Decisions, Clarity, and Rising World Disparity

A couple weeks ago, on a bit of a whim, I took a weekend to travel around the Appalachian Mountains. While driving down the Blue Ridge Parkway on Saturday, I stopped at Saddle Point, which sits on the top of the ridge in the mountains of Virginia. From here, I could see far out across the landscape on both sides of the ridge. It is truly spectacular.

It struck me that, for the first time in a while, I wasn’t in a rush to get anywhere. I could let myself relax. To just stare out over the landscape and be still. The last couple years have been a whirlwind (in my life and in the world). But here I was, with time to sit and reflect, unburdened by distractions or deadlines. I haven’t had that privilege in a long time. There was a lot to unpack, so I pulled out a notebook and started writing. Now I’ve typed it up to share.

Here goes.

Almost exactly a year ago, in September 2025, I was on a road trip through the mountains that also took us on the Blue Ridge Parkway. We stopped at this exact point. When I think of who I was during that trip, I realize that it is remarkable how much can change in a year. Year-ago me was working at USACE and pushing hard (way too hard) to finish my Master’s degree. Year-ago me was contemplating the implications of staying at USACE during the federal turmoil caused by the current administration. DOGE was removing critical people from federal service without any critical thought, cutting research programs, and changing the scope of remaining programs so they were barely recognizable, including the programs I was working on.

In February to March of the same year (2025), DOGE had threatened to cut a significant number of “probationary” employees; employees who had been in service for less than two years. Some employees were cut with no regard for their impact in the organization. The cuts were extensive, particularly in civilian agencies such as USAID, the Department of Education, and the Environmental Protection Agency. My USACE lab was more insulated than most government organizations, but we weren’t immune. The threats became a real possibility while I was on a work trip. I was just under two years into my position, still probationary. I sat in an airport with my team. I wondered if I would lose my job. They wondered if I would lose my job. We had already seen cuts, we knew it could happen. We spoke on the plane in depth about what I could do if I was cut too.

That uncertainty catalyzed me towards change. I tipped myself over the fence. I decided that I wanted to move on. My mind was already headed in that direction due to the changing priorities of our work, but it’s (not so) funny how a forcing function can speed up the process. In the back (or maybe the middle) of my mind, I knew that I wanted to move on, because the organization’s priorities were shifting in a way that no longer aligned with the impact I want my career to have. But the possibility of losing my job made me act on it faster. It made me change my life with greater urgency.

Speaking to my friends and colleagues around the lab was accompanied by a massive elephant in the room. I watched teams’ project funding get cut. I watched the scope of other projects drastically change to align with new “priorities.” I watched the erasure of any efforts that could even be remotely connected to sustainability, to environmental preservation, to mitigating climate change, and to the humanities. To regulation. To responsibility and accountability in Military spaces and Military resource use. But we weren’t allowed to be “political,” even though it was directly affecting us.

My work at USACE was in power systems and microgrid projects, but the military capabilities it enabled had been shifted to the hands of some of the most cruel and irresponsible leaders - not just in my lifetime, but in the lifetime of mentors and colleagues I looked up to who have had decades-long military careers. None of us were surprised watching the administration spark needless war and escalate global conflict. Iran, Yemen, Gaza.

“No new wars,” amirite? 

I remember hearing that from the deceiver’s lips over and over again. I also distinctly remember continuous promises of lower gas and grocery prices. Instead, we’re in a fuel supply crisis thanks to the Iran war. Of course. We need to transition away from fuel, but not by way of crisis.

Not to mention the promise to “cut government waste,” which brings us back to the whole DOGE mess. Thanks to DOGE, the size of the federal government workforce fell by 327,000 people since October 2024, or 11% of the total government workforce (Number of Federal Employees by Year Statistics in US 2026 | Key Facts - The World Data). But, government spending is at an all-time high ($6.81 Trillion in 2026, Federal Spending | U.S. Treasury Fiscal Data) and no ordinary person’s taxes are any lower. So, if not to us, where are all the savings from paying fewer government employees going? To the sleazebags at the top.

