Not the background as in something unimportant.

The opposite.

I want to pay attention to the things that usually remain unnoticed: the extras, the setting, the weather, the room, the landscape, the circumstances surrounding the scene.

The things happening behind the obvious story.

Because without the background, there is no story.

A character standing alone on an empty stage tells us very little.

But place that character in a dimly lit kitchen at midnight, with rain tapping against the windows and a half-written letter on the table, and suddenly we begin to understand.

The setting changes the meaning.

The weather changes the mood.

The people in the background change the choices being made. The details we might otherwise overlook become the context that makes the story comprehensible.

There is no story without the background.

This is what I want to explore during this waxing gibbous phase of my lunar cycle.

My 4-Week Lunar Cycle Purpose is The Stage.

As Shakespeare wrote, all the world’s a stage…

But what if I have been thinking too much about the performance?

What if I have been caught up watching the characters, the dialogue, the conflict, the hero, the villain, the ordeal? What if the stage itself has been influencing the entire production?

Through my Quantum MeMoir practice, I am working to understand the performance of humanity differently.

Not simply by asking:

What is my role?

But:

What is happening around me?

• What is influencing the scene?

• What is quietly shaping the story?

• What has been present all along, but remained in the background?

I want to experiment with this…

To play with it. To observe it. To notice the environment. And perhaps this is especially timely because I am “Approaching the Ordeal” in the Heroine’s 4- Week Journey.

The point where I eventually meet the dragon... or the shadow. Or whatever appears to stand between me and the thing I have chosen to pursue.

On my Quantum MeMoir note pages, I have a place for these types of Challenges, Shadows, or Blocks.

But as I looked at my purpose for this seven-day cycle, I realized something unexpected. I cannot currently identify a challenge between me and my commitment.

There is no obvious obstacle. No known dragon waiting in the bushes. No innate block that I can see. And that realization made me think about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

Perhaps I have reached a place in my life where I am no longer primarily struggling against the bottom of the pyramid.

I am not focused on finding food.

• Shelter

• Safety

• Basic survival

• Companionship

I have the opportunity to think about something else. To pursue something else…

To ask:

What do I want to create with this life?

And when the basic struggles are no longer occupying the entire stage, a different kind of challenge emerges.

The unknown…

The things I cannot prepare for.

The block I do not know is coming.

• The weather

• The mood

• The interruption

• The person who enters the scene

The thing in the background that suddenly becomes part of the story.

So my challenge is not to prepare for the specific obstacle I already know will appear. Because I don’t know what it will be.

My challenge is to prepare myself to respond well to whatever appears.

To remain observant. Flexible. Resourceful. Present. To recognize that the thing I initially perceive as an interruption may actually be part of the story… a bridge.

Maybe the unexpected thing is not taking me away from the quest. Maybe it is the background of the quest.

The background will change.

The weather will change.

The extras will enter and leave.

The scene will shift.

And I will have to respond.

My purpose for this seven-day cycle: BACKGROUND

So for the next seven days, I am going to watch the background.

I want to see what I usually overlook.

The details that seem irrelevant.

The things that influence the scene without announcing themselves.

The context surrounding the story.

Because maybe the background is the invisible force that makes the story possible. And maybe the next dragon I meet will not be waiting in front of me. Maybe it will be something I notice happening quietly around me.

I will observe The Stage.

• The extras

• The setting

• The weather

• The circumstances

The things that shape the story before the characters even realize they are in one.

And I will see what happens when I stop treating the background as scenery...
and start recognizing it as part of the plot.

An Invite to Write Along…

If you want to write along with me, you are welcome to.

You don’t need to understand the entire Quantum MeMoir practice before you begin. You can simply start paying attention to your own background.

Subscribe now

Subscribe and follow along here, and if you want to explore the practice more directly, reach out to me. I can point you in the right direction.

You can also find my journaling resources in my Etsy shop and explore my Quantum MeMoir Journals on Amazon if you would like something to write with as you begin creating your own Quantum MeMoir.

You don’t have to wait for the perfect story. You can begin with the scene you are already standing in.

Your Muse,

Molly MissUnderstood

For this first seven-day cycle, I choose the role of Manager as Day 1.

Not because I want to control life, but because I have begun to recognize something that has quietly followed me throughout my life. I naturally organize. I edit. I direct. I see disconnected pieces and instinctively begin arranging them until they form something meaningful.

• Creative Director

• Production Manager

• Marketing Manager

• Web Designer

• Stage Manager

• Project Manager

• Editor

These titles have appeared in different forms throughout my life, but underneath them all is the same capacity: I love bringing the pieces together.

Where others see scattered fragments in their life, I see a puzzle waiting to become a picture.

For many years, this ability felt like a burden. I often became the one carrying responsibility, solving problems, organizing chaos, or holding everyone else’s moving parts together. I accepted every challenge as my own endeavor…

I confused my gift with obligation.

This Lunar Cycle is an invitation to change that story. Instead of resenting this instinct, I want to understand it. Instead of carrying it unconsciously, I want to wield it intentionally. Instead of managing everyone else’s production, I want to become the thoughtful manager of my own.

The next twenty-eight days are an exploration of The Stage.

Not one stage. Many stages.

• The stage of the natural world, where seasons, cycles, and ecosystems continually perform their quiet choreography.

