the report | vol. 32
journal entry— 6.30.2026
I arrived at 2:00 PM on a Tuesday. The parking lot was a zoo. Bursting at the seams with people clamoring around in their best “outdoorsy” cosplay—or in jeans—talking loudly, iPhone speakers blasting tinny rap, children arguing with their parents:
You said this wasn’t a hike!
A quarter mile doesn’t count as a hike.
They are all hobbling up to the viewpoint to take a picture of the waterfall to post on Facebook as proof of what a good time they had in Oregon, as proof of how much they just loooove nature. Then, they will hobble back to their cars to fulfill their lunch plans.
I am only a mile down the trail, maybe less, before I see my last person for a while. It’s not a hard trail, but most people only come out here to see the big, impressive thing. The thousands of gallons of water crashing over a cliff. They want to get their picture and leave. They merely want to say they were here.
Like so many other things, people just want the big, obvious, flashy thing. They never go deeper.
Not even that much further away from viewpont, away from the parking lot zoo, a world appears. Vibrant textures and colors—water sparkling in the sun, tiny pocket meadows of wild flowers, entire universes on tree trunks. But these worlds are only revealed for those who can withstand the silence. In this silence, I find not only tiny universes, but little fragments of myself.
Most people are afraid of what will come up when they let the quiet in. They’re so addicted to the noise and distraction that silence and solitude are painful. They’re too wrapped up in what’s happening on the surface to go deeper. To feel what’s underneath. So most people live surface lives. And they mindlessly move about the surface world, wrapped up in their own neurosis, wondering why existence feels dull and disconnected, wondering why they’re so stressed, blaming it on everyone and everything they can.
We avoid going deeper into the wilderness because we fear the unknown. We avoid going deeper into ourselves because we fear the unknown. We’re afraid of what we’ll find—of what we won’t find. We keep treading water at the surface, afraid to sink. But when we stop kicking, become still, and let the sediment settle, we get clarity.
and then a page-long rant about the people who came and sat 10 feet away from me on my rock in the river in the middle of the forest with so many other places to be and wouldn’t stop talking and I’m aware of the many layers of irony that’s cloaked in… on to the report…
reading —
Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake | A really interesting book about fungi and the role they play in… pretty much everything. I learned something new and interesting on every page.
Lifeform by Jenny Slate | How dare I forget that Jenny Slate is one of the funniest, most earnest, brilliant comedic minds of our time. This book is quite a ride—I’m sure it’s a good read, but the audiobook is literal performance art.
eating —
Snap pea salad | It’s farmers market season, which means I just grab whatever looks good and figure it out later. In this case, with snap peas, I’ve been making an iteration of this salad (but I add cucumber to it), along with honey miso salmon and kimchi, and I’ll be eating it on repeat until snap pea season is done
Hibiscus cherry lemonade | I made this recipe from Olivia Noceda for a gathering and really loved it! Definitely recommend topping it with some sparkling water. I also added a little ACV to what I had left over the next day, and that was also lovely!
playing —
The Drama | Somehow I avoided spoilers for months—it pays to not be chronically online, I guess! I know when it came out, there was a bit of discourse around it—many didn’t like it—but I actually really liked it. Even got a little teary-eyed at the end.
House of the Dragon | I’m obsessed with anything in the Game of Thrones universe. Sue me.
The Bear | Ok, I think most of us can agree that this show can never live up to the first season, but I still love it for 3 reasons: 1) it makes me feel all nostalgic and romantic about the service industry, and I think it does a good job of depicting what its actually like (minus the leaving in the middle of an overbooked service to have a heart to heart—that would never happen), 2) I find the pace and style of story telling compelling, and 3) the acting. From literally everyone.
obsessing over —
Bryan Johnson’s got an autoimmune disorder | Ok, putting this in the “obsessing over” category feels a little insane and tacky, but it’s not in the way that you think, just… let me explain. Last week, Bryan Johnson, the entrepreneur and venture capitalist who spends a reported $2 million a year on optimizing his health, who has 30 doctors, tracks everything, and whose IG bio reads “we may be the first generation who won’t die”, came out and announced that he has autoimmune gastritis.
FIRST LET ME SAY — I don’t know Bryan, but he is a complex person like the rest of us. This revelation doesn’t please me, and I wish him no ill will. I think his treating himself like a human guinea pig is a net positive for humanity as a whole, and his willingness to share this probably took a lot of guts. I am NOT obsessing over the fact that he has an autoimmune disorder.
What I am obsessed with are the conversations coming out of this revelation. While I don’t think it’s entirely fair to say, which a lot of people are, that if he weren’t vegan, didn’t pound 100 pills a day, and didn’t avoid that sun, this wouldn’t have happened—we don’t, and can’t know that (although I personally don’t agree with those things). But the resulting discourse that you can spend and hack and optimize and do everything “perfect”, and still get sick that’s happening in certain corners of the internet is illuminating. It’s really shining a spotlight on what it means to live a life well lived, and about the realities of what being “well” actually entails, which is kinda my whole thing.
My prediction is that this is going to usher in a new wave of looking at the deeper nature of how stress, perfectionism, and suppressed emotions impact health.
recommending —
Sinus support | It’s grass season here in Oregon, and everyone’s allergies are going insane, which means I’ve been proselytizing the Sinus Support pills from Beekeepers Naturals. I take one daily to help combat nightly histamine increases, and two when airborne pollen is bad. I gave one to a coworker who hates taking pills of any kind, but was suffering so badly she acquiesced, and she was shocked by how well it worked.
TBM | Every summer for the past two years, I’ve done the To Be Magnetic manifestation program. I know many will bristle at this, but I’ve found that it works—if not for manifesting, then for helping me cut through noise and grounding me in my authenticity, especially in times of transition. Every time I do it, I feel like another layer gets peeled back. So, I’m going in again. If it’s at all compelling to you, I encourage you to give it a shot!
trying —
Acupuncture | I’ve had acupuncture once before, and I hated it. But I felt the pull to try again, mostly because I read that it can be effective for histamine intolerance, so I decided to give it another shot, and I LOVED it. It was a totally different experience from the first time I tried it. I can’t wait to see what happens by going regularly.
I was actually dying to hear your thoughts on Bryan Johnson… this quote from Jung came to mind
“We should not try to ‘get rid’ of a neurosis, but rather to experience what it means, what it has to teach, what its purpose is. We should even learn to be thankful for it, otherwise we pass it by and miss the opportunity of getting to know ourselves as we really are. A neurosis is truly removed only when it has removed the false attitude of the ego. We do not cure it—it cures us. A man is ill, but the illness is nature’s attempt to heal him. From the illness itself we can learn so much for our recovery, and what the neurotic flings away as absolutely worthless contains the true gold we should never have found elsewhere.”
With the obsession over health as a neurosis will illness actually heal this man? And the culture of wellness?
And ofc Rumi “the wound is the place where the light enters you”
I’m so interested to see where he goes after this point.
TBM girlie 🙋♀️🙋♀️ are you doing the be seen challenge??!