It felt like I was going through the motions at work. I cared about my team (and I still do). I held on to hope that the direction of our projects would once again become something I could look at with pride in the impact it had. I want the work to continue, because when power changes hands again, some normalcy may eventually be re-established (although it will take years). Perhaps our military capabilities will be used somewhat responsibly again. Perhaps USACE will once again drive efforts that include climate change mitigation, renewable energy, mobile power for disaster relief efforts, networked power systems / microgrids in remote and under-served communities, etc. 

What a wonderful thing it would be for USACE to drive these efforts instead of Hegseth’s “Holy war.” When he prays for victory against the “enemy,” his words are the creaking of a rusty gate. He doesn’t give a shit about the innocents caught in the wake of his war. Innocent people torn apart by American bombs. Iranian girls’ schools, the Strait of Hormuz, etc. International legal frameworks that define war crimes have been established to hold people like him accountable, but they’re failing.

Amen?

I started pursuing my Master’s degree shortly after beginning work at USACE, and completed my degree in two years while working full time. Things were normal. It was rewarding, even though I was always busy. I found my classes to be useful to my work, and I completed a thesis project that I significantly enjoyed. The direction of my work at USACE was also rewarding. It aligned with my interests at the time that I started my degree.

Things took a dive quickly after November 2024, which compounded the stress I was already under from the juggling act. Changing priorities not only killed my motivation at work, but made me question the impact of my career. 

For years, my mind told me that my studies were never enough. I was never doing enough. There was too much going wrong with the world to focus only on my education. I joined student groups, championed proposals, led community service events, ran for student senate (and won). I threw every ounce of myself that I didn’t spend on my studies into these efforts.

That was also rewarding in many ways, but I nearly drowned myself in stress. I learned how corrosive stress can be. 

In September last year, I was nearing a breaking point. The path of my USACE work seemed bleak. I remember sitting in this exact spot at Saddle Point wondering if I would be able to change things. Not just for me, but also on a broader level. I had three months left to complete my degree. I had been searching for a new position for a couple months at this point, navigating an increasingly complex and competitive job market. I was searching for the type of position where I could make a positive impact in a field of my interest. The longer I searched, the more it felt like I was searching for a unicorn.

I was intentional in my job search no matter how badly I wanted to find a new position.

Conditions at USACE kept degrading. Funding for our projects was dwindling. Our programmatic leads were burning the candle at both ends trying to make it work; trying to find alternate funding sources. I will always appreciate the work they put in. Regardless, I struggled to see a path forward that I was motivated to take, but there was still pressure to perform technically. External and self-imposed.

I finished my Master’s program, somehow, and graduated in December 2025. I wore the regalia, walked the stage, and felt like a zombie through it all. Like an outside observer, almost. I can even see it in my pictures. The stress had eaten away at me and I had no leads yet in my job search. I knew I had accomplished something incredible, but I couldn’t really feel it. My life wasn’t changing after graduation. I had no idea how much longer it would take for me to find another path. 

Regardless, I am extremely grateful that I had the opportunity to study and earn my degrees.

Many people, especially women, never get the chance to study and build a career. It’s easy to forget how recently, relative to the span of history, women (in some countries) have had the freedom to study alongside men, to vote, to own property, to work, to be autonomous. And we do it all (remarkably!) while troglodytes on the internet say we should return to “traditional values” or to the “good old days.” Good for whom, exactly?

I kept working and searching for a new position several months after graduation, but it was a tremendous effort to just keep moving forward. It turns out, years of overextending yourself compounded with uncertainty can lead to a thing called “burnout.”

Gasp.

Should’ve seen it coming.

I’m in a much better place now, though.

I found a fantastic position in industry after months of searching. The moment I received the offer in April, it was as if the fog had lifted. Things instantly felt brighter than they had in at least two years. In one day, it was as if the world opened up again. I even celebrated my graduation in a way that I couldn’t months ago. All that effort, it was leading me somewhere. Somewhere with promise.

I packed up my life and moved to North Carolina at the beginning of June. Now I am settling into my new position, which has been an amazing fit so far. I am finally in a stable enough place to pursue hobbies and efforts outside of work that I haven’t yet had the chance to. I joined a hiking club, joined my local Sierra Club chapter, and did some canvassing for local candidates ahead of the Midterm Elections. I have found some amazing new friends. I am working towards journal-publishing my Master’s thesis work. I am starting to write. In all of it, though, I don’t feel the self-imposed urgency that I felt before. I can pace myself. I can have better balance. 

