This is my journal entry from February 8, 2026 — my real, unedited day, shared just as it happened.
Woke up this morning and headed out to tennis with my tennis coach and a tennis partner. Before that, I started editing some of my old books to get them back live on Amazon. It seems crazy that I published all these books a decade ago and I just unpublished them for no good reason. Maybe to clean my inventory up. They're still on there. And that felt good to get those back out there. I also worked on getting my audiobook for I'm Seeking a Wife. I got that worked on this morning, too. It was a productive morning. Got out there to play tennis with my tennis partner and my coach, and I had a great time. We hit lots of balls, had fun, caught up, and I'm so glad I went. It was a good exercise, too.
I came home, had a nice big salad to eat, then walked around Crescent Lake with my shirt off to get some sun. Came in and worked my ass off for four hours. I rolled through the manuscript of the book I was going to call Un-effin' Myself, but now I don't know if I'm going to call it that. But I rolled through the entire final chapter, and then I'll do an epilogue, and that felt great. Time just melted while I did that. I loved how much work I put into my books today. If I'm doing work on my books, everything just feels right. I know this is what I want to do. And I'm just going to keep doing it. And I'm going to pray that the universe supports that like it already has. I'll pray that it keeps supporting it and keep my ears open for anything I need to do to make that happen.
After working on my books all morning and into the early afternoon, my ex-wife says she's bringing the kids home from the state fair and they'll be available at her house. I drive up to her house and I play the Harry Potter deck builder successfully today with the kids. My daughter and my son are getting along really well. The kids had a great time at the state fair, which was perfect. And my ex-wife's mother went with them, so they had a really nice time. I played the deck builder game with the kids and we whooped up on them. We picked the right proficiencies and I played Hermione and she actually did well with her upgraded power. And my ex-wife said that I might enjoy playing Ticket to Ride with the kids. I would love to just keep learning and playing different board games with the kids. I love their enthusiasm. And yet, you know, sometimes they get really into stuff and then they're kind of over it. Like they were really into Harry Potter Monopoly for a while. They've been really into the Harry Potter deck builder game lately. And I want to keep the board game enthusiasm going. This is a dream come true to play board games with my kids. And I'm so grateful. Playing a board game with the kids is so much more fun than like getting on screens or something. It just feels a lot better.
I had a nice talk with my ex-wife and a realization starts to come up. I've been wondering what was going on. You know, I've been thinking loving thoughts about my brother and trying to figure out how I could make amends there. But I just was having a hard time seeing exactly how I was wrong. Like, yeah, I didn't come to his wedding and I was standing behind my defensiveness of like, I have a right to say no to my brother's wedding. Of course I do. And yes, I had valid points about the drinking there and the drive and all that stuff. But I go over to my mom's house after hanging out with my ex-wife and the family, and I have an epiphany. I realize that what was really getting me with my brother's wedding was this secret part of my personality. I finished listening to The Seat of the Soul today by Gary Zukav, and it hit me. I'm like, this hidden aspect of my personality that was operating, that was pulling the trigger on not going to my brother's wedding, it was really all about jealousy. And yes, that was unacknowledged jealousy.
It was jealousy to go see my brother marrying again and starting a whole new chapter. At the time, that's what I secretly wanted. And there were times when I consciously was very aware of it. But it was one of those things like an unacknowledged or buried desire I felt bad about. And here's my brother living it. And I can see now, like, it doesn't make logical sense why I attacked his wedding and attacked his fiance at the time and now wife. It doesn't make sense how critical and nasty and defensive I was about the whole thing. And yeah, I've been sober long enough that I could go to my brother's wedding and not drink like that. That was a bigger deal than I made it.
My mom said I'd regret not going to his wedding, which I don't know that regret's the right word. If I had to do it over again, I would face what was going on inside of me. Like, why am I so triggered by my brother getting married again? And then I would have seen, it's like, oh, because I want to get married again. I want to get divorced first off. And I want to find the kind of life he's got. Like he has what I want. And I was shocked that, you know, on the surface, like, I criticize, you know, superficial things, but deep down in the general template of his life, like, here he was having what I couldn't say that I wanted. Once I had that epiphany and talked to my mom, I'm like, okay, now I can issue my brother an apology and properly make amends, because now I see why I was acting that way. Because I couldn't say I'm sorry for not going to his wedding when I felt righteous and justified with the logical points I made. But what wasn't logical was why, instead of going there to support my brother and having the inconvenience of the time and the travel and the people drinking, the love for my brother in an ideal scenario would have overcome those things. But because I had that hidden jealousy underneath, then I made the decision out of fear instead of love. And that hurt my brother. And that left an uncomfortable part of the relationship with my mother too. I drive home and I dictate a letter to my brother and I feel much better.