• The stage of capitalism, where work, money, productivity, and value influence the roles we inhabit.

• The stage of womanhood, where culture, biology, relationships, and identity intersect in ever-changing ways.

• The stage of social media, where performance and authenticity often compete for the spotlight.

• The stages of friendship, family, marriage, and strangers, each inviting a different version of ourselves to emerge.

And perhaps the most intricate stage of all...

My Inner World.

The place where thoughts rehearse, emotions improvise, memories preserve old scripts, and imagination writes new scenes.

This journey is not about finding a single purpose.

It is about learning how purpose is managed in my actual life.

Like a great stage manager, I want to understand timing.

• Transitions.

• Lighting.

• Perspective.

• The movement of people.

• The movement of ideas.

The rhythm of beginnings, endings, entrances, and exits.

If life is a theater, then awareness becomes the director, values become the script, habits become rehearsals, relationships become the cast, and purpose becomes the story unfolding through every act.

Over the next seven days, I will explore what it means to become the conscious manager of my own experience. Not controlling every scene. But learning to steward my attention, my energy, and my gifts with greater intention.

The Ground Sphere is day 2 of my 7 Day Purpose of Manager… the Stage Manager of my life. It teaches me that life is not built from isolated moments. It is built from continuity.

A single conversation is interesting. A hundred conversations become a pattern.

This is why I hold the Ground Sphere with such gratitude. It is not about rushing toward the next thing. It is about noticing what repeats, what deepens, and what quietly becomes part of the structure of my life. Continuity is how I learn what is real.

Continuity transforms information into identity.

Each moment becomes another layer of evidence. We pause. We question. We disagree. We Compromise. We laugh. We recognize ourselves in different situations, but the same pattern. Over time, these conversations create something larger than the experience itself. They become a living archive of how we learn to trust our own voices.

Ground is where patterns become visible.

When I reflect on scattered experiences, they can feel random. But when I remain present long enough to relate with an idea, and to appreciate it from different angles, hidden geometry begins to emerge. The same lessons echo through different circumstances until I can no longer dismiss them as coincidence.

That is continuity. It is the bridge between experience and truth.

As the stage manager of my life, I need continuity because it helps me keep the production moving with intention. It reminds me that the work is not only in the dramatic moments, but in the steady repetition of what matters. The cues, the timing, the rhythm, the return to center… these are what make the whole experience possible.

Ground also prepares me for the next sphere in the cycle.

Living Deliciously: Mother & Daughter Book Club

Day 3 belongs to the Intend Sphere: Living Deliciously. That sphere is shaped by ‘s Women Living Deliciously, and it carries a different energy from Ground. Ground inspires me to embrace the pattern. Intend asks me to choose the life I want to live inside that pattern. They are separate spheres, separate days, and together they begin to build the full seven-day quest.

Read more

The final sphere of this 7-Day Quest.

The final sphere of this entire 28-Day Lunar Cycle.

There is something beautifully symbolic about ending here because refinement isn’t about becoming someone new. It is about carefully removing what obscures the lesson until the wisdom underneath finally becomes visible.

This week I believed I was refining an idea… The Cosmic Game.

I thought the lesson was about surrendering expectations.

By the end of today’s reflection, I realized it was much more specific than that.

The oracle card I drew was Boundaries.

At first I assumed it was talking about other people crossing my boundaries. That seemed obvious after spending the weekend out in public, navigating crowds, different lifestyles, different priorities, and the constant friction I sometimes feel between the world I wish existed and the world that actually does.

But as I continued talking, something unexpected happened.

The boundary wasn’t between me and other people.

The boundary was between what belongs to me and what belongs to reality.

I realized how often I carry expectations for how people should behave.

• How they should treat public spaces.

• How they should respect one another.

• How they should care for themselves.

• How they should move through the world.

Even writing those sentences makes me uncomfortable because they sound judgmental.

For years I’ve softened that truth because I didn’t want to sound arrogant.

I didn’t want anyone hearing, “She thinks she’s better than everyone else.”

There is a piece of me that has wrestled with exactly that guilt.

But today’s refinement showed me something more honest.

The real issue isn’t whether I think I’m “better.”

The real question is whether I have developed certain values that I hold very deeply, and whether I quietly expect everyone else to live by those same values.

Those are two entirely different questions.

My values lean toward an evolving refinement.

Toward awareness. Toward stewardship. Toward respecting shared environments. Toward lifelong learning. Toward asking difficult questions. Toward taking responsibility for my own inner world.

When I encounter behavior that seems careless, unconscious, or dismissive of others, something inside me reacts almost instantly.

Because I care. Or because I am self protecting?

Then something even stranger happens…

After judging “them.”

Then I judge myself for judging others!

The cycle repeats.

What I discovered today is that the suffering isn’t coming from having ideals.

The suffering comes from expecting reality to organize itself around those ideals.

That expectation quietly crosses one of the most important boundaries in the Cosmic Game.

Inside my sphere are my choices.

Outside my sphere are millions of other human beings living according to their own level of consciousness, history, pain, priorities, and values.

The Cosmic Game isn’t asking me to stop caring… or to pretend that everything is acceptable. It certainly isn’t asking me to abandon discernment.

It is asking me to recognize where my influence ends.

I can participate. I cannot govern.

Perhaps that is what surrender expectations has meant all along.

Not surrendering my values. Surrendering my expectation that reality should mirror them.

