This one's with Nate. My sink and AC decided to give out in the same week, so we start there with me venting a little while Nate compares notes from his own home remodel, including a crawlspace he's not exactly thrilled about. From there it goes into his union laborer work and the bathroom he's been rebuilding by hand, including a corner vanity he wasn't about to pay $500 for. Stick around, because things really pick up around the 15 minute mark. We get into presence, what our dads did differently than their dads, and some research Nate ran into on boundaries and compassion that's been sitting with me since. He opens up about his own path through recovery and a mentor named Terry who shaped him more than he can fully put into words. Somewhere in there he drops the line that gives this episode its name, that success can be sneakier than failure because nobody warns you when things are actually going well. We close it out with him doing ninja-ups on his back porch while his granddaughter cheers him on in the background. Good one.

The first one. In this intro episode I get into why I started Not Dead, Yet., why I'm not going to monetize it, and what it's actually done for me so far. I go honest about my own stagnation this past year, the tension between wanting independence and being present for my family, and what I learned installing a mini-split myself instead of paying someone to do it. Some stuff about pivoting when the things you want to do have to sit on the back burner for a while, and why I've been trying to outsource less of my own life, even when it's hard. No agenda. Just getting the pulse going.