I go to the AA meeting and I share how, you know, I tie it into what the person did for the lead and I share about that there. And then I started to think, who else have I been acting toward in a way that I'm not proud of? And the next name that comes to the top of my mind is a woman I had been seeing. I'm like, damn it. I was a jerk with her. She was so nice with me. I'd gotten to know her, and we'd traded services, and it was a lopsided trade in my favor; she gave me much more than I gave her. And I realized then that after the last time I saw her, I sent her this message right after my ex-wife and I decided to get divorced. I sent her this message asking if she wanted to go to the beach with me. And the last time I'd seen her, my ex-wife and I were married and we're having, you know, a little bit of a hard time. And all of a sudden I'm asking her to go out on something I definitely mean as a date. And like that put her in an awkward position. If I had it to do over again, I would feel that out, or, you know, I would kind of gently work into that instead of just asking her over a voice memo. Like if I had it to do over, I'd go see her several times as I was getting divorced, because I thought she was dating somebody too. So I'm asking this girl out that is also, I think, dating someone. You know, it's inconsiderate. Inconsiderate to send a message like that.
She handled it really well, as I documented in my previous daily series. And I was not nice about it. I sent her a message back saying if she wanted to keep things professional, which is a summary of the message she sent, that I didn't need to see her anymore, which was rude. It was a hurtful message. Because I really enjoyed my time with her. And I can see now, damn, that was a hurtful message. Now, then on top of that, I sent another message or two with cold energy and intent. And she had reached out a couple of times since. So I'm like, I need to send her a message to make amends and admit what I was wrong. So I sent her a three minute, 33 second voice memo after the AA meeting tonight, talking about what I talked about here. And instead of sending my brother a letter, I just sent him a text message to say what I said here in like five sentences.
And then I'm seeing even more areas, like my side of the street has gotten dirty. Like these previous daily entries are embarrassing at this point with how I behaved. And yet I forgive myself for acting that way, and the best way I can move forward is to act differently, to act out of love and joy. And I think it's real to leave those entries as they are. I could go back and try and clean them up and stuff, but that's what I did. I have entries in the past where I ranted about her. If you've read all those, you can remember those. And it's like, I did this. I created this. I did all this. Now, you know, you do everything with other people too, so let's not get overly self-important. But I put some bad energy into things with her. I put a lot of bad energy into things with my brother. And that was inconsiderate, what I did with her as well.
And yet, I think the best way to make amends to her would just be to leave her alone at this point. I said I wanted to end things a month ago in the last message. I think that'd by far be the best way. You know, if she reaches out again, I would be nice. So the best way I can make amends with her is to leave her alone. I don't need to, you know, bring up the past with her. And with other people, I gossiped about people often indirectly. I often didn't say their name directly. But this was what was revealed in my book that now is called I'm Seeking a Wife. I mean, in the first version of that, I went around like sideways criticizing several girls that I've got to know. Like with a woman I had been talking to, I wasn't nice with her. You know, she sent me a message and then I didn't text her back for months. Like I left the conversation hanging. So now, I did that again. The next time I texted her, I intentionally sent her a message and didn't reply to it. That's not nice. I didn't reply for weeks to it because I thought it was funny. And then she now has dropped the text conversation a couple of times. It's like, what do you expect? You did that first.
Going forward, I intend to consistently act and choose love as much as possible. I'm so grateful I've had some of these realizations without having to take a drink or spinning out worse. I'm so glad I got through my divorce while I also wasn't talking to my brother, and created drama with so many other people. And I'm grateful I took this thorough inventory with the kind of wife I want to have moving forward. It's like, you know, I imagine a second wife would say, well, if you want to be with me, you need to clean your side of the street up to prepare. You need to clean up, you know, the resentment with your brother, the way you've treated other people, like the woman I had been seeing is a good example, and the woman I had been talking to. You need to clean that up. Now, with the woman I had been talking to, I don't know as there's anything to do there except to, you know, be thankful for the conversations we did have, to forgive her for not responding, for dropping the text thread a couple of times herself, just like I did, to have some enthusiasm if she reaches out again, and to be open to love when it comes along, and to have an abundant mindset. There's a whole world full of women out there. One woman that really is excited to be with me that I'm excited to be with is enough, and I don't need to try and figure out who it's going to be until it's clear. I'm super grateful for these realizations today, and I think this is a great journey. If you started with me at Author in St. Petersburg and got here, it's kind of like, huh, this is cool. I could see some of this was going wrong before, and it's nice to see where it's at today.
If you connect with how I live and think, you can follow the rest of my days on YouTube in my Life playlist.