That may be the final refinement of this lunar cycle. The lesson is to stop mistaking my ideals for universal laws. The Cosmic Game continues whether I approve of every move on the board or not.

My freedom isn’t found in controlling the game.

It is found in learning how to play my part with clarity, integrity, and enough humility to remember that I am one player among billions, watching the mystery unfold.

🌑 End of Lunar Cycle Reflection

Tomorrow, the moon begins again.

So do I.

Your Muse,

Molly MissUnderstood

For nearly a decade, I have been developing Quantum MeMoir.

Or perhaps... Quantum MeMoir has been cultivating me.

(If you prefer to listen instead of read… watch the video above)

In my Quantum MeMoir lifestyle practice…

The Intend Sphere offered a single word:

MYstery.

Yes... I intentionally play with words.

Sometimes they reveal ideas before I fully understand them.

As I moved through my morning... coffee, chores, lunch... a familiar pattern quietly stepped into view.

Timing.

Procrastination.

Not finishing.

For years, I’ve judged myself for the number of unfinished projects scattered throughout my life.

• A theory

• An oracle deck

• A painting

• A sketch

• A mind map

• A relationship

A New Habit…

Something would call to me with incredible energy. I’d begin. I’d pour myself into it.

Then...

I’d drift.

For a long time, I interpreted that drift as failure.

As inconsistency.

As proof that I lacked discipline.

But standing here, nearly a decade later, I can finally see something I couldn’t see from inside the moment.

Those works weren’t abandoned.

They were becoming…

Each one was waiting for another raw element to appear.

Another experience.

Another conversation.

Another heartbreak.

Another insight.

Another cycle.

I return to them.

The activity of creating never really stopped.

It simply continued within me…

The sketches became philosophy.

The philosophy became conversations.

The conversations became new artwork.

The artwork became Mind Maps.

The Mind Maps became a way of seeing.

And somehow...

everything kept feeding everything else.

That realization has changed the way I think about completion.

Perhaps nothing meaningful is ever truly finished.

Maybe… it simply reaches the next version of itself.

As human beings, we experience reality through beautifully limited senses.

Compared to the vastness of existence... all of space, all of time, every possible path that could unfold...

We perceive only the smallest sliver of what is available.

There are infinite possibilities surrounding every moment.

How could I possibly [k]NOW…

Which unfinished sketch is actually waiting for its perfect season?

Which half-developed idea will become the cornerstone of a new Mind Map?

Which Mind Map drawing will suddenly make sense ten years from now?

I can’t.

That’s the MYstery.

I’ve spent enough years worrying about whether something was good or bad.

Right or wrong.

Complete or abandoned.

I’m learning to care less about those judgments.

Because every cycle teaches me the same lesson.

Nothing is wasted.

Every page.

Every drawing.

Every abandoned idea.

Every notebook.

Every failed experiment.

Every unexpected conversation.

Every quiet observation.

They all become raw materials for whatever comes next.

Maybe that’s what magic has always meant to me.

Not controlling the outcome.

Not predicting the future.

But participating so fully in the mystery of life that ordinary moments quietly transform into something I never could have planned.

So here’s to the mystery…

I hope you enjoyed the preview and evolution of my artwork over the last 8 years…

You can find a collection of my original sketches, drawings, paintings, and visual explorations in my Quantum MeMoir Etsy Shop…

Or in the Quantum MeMoir Gallery…

Quantum MeMoir Gallery

Some are finished.

Some are still becoming.

In truth...

I no longer know the difference.

If one of them speaks to you, I’d love to tell you its story.

If you’d like to purchase an original, reprint or custom map simply reach out.

I’d be honored to share a little piece of the journey.

Perhaps completion isn't an event. It's a perspective.

Your Muse,

Cheryl Crow

aka

Molly (MaLee) MissUnderstood

Not my mood. The actual weather outside.

Its cloudy and rainy again… My High Pressure Front disappeared…

I’ve always noticed that cloudy, rainy days affect me differently than bright, dry ones. When the sky grows heavy with clouds, something inside me seems to loosen.

Memories rise.

Shadow material surfaces.

My UNconscious becomes louder.

It’s as if the rain outside gives permission for something inside to finally be flushed out...

Sunny, dry days feel different. My mind clears. I become grounded, productive, and emotionally spacious.

Ironically, my husband experiences almost the opposite. The hot, dry weather that energizes me can leave him irritable and stationary.

That realization made me pause…. and EXPLORE more…

Today… for my Express Sphere… I am the Explorer of the Inner Dialogue… The Psyche… as my personal Low & High Pressure Fronts… seem to hold the data…

The same weather doesn’t create the same inner climate in everyone.

The outer atmosphere and the inner atmosphere are related, but they are not identical.

Then another thought arrived.

Maybe I’m actually living inside two weather systems at once!

Earthly Weather

The weather outside.

• Clouds.

• Rain.

• Humidity.

• Heat.

• Sunshine.

• Winter

• Summer

My body responds to it whether I intend it to or not. My nervous system, hormones, energy, and senses all seem to notice before my mind does.

Psychic Weather

The weather inside.

• Vulnerability

• Sadness

• Reflection

• Fatigue

• Openness

• Joy

This one appears to have nothing to do with the outside forecast.

It changes because of conversations, memories, disappointments, victories, rejection, inspiration, grief, beauty, or love.

