The road opens up somewhere between Santa Fe and El Paso.
It always does.
Not all at once.
Not like a switch.
Just enough space between cars.
Enough distance between towns.
Enough quiet that the noise you’ve been carrying finally starts to loosen its grip.
Mid-afternoon slipping toward evening.
That stretch where the sun isn’t harsh anymore, just leaning.
Clouds hanging low over the mountains in the distance, like they’re deciding whether to stay or move on.
The hum of the road is steady.
Wind cuts around the car, not loud, just present.
The engine settles into that rhythm where it feels like it could go forever.
Out here, I drive a little faster.
Not reckless.
Not careless.
Just… free.
There’s something about open space that does that.
Pulls something out of you.
Or maybe it gives something back.
I had an audiobook on.
Good one.
The kind where you don’t notice the time passing.
The kind where the characters start to feel like people you know.
I wasn’t just listening to it.
I was inside it.
And somewhere in the middle of that… it hit.
Not loud.
Not dramatic.
Just a quiet shift.
A thought that didn’t ask permission.
Man… I miss this.
I turned the volume down.
Not off. Just low enough that it faded into the background.
And I kept driving.
The road stayed the same.
The mountains didn’t move.
But my attention did.
Because that thought didn’t leave.
It just sat there.
I’ve been writing.
Just not like that.
Not in the way that pulls you under.
Not in the way where you lose track of time and forget everything else exists.
I’ve been editing.
Reading deeper than I ever have.
Thinking about structure.
Helping other people find their voice.
I’ve been creating.
Just not in a way that feels like… creation.
More like movement.
More like output.
More like something slightly off rhythm.
A little clunky.
And it should be.
Because I don’t have a rhythm right now.
So I kept driving.
Letting the thought stay.
Didn’t push it away.
Didn’t try to solve it.
Just let it sit there long enough to ask the next question.
Why do you feel that way?
That’s when everything else started showing up.
Not all at once.
Just pieces.
A weekend.
A field.
A dugout.
Kids who finally started to believe.
We had a good week.
Not perfect.
But something shifted.
Eight out of twelve kids new to the team this year.
Months of practice that didn’t always look like progress.
Games where it felt like nothing was clicking.
And then…
It did.
Not because of one big moment.
Because of repetition.
Because of small things finally stacking.
Because they trusted something they couldn’t fully see yet.
And I’ve said that to them.
Over and over.
Trust the process.
Have a vision.
Stay consistent.
Simple.
Easy to say.
But sitting there, driving, letting that thought hang in the air…
I had to ask myself something I didn’t really want to answer.
Are you doing that for yourself?
Because the truth is…
I say I want to write more.
I say I miss it.
I say I want to get back to it.
But I haven’t built a life that allows it.
And I’m not saying that with guilt. I’m saying it with clarity, because there’s a difference between being stuck and being allocated, and I think that’s where most of us blur the line when we’re being honest with ourselves. My days aren’t empty. They’re full. Full in ways I chose, full in ways I’m proud of, even if those choices have come with tradeoffs I didn’t fully understand at the time. Eleven stores across four cities. Two other companies. Publishing. Editing. Coaching kids. Helping parents. Building leaders. Trying to be present in moments that used to pass me by. Trying to be better in ways that don’t show up on a page. And somewhere in the middle of all of that, there’s this quiet thought that keeps returning—this idea of going back to school, becoming a therapist, stepping into another space that has always called to me in a way I can’t fully explain. So when I catch myself saying I haven’t had time to write, I have to stop and correct it. That’s not true. I haven’t made time. And that’s different. That difference matters, because one sounds like something that happened to me, and the other is something I chose.
There’s a moment that keeps coming back to me, and it’s simple. On the field. A kid struggling. Frustrated in that way where you can see it before he says it. He tells me he can’t figure it out, that he’s stuck, and I ask him the same question I’ve asked a hundred times before, the same question I know the answer to before it’s spoken. Did you do the five things we talked about? The small ones. The boring ones. The ones that don’t feel important until they are. He doesn’t answer. Just looks down. And I’m not mad. I’m not surprised either, because I’ve seen it before, and if I’m being honest, I’ve done it before. And somewhere between that field and that drive, somewhere between watching that moment and sitting with my own thoughts, it connected in a way that didn’t need explanation. I’m sitting there, frustrated that I’m not writing the way I want to, and I have to ask myself the same question. Did you do the work? Did you build the structure? Did you protect the time? The answer is no. And once you say that out loud, the frustration changes shape. It doesn’t disappear, but it becomes something else. Something more honest. Because then you have to ask the question that sits underneath it all—what exactly are you frustrated about?
That’s the part we don’t like to say out loud. Not in writing. Not in business. Not in life. We want the result to still be available, even when the structure isn’t. We want the feeling to show up without the foundation that once held it. And sometimes it does, for a while. There was a time where I wrote like that. Constantly. Obsessively. A million words in a year. Fourteen manuscripts. Requiem in nine days. It didn’t feel like discipline. It felt like something had taken over, like I had tapped into something that didn’t require permission or planning or balance. It was just there, and I followed it. And if I’m honest, it came at a cost. There were moments I missed, things I pushed aside, time I didn’t get back. Not out of neglect, but out of focus. Out of obsession. And at the time, I was okay with it. I didn’t question it, because it felt like progress, and in many ways, it was.
Now I see it differently. Not with regret, but with awareness. Life changed. Priorities shifted. Perspective grew in ways that only time allows, and somewhere along the way, that version of writing didn’t fit the life I was building anymore. So the question isn’t why I’m not writing like that. The question is whether I need to. And if I do, what does that look like now, inside a life that’s fuller, heavier, and more intentional than it used to be. Because I can’t pretend nothing else exists, and I don’t want to. I like where I’m at. I like who I’m helping. I like what I’m building. There’s real value in this space, real meaning in the work that fills my days. But that doesn’t mean something isn’t missing. It just means I have to be honest about what it takes to bring it back.
That’s the part I think we skip. We call it writer’s block. We call it a slump. We call it being stuck. But a lot of the time, it’s none of those things. It’s a lack of alignment between what we say we want and how we’re actually living. And that’s not failure. That’s information. It’s a signal, not a sentence. Sitting there, somewhere between Santa Fe and El Paso, with the road opening up in front of me and the noise finally quiet enough to hear my own thoughts, I didn’t come to some big conclusion. There was no plan, no perfect system, no sudden clarity that fixed everything. Just a quieter realization that felt more true than anything else I had been telling myself.
If I want to get back to that level of writing, I don’t need to wait for it. I need to build for it. Slowly. Intentionally. Without pretending I’m in the same place I used to be, because I’m not. And maybe that’s the point. This isn’t about getting back to where I was. It’s about figuring out what writing looks like now, in this life, with this weight, with these responsibilities, with this version of me. That’s what this is. Not a declaration. Not a restart. A journal. A way to think through it, to deconstruct it, to be honest about it in a way that doesn’t hide behind labels or excuses.
Marcus Aurelius wrote, “You have power over your mind—not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.” And sitting there in that moment, that’s what it felt like—not strength in some loud, dramatic sense, but something quieter, more grounded. The understanding that nothing was being kept from me. Nothing was out of reach. It just wasn’t being built right now. And if I’m telling kids to trust the process, if I’m telling leaders to build structure, if I’m telling other writers to stay consistent, then I should probably start listening to myself. Not perfectly. Not all at once. Just enough to begin again. Back to the page.
You went big on me, brother. I’m fired. And excited for what’s coming from/for you.