Happy New Year!!
The other night, I typed out a response to something I disagreed with online and then sat there with it for a moment before posting. It was clear, thoughtful, and true. I could feel exactly where it came from and after sitting with it, I deleted it.
What I noticed wasn’t relief or restraint, but familiarity. I’ve been here before. The pull to explain. The sense that if I just say it the right way, it might land. Over time, I’ve learned to pay attention to how those exchanges stay with me afterward, to the subtle shift that happens when I leave myself to stand inside a conversation that was never really asking for clarity in the first place.
There was a time when I stayed longer in those spaces, offering context, trusting that care would be met with care. Sometimes it was. Other times, I could feel myself walking away a little thinner than I arrived, like I had spent something internal that didn’t need to be spent there.
Now, when that familiar pull shows up, I stay with it long enough to recognize it. Most of the time, stepping back isn’t a decision I debate. It’s a way of staying where I am. The conversation keeps moving, life goes on, and I remain intact without needing anything to resolve for that to feel true.
I’ve started to notice that this isn’t isolated to the internet. It shows up in how I move through uncertainty in general… in decisions, in work, in money, in the places where there’s no guarantee and no clear answer waiting on the other side. Staying with myself has become less about discipline and more about orientation.
It made me realize this wasn’t new for me. A few years ago, I quietly set a resolution to pay closer attention to where my energy goes. I’ve learned that the goals, resolutions, and even the wish lists we make for ourselves matter more than we think, if we let them exist without turning them into pressure or performance.
Misogi (禊) is a Japanese ritual of purification. Traditionally, it involved cold water — standing beneath a waterfall or stepping into a river to cleanse the body, mind, and spirit.
The idea has traveled far from its origins, but the essence has stayed intact. Over time, Misogi became a way of naming a year by choosing one challenge that carries real weight. Something that asks for commitment without certainty, where fear and discomfort are part of the landscape rather than signs you’re doing it wrong.
What has always drawn me to Misogi is how closely it mirrors the way life actually unfolds. The moments that shape us most rarely come with guarantees or clean edges. They ask something of us before we know how they’ll turn out, and they keep asking even when effort doesn’t immediately translate into reward. We step forward, not because we’re certain, but because something in us recognizes that this is where we’re meant to stand, even if we don’t yet know what will meet us there.
For me, Misogi puts language to something I already recognize in my own life. The way a year can be shaped by attention rather than outcomes, by how present I remain with what’s already unfolding. Instead of letting the months blur together, it creates a point of reference I live alongside as decisions are made, energy is spent, and time moves whether I feel ready for it or not.
This year, I’m carrying that orientation with me into a few very real places — my body, my finances, and my inner life — not as a performance or a declaration, but as a way of staying honest with myself as the year unfolds.
Money, Mortgages, and the Part People Don’t Say Out Loud
Most of the mortgage conversations I have don’t start with rates, even when people think they do. They start with a feeling. A sense of pressure. A worry about timing. A fear of making the wrong move and having to live with it for years. People usually come in asking what they should do, but what they’re really trying to figure out is how to make a decision they won’t regret or resent themselves for later.
The truth is, there is almost never a perfect moment to buy a home. There are only moments that are workable and moments that aren’t, and the difference between the two usually has less to do with the market and more to do with how clearly someone understands their own situation. Income stability, cash reserves, how long you plan to stay, how much margin you actually need to feel steady month to month — those things matter more than trying to time a headline or outguess a chart.
One of the most common mistakes I see is people forcing themselves into a decision because they’re afraid of missing out, or holding themselves back because they’re waiting for certainty that never really arrives. Both come from the same place. Discomfort with not knowing. When someone slows down enough to look honestly at their numbers, their capacity, and their life as it actually exists right now, the decision usually becomes much simpler, even if it isn’t easy.
A mortgage is just a tool. It’s a way of spreading the weight of a home over time so you don’t have to carry it all at once. Used well, it supports your life. Used poorly, it becomes something you brace against every month. My job is to help people understand the difference before they sign anything, so the decision they make is one they can live inside, not one they’re constantly fighting.
2026, Giving, and the Heart Behind the Dylan Foundation
Grief doesn’t move on a schedule, and neither does love. What does change is how willing we are to remain in relationship with both.
The Foundation exists to support families who are navigating loss in real, practical ways. Not through grand gestures or visibility, but through steady help that meets them where they are. Bills that still need to be paid. Lives that still have to keep moving. Children who still need care, even when everything has shifted underneath them.
Giving becomes another place where attention matters more than urgency, and where showing up quietly, again and again, carries more weight than anything performative ever could. The Foundation is one more way I live inside that commitment — to stay, to tend, and to let meaning coexist with loss.
Your Turn
For 2026, I’ve named my Misogi in three places that matter to me. One connected to my finances. One to my body. One to my spirit.
When I look back on this year, I want to remember it as the year I was paid twenty thousand dollars for a single keynote, completed a 10K in under sixty minutes, and spent a full week in silent retreat. Each one is deliberately chosen. Each one carries real risk. None of them come with a guarantee, and that’s part of why they matter to me.
They aren’t goals I’m chasing so much as commitments I’m willing to live alongside, knowing they’ll shape how I move through the year regardless of how they resolve.
I’m curious what that looks like for you. Not in terms of resolutions or performance, but in the quieter sense of what you’re willing to stay present with as the year unfolds.
What would you name if you let yourself choose honestly?
What’s your Misogi for 2026? (please respond to this and we can hold each other accountable)