Sometimes one sentence can create an emotional thunderstorm…. that I have to slow down and wait for it to pass…

Sometimes a single act of kindness clears the clouds… and my inner birdsong begins to sing again…

This inner weather patterns are not always controlled by the Earthly Atmosphere. It’s shaped by the dialogue within.

Today I wanted to know… which one of these Personas brought my inner clouds?

Recently I’ve been mapping the Inner Dialogue through six personas.

• The Protector - Grounds Fear

• The Performer - Intends Acceptance

• The Advocate - Observes Intuition

• The Inner Child - Connects belonging

• The Critic - Expresses Honesty

• The Rescuer/Restorer - Refines Love

Around them all is what I call the Whole Self.

Not another persona.

The AtmoSPHERE of Me.

The sky that contains every weather pattern without becoming any one of them.

What I’m beginning to notice is that these personas don’t simply speak.

They create inner weather…. high or low pressures… attitudes…

• Sometimes the Protector gathers storm clouds.

• Sometimes the Critic builds a heavy dome of pressure where nothing feels like enough.

• Sometimes the Inner Child calls in gentle rain that washes old grief to the surface.

Sometimes they gang up and create tornadoes and hurricanes!

Left unchecked, each Persona has the ability to influence the atmosphere of my inner world.

But here’s the insight that surprised me most.

The weather outside may influence my inner atmosphere...

...and my inner atmosphere influences how I move through the outer world… no matter the weather.

The direction isn’t always one-way.

Sometimes I wake up already carrying clouds.

Sometimes the clouds arrive after an unexpected conversation.

Sometimes the sunshine outside helps me notice the sunshine within.

Sometimes no amount of blue sky can quiet an internal storm.

I’ve spent much of my life trying to master my emotions as though every “Low Pressure Front” meant something was wrong with me.

Now I’m wondering if weather is simply information.

Meteorologists don’t get angry at rain.

They observe it.

Pilots don’t judge turbulence.

They navigate it.

Inner & Outer Atmospheric Pressure Barometer:

The Weight Upon You.

Low Pressure: Less weight overhead allows air to rise, the unconscious material comes up.

Steady Pressure: Centered & Adaptable.

High Pressure: More weight overhead pushing down, becoming more rigid and driven.

Self-understanding seems to be less about changing the forecast and more about learning to read it and dress appropriately…

Maybe every day begins with two questions.

• What’s the weather outside?

  • Helps me understand my body.

• What’s the weather within?

  • Helps me understand my psyche.

Both deserve my curiosity. Neither deserves my judgment.

So as it turns out... I don’t think any one Persona created my weather today.

Sometimes the Earthly Weather changes my inner atmosphere.

Sometimes my Personas create storms all on their own…

In conclusion… Maybe the better question isn’t,

“Which Persona created this weather?”

but...

“How do I care for myself in today’s forecast?”

Some days that means an umbrella.

Some days it means opening the windows.

Some days it means wrapping myself in a warm cup of love, and listening to the rain on the rooftop while I MeMoir...

Curious to explore your own Inner Weather?

I’m currently developing a set of Quantum MeMoir Draw & Tell Flash Cards designed to help you slow down, notice your Inner Dialogue, and discover the patterns shaping your own atmoSPHERE.

They’re conversation starters between you and your own psyche.

I’m looking for a few curious explorers to beta test them before they’re released.

If that sounds like your kind of rabbit hole, send me a message. I’d love to have you explore them before they make their way into the world.

Your Muse,

Molly

P.S.

One last question followed me after composing this.

I tend to thrive in high-pressure weather.

At least, I think I do?!

But do I actually feel healthier...

or simply more useful?

Have I mistaken productivity for peace?

Or perhaps...

have I become so accustomed to high pressure that sunshine feels like success?

That rabbit hole is waiting for another rainy day.

Who, exactly, is living inside of me?

• Not my body.

• Not my personality.

• Not even the version of myself that answers to my name.

I mean… the deeper me. The hidden me.

The one beneath the habits, the fears, the cravings, the comforts, and the stories I tell about who I think I am.

Jung called it the psyche.

Not the mind. Not the brain.

The psyche.

As a living landscape.

A world unto itself.

For years, I believed self-discovery was about becoming a better person.

• Fixing flaws.

• Healing wounds.

• Learning lessons.

• Leveling up.

Yet every time I arrive at a destination, another horizon appears.

• Another layer.

• Another mystery.

• Another dragon.

Today… via the psyche… Jung offered me a different possibility.

What if I am here to meet myself?

Not just the conscious self…

The hidden inhabitants as well.

• The fearful one.

• The wounded one.

• The wise one.

• The child.

• The exile.

• The seeker.

• The creator.

The witch who lives at the edge of town.

The observer who quietly watches it all unfold.

Jung spent years recording conversations with figures who emerged from his unconscious. He did not dismiss them as nonsense. He listened.

Because he discovered something astonishing:

The ego is not the only intelligence within us.

That thought has been following me...

How much of my life has been shaped by voices I have never taken the time to meet?

• The voice that reaches for comfort.

• The voice that seeks beauty.

• The voice that fears rejection.

• The voice that sings when nobody is listening.

The voice that knows… Not facts.

It knows truths.

The kind of inner dialogue that arrives without explanation.

The kind of thoughts that feel remembered rather than learned.

