Conk’s Brain Podcast

I know, I’m not supposed to swear. Mom says it’s not “ladylike”, but who the hell wants to be ladylike anyway? I’d rather be the bear. Oh dear, Did I just go there too? Guess I’m over zipping my lips and holding my tongue and tripping over socially awkward apologies. The news is all sharp angles and broken bottles, Molotov cocktails hurled through windows while we slept. The world has gone mad, drunk on promises of cheap eggs and retribution. They mean to quiet us, shove us down on mattresses keep us so very small. But we don’t go quietly into that good night - Dylan Thomas taught us well. We will rage, rage against the dying of the light and above all, We won’t let those motherfuckers get us down.

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Exhausted doesn’t even begin to cover it. My brain is so steeped in stress, I’m pretty sure it now constitutes as soup. I have ignored all of my own advice about setting limits on social media doom scrolling, going outside, and even putting on actual pants. I promised myself that I was going to be more consistent in publishing this newsletter (article on Monday and poem on Tuesday), so here I am clickity clacking away at my keyboard while the inside of my head makes sloshing noises.

This is the most consequential and controversial election in my lifetime and all I want to do is eat Swiss Cakes and scroll TikTok until my eyes bleed in the hopes that someone can just promise me everything is going to be ok. I’ve cast my vote, done all the things, now it’s time to hurry up and wait.

I know millions of Americans (and people around the world) are perched on the edge of their seats, biting their nails, filled with existential dread and anxiety. I’m so overstimulated right now I’ve gone into full ADHD meltdown mode and am snapping at the dogs for licking the carpet - worst sound ever. This definitely isn’t healthy.

So what can we do to stay sane while we wait? I’m starting with actually enforcing my social media/internet boundaries. Psychologists will agree with me when I say that checking Google or TikTok every five minutes from now until the end of the week isn’t going to lessen the anxiety, nor will staying up all night glued to the television. I’m going to stick my electronics in a drawer and do my damndest to only check in a handful of times during the day.

Next, I’ve made a list of things that make me happy or distract me from the inevitable march of time:

👉 Making graphics and creating content for my new Facebook group Fashion Rebel

👉 Writing for Substack

👉 Making critters and unleashing my imagination with polymer clay

👉 Listening to soothing records and sipping hot tea with butter cookies

👉 Changing out my manicure

👉 Cleaning out my closet, putting away laundry, and styling some outfits

I’ve also decided to take on another 100 day challenge and started today. The idea is to focus on achieving an ambitious and concrete result by committing to doing one specific thing every day for 100 days. The purpose is to build a habit that changes your life for the better. What better to take my mind of the chaos than a daily task, right?

The name of the game for the foreseeable future is to distract myself with tasks that bring me joy, take frequent deep breathing breaks, respect established social media boundaries, and go to bed at a decent time. I’m also going to be leaning heavily into the Headspace sleepcasts (and their entire subsection on election stress).

Taking care of ourself is non-negotiable, doubly so in tumultuous times. What kindnesses are you affording yourself right now? Have you eaten? Drank some water? Participated in an activity that brings you joy? No matter how big or small the gesture, every little bit of self-love and self-compassion brings a moment of quiet respite from the storm. So, take a deep a deep breath and hang in there my friend. All we can do is take it one day at a time.

Thanks for reading! If this post speaks to you, I’d be honored if you to pass it on.

Conk’s Brain is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

You can also share the love and buy me a cup of coffee on Ko-fi.

I despise the word “too”. Too loud, Too talkative, Too boisterous, Too tenacious, Too much. I don’t fit in boxes, Defy hard lines and sharp edges. I swear liberally, love fiercely, dream so big I sometimes fear I’ll explode. I hemorrhage glitter, hit ‘em with the razzle dazzle, leave chaotic sparkle in my wake. My awesome can’t be shackled by small minds wielding “too” like a weapon to put me in my place.

Thanks for reading! If this post speaks to you, I’d be honored if you would pass it on.

Conk’s Brain is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

You can also support me and share the love by buying me a cup of coffee on Ko-fi.

I’m awkward,

Thanks for reading! If this post speaks to you, I’d be honored if you to pass it on.

