What makes a person optimistic or pessimistic? ( I have a mental image of Winnie-the-Pooh who tends to move through life with gentle optimism, appreciating simple joys like friendship, kindness, and honey. Meanwhile, Eeyore often represents pessimism, expecting things to go wrong and seeing life through a heavier lens. ) Over the years, I have been mesmerized by the stories people have shared with me. I have heard incredible triumphs and heartbreaking tragedies. Yet through all of it, one...

Caregiving taught me something no other job (role) has ever taught me! Many days I come home and cannot explain the weight of the day. Listening is heavy. I mean really heavy. Not the kind of listening where you wait your turn to speak, the kind where you hold someone’s fears, their memories, their unfinished thoughts. The kind where silence isn’t empty, but full. Full of meaning. Full of trust. I didn’t understand my own exhaustion at first. I came from a world of surface-level...

As a Compassionate Caregiver, I can tell you firsthand that is a question on the minds of many seniors as they come face to face with mortality. “Who will tell my story?” Some seek to preserve their history and legacy through the written word: prose, fact, fiction, and poetry. What is written can never be unwritten, and for generations of writers, putting pen to paper (or digit to key, in today's case) is as good a way to secure an everlasting thought which will, hopefully, live on...