What a look back on all the writing I've done in 2025 reveals

As I start my fourth year of writing regularly, I’m struck by how much has changed…

Not just the world, but also how I view it. Writing forced me to truly take a look at my interests and my values and what made me tick. It made me thing about what I enjoyed doing and discussing with my peers throughout my life. Recent reflections have made me realize that I’ve reached a point where I’ve written substantially about a few things:

• identity and self-awareness

• technology and its impact on society

• politics, the underpinnings of corporate interests

All these things wrapped around the idea of self-improvement and the will to see things as they truly are without becoming cynical, bitter, and resentful of the system.

Everything I’ve done has brought me to this point — to wanting to inspire others to explore and grow and do something outside of that web of consumerism. Not all of us are going to lead a revolution to change the world, but each one of us has the capacity to speak up and establish a digital presence that can be used to establish a baseline of what we deem to be acceptable in our community.

As an engineer, an artist, and a parent, I think it’s essential to set an example for my friends, my family, and my colleagues.

For the past few decades, this phrase has stuck with me and made me think about what a legacy can do:

Writing forces you to think, and thinking is a dangerous thing to those with authority.

A digital decoupling from a system that prevents you from doing it too much is required to become unassailable, resistant to control. To do this requires realization that you can’t just unplug from the matrix, but you can play the game by learning more of the rules. That requires the will to do the inner work; the agency to go farther than is offered by the education system — a willingness to draw outside of the lines.

I know now that I’m not alone in this process.

Clear thinking, honest writing, and calm perspective. Your digital footprint belongs to you, not to the system.