Conk’s Brain is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

I don’t want to write this article. I’d rather curl up in the fetal position in front of my electric fireplace and listen to my compilation records from Vinyl Moon while the world burns, but here we are. As an English teacher, I taught many, many books about dystopian hellscapes (both real and fictional) and the students always asked, “why can’t we read something happier? This is all so depressing.” 

I can’t disagree. Reading about the worst parts of our nature and the seemingly infinite ways humanity inevitability fucks it all up doesn’t exactly warm the heart. It does, however, bring awareness of our history and our potential futures. It calls on us to evaluate how we would react and what we would do differently. The second question students always asked without fail, “how could people just sit back and let this happen? Why didn’t they speak up or fight?”

Over the years, I mediated hundreds of these discussions in my classroom. Watched as students threw up their hands in exasperation as one real or fictional tragedy after another unfolded before their eyes. It’s easy to decide the right thing to do from the comfort of your living room curled up safely in your jammies with a paper back book; it is entirely another thing to actually be living it. 

I’ve been out of the classroom for nearly 7 years now, but I’m plagued by the memories of these discussions as of late. You can’t scroll social media these days without an overwhelming sense of foreboding and doom - as a matter of fact, it’s actually called “doom scrolling”. Friendships, relationships, and families are being ripped apart by vitriol and divisive rhetoric. People are literally threatening one another with violence, roaming the streets ripping up peoples yard signs and calling for back alley justice. Shock and dismay doesn’t quite cover it. 

I’m not going to candy coat it or beat around the bush, I’ve read Night by Elie Wiesel, The Diary of A Young Girl by Anne Frank, The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer (not once, but many times). I’ve read history and fiction, been to museums, and watched countless documentaries. I have done my damn research, and I can say with certainty that history is repeating itself right before our eyes. 

You know that famous quote by Martin Niemöller that everyone mass shares on social media? 

“First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.”

How many times have you thought silently or aloud, I would speak up! I would fight! But dealing with hypotheticals and history in retrospect is immeasurably easier than present tense action. Risking your own relationships, reputation, safety and community standing is scary and deeply uncomfortable. I get it - reality is so much heavier than hypotheticals. 

I think it’s high time we lean into a team lift. Even when you’re tired and afraid, remember: Your courage is louder than their hate. Stand tall, you are not alone in this fight. Your vote is your voice. Period. Full stop. We are in a fight for the fate of our democracy. I don’t care how reactionary that sounds, because it’s the truth. 

I have watched Donald Trump and MAGA twist the narrative through hate and fear. I have watched his speeches, read his tweets, listened to the words coming out of his mouth. He talks about our country with disdain, sings the praises of tyrants and dictators, asks us to look upon our fellow man with distrust and hatred in our hearts. The Republican party has openly expressed that they are coming for the immigrants, the liberals, the LGBTQIA+ community, women’s rights, and anyone who opposes Donald Trump. I will not be silent. 

In person early voting starts in Kansas on October 21, 2024. Don’t ever let anyone tell you that your vote doesn’t count. Even if you are a little blue dot in an overwhelming sea of red, even if you are scared, even if the people you love are spreading lies and hate - you are not alone. This is our chance to amplify our voices, to stand up for the marginalized, to be on the right side of history. In the words of one of my very favorite contestants on Drag Race Bianca Del Rio, “Not today Satan, not today”. 

Thanks for reading! If this post speaks to you, I’d be honored if you to pass it on.

Conk’s Brain is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

I stumbled on a poem that I wrote in June of 2020. It’s every bit as relevant now as it was four years ago, maybe more so.

The weight of the world crashing down like a tidal wave,

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I can’t even count the number of times in my life I’ve heard the adage “Never talk about religion or politics in polite company”. Like every family, we had a few who had strong opinions and stated them loudly (and often), but my day to day life was largely devoid of “politics”. My grandparents had a subscription to the paper which they read over coffee at the kitchen table, but my parents never did. There were never any lively discussions in my immediate household about public policies or presidential candidates, no avid opinions about world events.