This morning I pulled an oracle card.

Confidence.

At first, I assumed confidence meant courage. Certainty. Boldness.

But now I wonder if confidence is something else entirely.

Perhaps confidence is the willingness to walk into the unknown landscape of your own soul and trust that what you find there belongs.

Even the parts that frighten you…

Even the parts that confuse you…

Even the parts that seem strange…

Especially those parts.

The card was BLACK.

And suddenly I saw it differently.

We often think of black as the absence of light.

Yet in many ways black contains everything.

• A cosmic womb.

• A fertile void.

• The night sky from which stars emerge.

• The rich soil where seeds wait patiently beneath the surface.

• The deep unconscious from which dreams arise.

Not absence.

The container for Presence.

Black is… All colors gathered together.

All possibilities waiting to become visible.

Perhaps my psyche is not a problem to solve.

Perhaps it is a universe!

And perhaps confidence is not standing in the light.

Perhaps confidence is trusting myself enough to walk into the darkness carrying only curiosity.

So today I begin… Not as a woman seeking perfection.

But as an explorer… Notebook in hand.

Lantern lit.

Stepping quietly into the forest of my own consciousness.

Listening for whoever wishes to speak.

Your Muse,

Molly MissUnderstood

Download the Mind Maps & Write Along!

No matter how much “better” I become, there always seems to be another level.

Another layer.

Another thing to learn.

Another dragon to slay.

Another promise to myself.

The road is always winding…

Consumption is at the root of this pondering.

I used to survive off sugar. Mountain Dew. Candy. Emotional support Latte’s.

From a very young age… Sugar was my companion through grief, stress, celebration, boredom, and exhaustion.

And for the most part, I’ve changed.

However… lately, after some safety issues of the past year… I haven’t quite been able to shake loose from my relationship with sugar.

I keep declaring this experiment is over.

“Okay, we’re done with sugar now.”

And then somehow, there I am.

Ordering another chai latte.

Extra sweet.

And suddenly my mind whispers: “See? You haven’t changed.”

Who do you think you are …to inspire anyone towards wellness…”

But have I really failed?

By whose definition?

I drink about three ounces of coffee. (Self justification)

Maybe two tablespoons of sugar in a day. (I’ll cut back or stop when I’m ready)

Is that truly the consumption of an addict? (One cup leads to two)

It sure feels like it sometimes. (Because if I don’t get it… look out…)

However… perhaps the burden isn’t coming from the sugar.

Perhaps the burden comes from what I think about consuming sugar.

I watched a beautiful interview today with neuroscientist David Linden, who calls his approach to living with terminal cancer “The Way of the Nerd.”

His answer wasn’t to fight harder.

It was to understand.

To become curious.

To know thyself.

Not just through the outward senses, but through the inward ones too.

Because we don’t only have eyes and ears pointed toward the world.

We have inner senses.

Signals from the gut.

From the heart.

From the nervous system.

From places beneath consciousness.

We don’t just possess conscious systems.

We possess autonomic systems… or rather they possess us…

Systems that have been quietly keeping track… while we have been busy trying to self-improve ourselves into living well.

And maybe that’s the thing.

Perhaps my body… wise thing that it is, keeps reminding: “Pay Attention”

Which explains why so many of us become frustrated.

“I know better.”

“I’ve done the work.”

“I’ve read the books.”

“I’ve grow beyond that...”

And yet…

The old cravings remain.

The same sensitivities remain.

The same fears appear.

The same habits knock consistently at the door.

Maybe self-development isn’t the answer…

Maybe self-understanding is descending into ourselves.

Into the hidden conversations happening between mind and body.

Into the sympathetic and parasympathetic dance.

• Into grief.

• Into reward.

• Into expectation.

• Into placebo thoughts.

And most importantly… Into belief.

Self under-standing.

Standing beneath myself.

• Listening.

• Studying.

• Growing curious.

Not asking: “Why am I still like this?”

But asking: “What is this trying to tell me?”

What fascinated me most about the video wasn’t the discussion about sugar or GLP-1 drugs.

It was the realization that eating isn’t a single choice. It’s a hundred little choices guiding us...

• The smell.

• The memory.

• The expectation.

• The sight.

• The taste.

• The reward.

• The fullness.

• The satisfaction.

Or the absence of satisfaction.

According to neuroscientist David Linden, before the first bite… there is an ongoing conversation between the mind and the body.

And maybe that’s true for all consumption.

Not just food.

• Scrolling.

• Shopping.

• Coffee.

• Wine.

• Busyness.

• People pleasing.

Even self-improvement itself.

Perhaps what we call compulsive behavior isn’t a lack of willpower.

Maybe it’s a conversation.

A dialogue between the outer senses and the inner senses.

The mind body systems do their thing…

And before I ever order that extra sweet chai latte, dozens of tiny decisions have already been happening beneath consciousness.

Signals are flowing upward from the body.

Signals are flowing downward from the brain.

The conscious “I” enters the scene late and proudly declares:

“I chose this.”

But maybe “i” wasn’t the only one voting.

Maybe my gut had a vote.

Maybe my memories had a vote.

Maybe exhaustion had a vote.

Maybe my body, still remembering unsafe seasons, had a vote.

And then I began wondering:

What if compulsions aren’t always cravings?

What if they’re communications?

Messages to understand.

