated, and reinforced. I’m surrounded by rock stars, at work and beyond. Despite the chaos, tumult, and distress in the world, there is still so much love and warmth everywhere I look. I feel it every day, through and through; people crave it, respond to it, absorb it like the thirstiest sponges. Pretty much everything I’m doing now feels sustainable for several more years, if not another decade yet. What a calming, contented, peaceful sensation. It could all go away in a heartbeat, too; one never knows.

So I revel. Peacefully. How nice. Thank you for reading along.
Wishing peace and love to you all, this day and all days.

Healing Through Connection Turns 10 This Month

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Dear Friends,

Oh my goodness. It’s been a decade. Holy cow. I’m in the feels, people.

I published the very first post here on April 14, 2015, The Premise. Reading it again now (I can’t remember the last time I read it), I’m proud that I can still stand firmly and proudly behind every sentence. At that time, I had only begun to speak nationally on physician burnout and well-being, culminating in multiple memorable and rewarding collaborations until right before the pandemic. That work carries on now without my direct participation, still championed by colleagues whom I admire more than words can express. My own work in wellness has since touched other professions including design, law, and state and federal judiciaries. How humbling to be invited into these spaces; what a privilege. Every opportunity teaches me, broadens my perspective, and reinforces my Premise:

“Patients and physicians have control over one thing above all else: our relationship with each other.  Relationships live and die by communication.  Barriers on the obstacle course of patient-physician communication loom large and formidable. Our system fails us over and again. And it falls to each of us, not the system, to find our way to connection and healing relationships.”

I thought our healthcare system was broken a decade ago; and here we are, worse off still in too many ways to count. Now more than ever, it is our relationships that will save us. It’s another paradox, connection: So important and fundamental, such a necessity, and also kind of mundane. It can happen in the smallest of moments–a glance, a fleeting facial expression, a passing vibe, a shared language–which can be lifesaving and also taken for granted. It can also require collossal effort–tremendous self-restraint, courage, and tenacity–to achieve it across deep and complex conflict and separation. I submit that both/all forms of connection are equally valuable and necessary for us humans to thrive. The longer I live, learn, practice, and write, the more I believe this to my bones.

It did not occur to me until today to do something big and special for my 10th blog birthday. Honestly I had thought of sunsetting the whole thing before the renewal date rolled around last month. But since I had not made any plans or decisions, I paid the fee and here we are.

So let’s have some fun this month, eh?

I think I’ll try to post daily. Nothing too labor intensive, no obligations, no rules. It’s my birthday party and I’ll write if I want to. I have 100 drafts waiting to expand and engage, four occurring just in the space of this morning’s commute.

It really is all about Connection: This blog, medicine, health, wellness, relationships, life.

How ironic: The world feels more divided and polarized, separated and divergent now than I can remember in my lifetime. And yet in my life personally, I feel more connected to people everywhere now than ever. What is that about? How fascinating and wonderful! Let me attempt to explore it and share in the next 28 days, yes?

Healing Through Connection. Connecting in all possible ways, for the good of us all. It’s what we live for, I’m convinced. So let’s dive in, celebrate, and see what emerges! Oh, this could be fun. See you tomorrow!

Love,
Cathy