I did, however, know that my family was staunchly Republican and Ronald Reagan took office the year I was born. My grandma would exclaim in frustration, “Damn Democrats” every time she stomped on a box elder bug that wandered into her kitchen. It wasn’t till college that I learned not everyone calls them that. When I turned 18 and registered to vote, my grandpa was visibly upset and expressed his disappointment upon finding that I had registered as Independent. I’m quite certain he rolls in his grave every time I now utter the words, “I’m a registered Democrat”.

It’s safe to say that none of my childhood friends had openly political families either. We didn’t sit around the lunch table at school or hang out on the playground discussing foreign policy. The only formative memory I have of being actively engaged in politics was the 1992 mock elections my 5th grade class engaged in where I, of course, voted for Ross Perot. I was visibly shaken when he dropped out of the race and got my first taste of being gravely disappointed by a politician.

As I sit here typing, we are embroiled in an election year wrought with controversy. Over the last 9 years, I’ve watched everything I believed to be true about our country pulled apart at the seams and fear, distrust, and hostility rip apart friendships and families. I’ve seen people succumb to their basest instincts turning on their fellow Americans with unimaginable vitriol. Social media and the internet at large has become an unrecognizable cesspool of misinformation, outright lies, and seething hatred towards our fellow humans.

Through all of this I have felt the gamut of emotions: depression, exasperation, fear, defeat, hopelessness, anger, confusion, and helplessness. Every time I open Facebook, Instagram, or TikTok these same emotions are reflected back to me through the faces of friends, family, and strangers. Despite it all, I have refrained from talking about “politics” in polite company. I haven’t shared or posted my thoughts and feelings on social media and the truth is this is largely due to fear.

For years, I have been sitting idly by afraid to have an opinion publicly, afraid of people’s reactions, afraid of what could happen to myself or my family if I speak up. At this exact moment I am terrified, but I am more unwilling to sit back and do nothing anymore. What is that famous saying misattributed to Edmund Burke? “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”.

The last few months have brought a new wave of emotions: hope, joy, optimism, empowerment, purpose, determination, and fighting spirit. My faith in humanity and my hope for a brighter future have been rekindled by the outpouring of love and support cropping up in social media feeds, Substack articles, and comment sections. Yes, the hate and divisiveness and vitriol still exist. The fear and the uncertainty still hover in the corners of every room, but everywhere, I am watching my fellow humans rise to meet it with determination and bravery. I too have been inspired to answer the call.

As I think about the future of this Substack and the content I might create for social media, I have been jotting down answers in my trusty notebook to questions compiled from various sources on how to effectively connect with your audience on the inter webs. For the sake of transparency, I’m just going to share my notes as they are written so that you might have a glimpse into the inner workings of my brain (and maybe be inspired to answer the same questions for yourself).

Who is your target audience?

→ Rural Kansas women who are liberal, left leaning, or democrats 💙

→ Childless cat ladies 🐈‍⬛

→ Fellow neurodivergents 🧠

How do you want them to feel after consuming your content?

→ Inspired and hopeful

→ Seen and supported

→ Epiphanies, ah-ha moments, knowledgeable

→ Ready to take action → Agency

→ Solidarity

What can you teach them or what can you learn together?

→ How state and local government works

→ Who is running for office, how to run for office

→ Where to find information & resources to make their own opinions, knowledge is power

→ How to critically evaluate sources

→ How to foster empathy, embrace diversity, and keep an open mind

→ How to create firm boundaries and respect the boundaries of others

→ How to constructively create kindness, tolerance, and understanding in the world around you

→ How to take care of yourself (and the basic things we forget to do)

What do you want them to do?

→ Create the world they want to live in

→ Leave the world a little better than they found it

→ Love themselves more and believe that they are worthy of that love

I am both excited and a little nervous to share this journey with you and I look forward to all the things we will learn along the way. As with all my endeavors, it will certainly be an adventure (at the very least).

Connect with me:

Instagram

Facebook

TikTok

Time gets away from me.

I have struggled epically with my desire to connect with others through writing and social media and my outright fear of internet trolls. As a high school English teacher my classroom was often a minefield of teenage angst and parental criticism. I would spend hours (sometimes days) researching and planning new lessons only to be met with “This is stupid”, “You’re stupid”, or “I hate this. Why do we even have to take this class anyway”. And that doesn’t even take into account all of the personal attacks on my character.

