In The Gemology of Language, I described how gemological evaluation—clarity, refraction, dispersion, absorption spectrum—became tools for analyzing words. The framework revealed what language obscures: who benefits, what’s missing, where the body disconnects.
That piece examined what passes through us.
This one examines what we’re made of.
I’ve been told my whole life I’m too much.
Too sensitive. Too intense. Too complicated. Doesn’t fit anywhere.
Sometimes it sounds like: No one’s going to read something this long. No one wants to think this hard. You need to simplify. You need to pick a lane. You need to be digestible.
I tried. I made the short posts. I made the reels. I compressed years of meaning-making into 30-second clips. Some of them reached hundreds of thousands of people.
And nothing changed. Not really.
Because what I need to say requires exactly the kind of focus that digital media often destroys.
There are statistics about this. Attention spans shrinking. Screen-read text processed less deeply than print. People too survival-focused for nuance. I’ve read the research. It describes populations, averages, trends.
Then there is you. The actual human being receiving these words in whatever way is available.
These are not the same, and I know that.
I would love to know everyone who reads my words. Some of you, perhaps, I will one day consider friends—not just supporters or readers, but friends. Like real relationship, like anything worth building, it takes time. That’s its nature. Not a flaw to overcome. Not something to be optimized away. So here I am. Writing something that takes time to read, for people who still have time to give.
If you’re still here, welcome back, I’m glad. If you’re just joining for the first time, welcome.
Let’s see what we can build.
The Question That Wouldn’t Leave
I kept running into a pattern I couldn’t explain: my own resilience.
This might sound like I’m tooting my own horn. Hear me out and then decide.
I’ve spent years studying developmental psychology, abnormal psychology, personality structure, spiritual systems, theories of mind and consciousness, addiction, recovery, and depth psychology. I have an uncomfortably clear view of what shapes a person—how different personality architectures form, what perspectives they produce, where they break.
My experience with alcoholism gave me first-hand knowledge of living in a pathological state of mind and body. Recovery gave me first-hand knowledge of the personality transformation required to have any chance at living.
Here’s my point: everything I learned could not explain with sufficient evidence why I recovered and others didn’t.
Everything I learned has not explained why I chose to use my pattern recognition and sensitivity to protect and educate people rather than exploit and control them.