If beliefs can kill, as in the strange phenomenon of “voodoo death,” then beliefs can also heal.

If expectation can release stress hormones powerful enough to shut the body down…

Then expectation can also release endorphins powerful enough to relieve pain and in David Linden’s case… keep cancer at bay...

The placebo effect isn’t fake.

It’s biology.

Which makes me wonder:

How much suffering in my life is coming from the thing itself?

And how much comes from what I believe about the thing?

Because maybe two tablespoons of sugar aren’t what’s weighing me down.

Maybe the shame …of knowing better …is.

Maybe the fear… of dementia …is.

Maybe the story is.

Maybe I hexed myself. Not with witchcraft.

But… With labels. With declarations.

“I’m addicted to sugar….”

“I have no discipline.”

“I should be further along.”

“I know better.”

And perhaps my nervous system, being the obedient creature that it is, simply responds: “As you wish.”

Maybe this is why “Know Thyself” feels incomplete.

Maybe the invitation isn’t merely to know thyself.

But to understand what stories thyself has come to believe.

And perhaps this is what I am slowly embodying inside my Ground Sphere of Self Under-Standing.

That thriving isn’t always found by controlling myself.

Sometimes it is found by becoming curious enough to ask:

“What am I believing?”

“What am I expecting?”

“Why do I keep telling this story?”

David Linden said something that touched me deeply.

He spoke about his approach “The Way of the Nerd.”

Not everyone wants to know all the details.

But for some of us, understanding is empowering…

For some of us, curiosity is medicine…. peace arrives not solely through acceptance, but through comprehension.

Perhaps that’s my way too.

The Way of the Nerd.

Simply understanding myself.

Again.

And again. And again…

“Know thyself,” they said.

I’d like to add…

“Be gentle with what you find.”

Your Muse,

Molly

Full Video: The bizarre phenomena that medicine struggles to explain | David Linden: Full Interview

Another video I recently watched that goes along with this pondering… about Gut Health…

Not because she had an easier childhood than I did.

Not because I got motherhood right.

But because somehow, through all the places where love was imperfect and wisdom unfinished, something beautiful continued to grow.

Like me, she was not given the full set of resources, skil…

Read more

And yet, lately, Vis-ability keeps finding me.

You can’t hide from your self…

Like… Kairos, the ancient Greeks’ word for the right moment.

Kairos… knows things that calendars don’t.

Recently, Ryan and I sat down as guests on the Lebanon NOW Podcast. We…

Read more

A little over a year ago, I sat in front of a camera, popped my collar, teased my hair into something resembling Dolly Parton confidence, and tried to be brave.

I called it a Video Memoir.

At the time, I thought I was making a video about Aging Gracefully.

I thought I was talking about authentic, vulnerable… self-expression.

I thought I was sharing a journal system (Compass) I had spent years creating.

But recently I watched the video again…

And now I think it was about something else entirely.

It was about visibility.

For thirty-six minutes, I can see myself circling the same idea over and over.

I called it a bold move.

I called it a courageous action.

I called it expression.

What I was really talking about was being seen.

Not the curated version.

Not the polished version.

Not the version with a script and a marketing plan.

The actual me.

Authentic. Vulnerable. The rambling me.

Watch "Aging Gracefully" on Youtube

The woman drinking homemade chai and talking about moon cycles, self-observation, mirrors, purpose, aging, and dreams.

The woman who repeatedly said she needed to stop judging the person she saw on the camera.

The woman who admitted she wanted people to get to know her.

Watching it now feels like opening a time capsule.

Because that woman had no idea what was coming next.

Soon after recording that video, I stepped back into the public.

After years of off grid living… studying, creating, healing, and largely residing in my own little world, I decided it was time to participate again.

I wanted to help.

I wanted to contribute.

I wanted to share what I had learned.

And then reality offered a curriculum.

The nonprofit organizations I hoped to support became a lesson in discernment.

The closer I looked, the more difficult it became to reconcile what was being said with what was being done.

Then, while attempting to share my art publicly, visibility introduced me to another teacher.

Fear.

Or more accurately, the fear that arrives after you’ve already been seen…

What followed was nearly a year of navigating the unwanted attention of a stalker.

A year of learning about boundaries.

A year of questioning whether visibility was worth the cost.

A year of learning that not everyone who notices you belongs in your life.

When I watch that video now, I see hints of all of it.

I hear myself talking about energy.

About feeling overwhelmed by the emotions and shadows of other people.

About needing to protect my energy.

About being unsure whether I had enough of myself to give to the world.

At the time, I didn’t fully understand why those themes kept appearing.

Now I do.

Read more

Not the kind that lives on clocks or calendars.

The kind that quietly shapes the stories we tell ourselves.

The ancient Greeks had two words for time: Chronos and Kairos.

Chronos is measurable time.

The passing of days.

The turning of seasons.

The moon completing its cycle.

The r…

Read more

Become more productive.
Become more disciplined.
Become more confident.
Become more successful.

The underlying message was always the same:

You are not quite enough yet…

This is the Self-Understanding that eventually led me to create… the Gallup -CliftonStrengths Talents to Strengths Mind Map.

For years, I followed the breadcrumbs of self-development, designing frameworks, habits, assessments, journals, certifications, and systems. Some helped. Many helped others too. But somewhere along the way, I noticed something curious.