My first year teaching in a new school district (and fifth year as an educator) my car was keyed, a cold beverage ice and all was dumped on my chair, and a student disrupted my class as they ran down the hall past my room yelling, “Conkey is a CUNT!” This was in a school with a population of 250 students, give or take. No, not all of my experiences were this hostile and yes, I forged lasting connections with many bright, creative, inspiring students who have grown into adults that I am so incredibly proud of - but it seems to be human nature to ruminate on our failures rather than successes.

The vast recesses of social media are filled with both the best and worst of our human impulses. It’s like grown adults revert back to their teenage selves on their worst day. If you dredge through the comment sections on Facebook and TikTok, you’ll find every manner of affront to grammar and spelling as people hurl insults that are at best disrespectful and mean, at worst threatening and borderline illegal.

I have seen people canceled, bullied into hiatus, and reduced to tears. I’ve also seen people whose lives and families have been threatened with all manner of violence, harassment, and even doxing. I’ve seen entire comment sections devolve into an onslaught of teeth gnashing from near bloodthirsty, angry mobs of online strangers.

Perhaps what’s worse, is that too many people write this off as the price of interacting in digital public spaces. Well, you know, the trolls are gonna troll or as Taylor says, “The haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate”. It’s like standing in my classroom listening to a student (whose parent was also a teacher) say, “You’re the one who signed up to be a teacher, this is what you get”.

I do not accept this response. I do not accept this attitude of dismissal and complacency. No, we can’t just stop people from being assholes. No, we can’t just demand that no one ever hurt our feelings, but we can establish boundaries. We can hold people to account. We can chose to do better for ourselves and others. Just because us elder millennials and the generations that came before us have never been taught how to talk about religion or politics or difficult issues without having a knock down, drag out brawl, doesn’t mean we can’t learn.

There is a staunch difference between disagreeing respectfully and insulting, degrading, or threatening another human being for having a difference of opinion. Can we not set the expectation of civility and then hold others to account? Can we not say if you chose to demean and threaten me, I will block and report you? Look, I understand that in the comment section of a viral post there might be thousands of responses and that we can’t reasonably respond to them all. I also realize that bots and fake accounts exist for the sole purpose of disseminating hate and disinformation, but that doesn’t mean we give up and stop trying.

I guess what I’m really trying to say is that I’m afraid of trolls. I’ve been discouraged by the hate and dehumanization that exists in online social spaces. I’ve been afraid to put myself out there because of the very real possibility that someone will run through my comment section yelling, “Conkey is a cunt!” But I think my desire to share joy and hope, to bond with strangers over the beauty and complexity and sometimes pain of existence, might finally be greater than my fear of trolls. Wish me luck, I’m lacing up my sparkle shoes and going out there to get my ass kicked.

Conk’s Brain is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

One of my absolute favorite memes goes a little something like this, “Never in the history of telling someone to calm down has anyone ever calmed down by being told to calm down”. Think about it. Really picture a situation in which you are absolutely losing your shit and think about the feelings that arise when some unsuspecting bystander ignorantly interjects, “You need to calm down”.

It might feel patronizing, condescending, dismissive (but absolutely not helpful). The sentiment might be met with rage, swearing, tears, or something distinctly the opposite of calming down. And, trust that I would support you whole heartedly in your frustration. Why then am I about to suggest a solution that seems entirely counterproductive to this shared understanding about the uselessness of telling someone to calm down?

First I must take us on a slight detour into the land of “RSD” (I’m doing the Sponge Bob rainbow hands as I say this). Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria is characterized by extreme emotional sensitivity brought on by real or perceived rejection or a sense of failure or falling short. A vast percentage of people with ADHD also experience RSD. Check out the article “The Most Impairing (and Overlooked) Part of ADHD: Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria” by substack author Laura Hudson for deeper insight.

I absolutely struggle with RSD and emotional regulation in general especially when my brain is overstimulated. My response to perceived rejection, annoyance, or frustration can be devastatingly disproportionate to the actual stressor. In those moments, it’s like I’m having an out of body experience watching myself completely melt down into a fit of hysterics powerless to stop it. This has everything to do with my brain switching to fight or flight mode and my primal brain tossing logic and reason straight out the window. Try reasoning with a person being chased by a wild animal through the jungle, “Hey there! I notice that jaguar is attempting to eat you, have you tried calming down?”

Sounds ridiculous when you put it in that perspective, right? A brain in fight or flight can’t tell the difference between a hungry predator and someone declaring that your bundt cake does in fact suck. It’s a leftover protective mechanism that no longer serves us quite the same way in modern society. People with RSD often experience this phenomenon two fold and later feel deeply embarrassed or ashamed by their societally unaccepted responses to these external stimuli.

This is why telling someone else to calm down or having someone tell you to calm down in a moment of heightened emotions never works, but what if you tell yourself to calm down? What if, far in advance of the stressful situation, you put a plan in place to help your future self emotionally regulate? Enter the rock of calm-down-y-ness. Its powers are not infinite but they are certainly immense.

Disclaimer: Please understand that what I am about to describe is not a one size fits all solution that will work for everyone. Instead, I hope that you will see it as an example of one possible solution and use your big, beautiful brain to create a solution that is uniquely you.

Now, imagine if you will a group of grown women gathered around a large dining room table covered in a plastic table cloth - a pile of flat, smooth rocks and paint pens piled in the center. We were painting rocks with whimsical designs to be left in rock beds throughout town so that passers by might see these rocks and smile. As I pondered my final rock, a pile of finished creations lay around me: a mouse holding a heart shaped balloon, a colorful red mushroom, a cute cartoon figure holding a heart. What then to do with this final rock?

It was a good rock, the perfect size and weight to be held in your palm. I began painting pastel shapes - rounded triangles in soothing shades of lavender, teal, sunshine yellow, and green. All at once it came to me. I had, that very day, experienced a particularly disconcerting episode of RSD colliding with emotional dysregulation and was now in a state of profound calm. I chuckled to myself and began writing on top of the now warm, pastel colored rock, “You need to calm down.”

This sentiment wasn’t coming from someone else. It was coming from me. It was written from a place of reflection, love, and understanding. This wasn’t some stranger or loved one criticizing me, judging me, or being exasperated. This was kind and thoughtful me whispering a note of compassion to future me. I was compelled to try an experiment.

I took the rock home with me and laid it next to the lamp in our living room, a place that was very visible and where I spend most of my time while at home. I then instructed my husband to hand me this rock the next time I began to have an RSD/emotionally dysregulated meltdown. He didn’t need to say anything, just hand me the rock.

When the moment came, he did exactly as asked, picked up the rock from its spot by the lamp and placed it in my hand. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen the Disney movie Lilo and Stitch, but there is a moment when Stitch (an alien) is playing make-believe and rampaging through a town made of building blocks destroying everything in sight. Lilo places a Hawaiian lei (she is from Hawaii and this is where the film is set) around Stitch’s neck and informs him that he needs to calm down. He immediately goes slack and becomes completely relaxed as if the lei was magic.

While the effect was not exactly the same, holding that rock in my hand was equally profound. The weight, the shape, the colors, the loving message from past me brought me back into the present moment. I held it, I breathed deeply, I concentrated on the memory of creating this rock and just as suddenly as I had spiraled, I began to recenter.

No, it’s not magic. And no, it doesn’t magically heal everything inside me. However, the rock of calm-down-y-ness does shift my brain from fight or flight to logic and critical thinking. It is a tool to help bring me back to a more compassionate, loving, and understanding self. Are there times it doesn’t work as effectively? Sure. Are there times I completely forget about the rock and continue to melt down anyway? Of course. Because I’m human and humans never get anything right 100% of the time.

This is why my rock works for me but might not work for you. It has power because I gave it power. The best time to formulate a plan for the future is when you are in a state of calm. Find something tangible and tactile that can ground you when shit starts to hit the fan. It can be imbued with the literal words, “You need to calm down” or just be something that makes you feel that way in the moment. As long as you chose this object with love and it is imbued with a strong memory of peace and calm it can serve as your object-of-calm-down-y-ness.

Obviously, this is just one tool in what I hope will become a whole box of tools. It’s not the prescription for solving the problems of life, the universe, and everything but every little bit helps. And some days, a little bit is exactly what you need.