The more I tried to improve myself, the less time I spent living as myself.

Lately, my Earth Cycle has been inviting me into a different conversation.

My Purpose …Persona… leads me to explore who I am.

My Ground Sphere reminds me: Trust thy Self.

My Intend Sphere provides direction: Can I remain sovereign?

My Observe Sphere encourages me to Study Self, Other, and Society, not as separate things, but as interconnected expressions of the same field.

And today’s Connect Sphere theme is Quantum Me.

Not the isolated me.

Not the optimized me.

Not the idealized future me.

The whole ecosystem. The entire field of experience.

Quantum Me is less interested in fixing the parts and more interested in understanding how the parts belong together.

To go along with today’s “Quantum Me” Connect Sphere… is a Sacred Geometry Oracle reading… that seemed to echo the same lesson.

The card’s element was Silver.

In alchemical traditions, silver has long been associated with the Moon. The Moon governs reflection rather than projection. Receptivity rather than force.

Silver is not the blazing certainty of the Sun, the Gold of our hearts.

It is the softer light that gently helps reflect what was always there.

The Moon has also been symbolically linked to the mind and the subconscious, illuminating hidden patterns that operate beneath awareness.

Perhaps Self-Understanding begins there.

Not by blazing some new trail.

But by bringing consciousness to what already exists.

This realization has been quietly unfolding since early spring.

When my husband’s new company began using Gallup CliftonStrengths, curiosity got the better of me. I decided to take the assessment as well.

At first, I approached it like many people do.

What are my strengths?

What do they mean?

How can I use them more effectively?

But the longer I sat with the results, the more interested I became in the relationships between the talents themselves.

Not the individual domain themes.

I wanted to explore the entire eco-system of my talents merged with Ryan’s.

How one talent supports another. How one creates friction with another.

How certain gifts naturally amplify each other while others hold tension that leads to growth.

I found myself mapping the connections, sketching relationships, asking questions, noticing patterns.

Read more

Not literally. Well... yes, literally too.

A tall wooden fence separates our yard from a neighbor’s.

Behind the next yard over… lives a dog I cannot see.

That is the problem.

And that is the lesson.

I hear the dog.

I hear the barking.

I hear the chain.

I hear the scratching at the door.

I hear the metal bowl scraping across the decking.

What I do not hear is the whole story.

The fence keeps me from knowing.

My imagination fills in the gaps.

Perhaps the dog is lonely.

Perhaps neglected.

Perhaps bored.

Perhaps loved.

Perhaps all of these things at once.

The fence remains silent.

Read more

Getting used to the sounds. The smells. The sights.

Or maybe more accurately... getting used to the absence of them.

It’s amazing how loud “civilization” is once you leave it behind.

I missed the perceived sounds of safety…

The breeze moving through leaves.

Birds negotiating territory.

The soft percussion of rain on a roof.

These sounds have weight to them, but they don’t demand anything from me.

For the first time in years, my nervous system seems to be exhaling.

I’ve spent the last three years “in society”.

After years of living off-grid, my husband and I moved downtown into an old railroad town. At the time, it felt romantic. Walkable. Historic. Easy.

The kind of place where artists are supposed to thrive.

Instead, from the very first week, I developed headaches.

I needed naps every day.

Sirens ricocheted between buildings.

Exhaust fumes drifted through the streets.

The building shook with every large truck that flew by…

An angry religious zealot regularly screamed sermons that echoed through downtown corridors like a fire alarm no one could turn off.

I couldn’t think straight.

At first I thought it was preference.

I thought maybe I had become too picky.

Sensitive.

Difficult.

Preferring the Wild of Nature.

But after enough time, I realized something important.

This wasn’t about preference.

It was about regulation.

My nervous system was not at ease.

So naturally I did what many of us do.

I tried to solve the problem with logic.

I tried to “fix” it… but that didn’t work… so…

Maybe a nicer neighborhood.

Maybe a more upscale district.

Maybe better retail shops and restaurants.

More culture.

Better aesthetics.

Surely that would help.

What I discovered was that more culture doesn’t necessarily mean more peace.

Sometimes it simply means more stimulation wrapped in prettier packaging.

The new backdrop may have resembled Downtown Disney.

Yet… the nervous system knows the difference.

What ultimately pushed me over the edge wasn’t noise.

It wasn’t smells.

It wasn’t traffic.

It wasn’t a new town crier.

It was a quiet man. Actually 4 of them…

But one particular man …far to young to be living the life that had become his…

A vagabond.

A schizophrenic drifter who became fixated on me.

At first, he was simply part of the scene.

The way many troubled people become part of the human landscape.

Everyone knew him.

Everyone had a story for him.

His mother died young.

His father was a good guy.

He went to California and never came back the same.

My favorite… “He is on a spiritual journey”

People explained him.

People sympathized with him.

People excused him.

What nobody seemed interested in discussing was the impact he was having on the people around him.

Particularly women.

Read more

A philosophical question wrapped in sound.

A narrowing.

A label.

A way humans point at the wild mystery of a thing and say... there. That. Cat. Bird. Mother. Wife. Failure. Success.

As if naming something tells us what it is... instead of simply allowing the experience of it.

I’ve had a long relationship with names.

Of course, it started with my birth name.

Cheryl Milum.

That one comes with a whole lotta baggage.

Sometimes even the sound of Cheryl makes me cringe. Not because of the letters themselves... but because of the imprint behind them. The sound of a parental figure disappointed about something. Demanding something. Correcting something.

The nervous system remembers tones better than syllables.

My other parental figure had a simpler name for me.

Pumpkin.

Sweet on the surface.

Until I was old enough to understand tone.

Funny how names can spoil.

Then came high school.

Casper.

Followed by Lobster and Oompa-Loompas... courtesy of my pale skin and a regrettable encounter with Estée Lauder’s “tan in a bottle” …somewhere in the late 80s.

(Think Charlie and the Chocolate Factory friend’s.)

Then... my first official legal name change that I truly loved.

Cheryl Crow 1997.

Read more

Ryan and I were bound to adventure almost immediately.

Within our first year of marriage, we left behind nearly everything we thought we were supposed to be and built a tiny house to live in the middle of nowhere.

And here we are, over a decade later, in a little house off the beaten path.

How did we get to this unknown land?

That answer starts yea…

Read more

Quantum MeMoir grew out of that restlessness. It is my expe…

Read more

What phase of development am I actually living in right now?

Not where I want to be…
Not where I think I should be…
But how my life is currently organizing itself.

When I look through the lens of Quantum MeMoir, I stop …

Read more

It’s about trusting the momentum that’s already here.

I’ve “seized the treasure” in a way that feels almost quiet. I have my lab back. Not the one in the woods, wrapped in trees and silence, where I first dove deep into my notebooks and studies. This is a different lab: walls instead of trees, neighbors instead of wildlife, my little downtown block instead of open sky. In winter, I retreat like I always have—but this time it doesn’t feel like hiding.

It feels like Might.

That’s ’s word for this 7-day cycle. MIGHT. I used to be tough in the sharp-edged way—putting up a front to survive, bracing for impact, reading every room like a threat assessment. Now toughness has been reorganized.

Favorable or challenging, I know I can adapt. I’ve walked through enough fires to understand my own resilience. At this approaching Winter Solstice, I’m not retreating out of self-protection. I’m retreating into my city, my block, my little castle downtown to birth a new year.

Like a caterpillar folding into the chrysalis, I can feel myself softening into a new form. This is the re-calibration of wings. On the surface, it looks like I vanished, extra blankets, quiet nights, fewer plans. Underneath, everything is rewiring.

Which brings me to the real work of this Road Home: listening.

Speak. Say. Tell. Share. Yes. But most importantly—listen. Listen to my inner dialogue as a kind of synergy between “me” and all the lives I’ve already lived inside this one: the girl who hid, the hermit in the woods, the woman downtown drawing circles at her drafting table… looking at the world go by outside the window.

Listen, and then act accordingly. Remember that garbage in, garbage out isn’t just about food or media—it’s about stories, too. The things I think I know may simply be the things I was conditioned to believe. They aren’t always absolute truth.

Subscribe now

So now, on Day 2 of this Road Home, my ground message is simple: soul guidance.

That phrase came back to me when I pulled out my old alchemy notes—the ones I scribbled when I was wintering in the woods, letting the trees be my teachers.

In those pages, I had written about a fourth body: the etheric. The place where shadow lives. For the last few years, I’ve been busy learning the language of the physical, mental, and emotional—mapping them at the compass of my experience here on Earth. Now, I can feel myself stepping into a new stage. One with wings.

will continue with the 3 Bodies that are fundamental to his CALM framework.

For me… it is the beginning of exploring the spiritual body more deliberately, not as an escape but as another layer of reality to integrate. I want to use alchemy and shadow work as lenses to illustrate it—to show, on paper, how the unseen shapes the seen. It feels less like a new idea and more like my soul clearing its throat and repeating what it’s been saying all along.

If you’d like to turn this from “interesting to read” into “something I’m actually living,” you’re invited to join the (r)evolution of time Write Along by subscribing. As I map my own days, weeks, and lunar cycles as a living experiment in alchemy, you’ll get the behind-the-scenes mind maps, prompts, and reflections so you can run your own version alongside me—on your calendar, in your journal, in your life. Think of it as a quiet little cohort of time travelers and note-takers, each of us tracking our Great Work in real time, learning how to turn ordinary days into chapters of a story we actually want to remember.

Start Here: Your Call To Adventure

The muse has my attention again. I’m inspired by what MaLee wrote in the woods, what she saw before I was ready to live it. This Road Home is my way of walking back through those notes, not to repeat that chapter, but to bring its wisdom into this one—into my city lab, my winter cocoon, my next set of wings.

To be continued…

Cheryl Crow

P.S. If you’d like to see where this “soul guidance” first sparked on paper, the rest of this entry (including photos of the Calcination Alchemy Mind Map I drew a few winters ago while studying in the woods) lives in the subscriber section. Become a paid subscriber to step into the lab with me and walk through the first stage of this alchemical journey, map in hand.

Subscribe now

🔒 Subscriber Section: Calcination in the Woods

The Calcination Mind Map and 7 Alchemy Stages I’m sharing with you today is one of those artifacts I didn’t realize was a prophecy until now.

Read more

I wasn’t going to “get my life together.”
I was going to study it.

Not in a self-help workbook kind of way, but as an ongoing experiment: one year, one orbit, lived as a theory in motion.

I’ve come to accept that my life speaks to me in three languages.

Read more