Now that I’m not in a federal position, I am far more disconnected from the chaos of the current administration and I am building a career that I’m proud of. Nothing is completely disconnected from it, but I have the luxury of disconnecting (in a way). 

Hell, I’m sitting on a mountain ridge while children are getting bombed. I’m looking across vast, peaceful land on both sides of the ridge. I don’t have to look up. I don’t have to fight for scraps of food on decimated land. I had the freedom to just take a weekend away, drive to the mountains, see the sights, and reflect on the past few years of my life - among other things. Things that I have the privilege to look away from, but I won’t. It’s too much to process, sometimes. The magnitude of human cruelty. The massive scale to which it gets dismissed or explained away. But, the difficulty of processing it is nothing like what it is to live it.

There are far too many examples.

Exhibit A: “They should have come here legally!” 

Well, people are dying in detention centers. Let me rephrase. ICE is criminally brutalizing and neglecting people in their custody. The majority of people in detention centers are NOT criminals. Besides, regardless of supposed criminality, people deserve to have their basic needs met. People deserve dignity.

Social media algorithms reward cruelty. They amplify it. They normalize it. It dominates our feeds and begets more cruelty. Our social media feeds try to convince us that people deserve the cruelty they’ve experienced. Which works, far too often. We’ve stopped seeing the humanity in our neighbors. So I look away sometimes. For sanity.

“And who is my neighbor?”

I’ve been a social media observer for a long time. I’ve hardly ever shared my thoughts - not in the social media cesspool, anyway. I was always too occupied working towards my career. That was a part of it, anyway. I trusted that my studies would get me to a position where my technical career would have a real impact. Now, it’s paying off.

When I was 7 years old, I wanted to save the world. I had begun to learn about the ongoing climate crisis and environmental problems. I kept reading, understanding as much as my little kid brain could. I thought, “how could people keep polluting while the earth is dying?” Of course, at that stage, I had no grasp on how complex the issue truly is. There was no way I could wrap my head around corporate greed, or supply and demand, the vast, networked complexities of the global economy, or the challenges of eliminating pollution. Even if I could, understanding the immense greed that has gotten us to this point might have broken me.

My care for the climate evolved into “helping people and animals.” I wrote about everything I found to be wrong, and wondered why the adults wouldn’t fix it. I wondered, “how can people let things be this way? What will the world be like when I grow up?” I resolved that when I grew up, I would be one of the people who changes things.

At 27 years old, I have more perspective than I’ve ever had. And not just because I’m sitting on a mountain ridge. I’m still relatively young, but I’ve had 20 more trips around the sun, have built a life, a career, and am finding community in the new place I have landed. I’m wiser, educated, and much more aware.

So, what is the world like now that I’ve grown up?

To answer that question, it is important to acknowledge the difference between how the world has changed in the past 20 years and what I have learned about how the world works during that time.

I learned how wicked some peoples’ hearts can be. And how apathetic others can be. I learned how little many people think about things that don’t affect them. I learned that admitting an injustice tears your heart in two is an invitation for sharks to devour it. I learned that calling someone a “bleeding heart” is often an insult, as if caring for other people is a weakness. As if believing that it is possible to build a better world for all people, including the vulnerable and marginalized, makes a person naive.

I learned how socially and technologically complex our world is, how entrenched its power structures are as well as the people who enjoy that power. I learned how much arduous, long-term effort it takes to change policy, processes, and technology. I learned how costly it is to challenge power, those entrenched within it, and “the way we’ve always done things.” How it often takes massive coalitions backed by grassroots money, and many brave, selfless people who are willing to lay down on the wire to show the powerful that people won’t tolerate their abuse and exploitation any more. Even when they face severe risks to their livelihood, freedom, health, or their life itself.

The freedoms we enjoy today are, in part, due to people who had the strength and resolve to break away from the status quo, and even break the law, until the powerful gave in and lifted the boot a little higher off our necks. People were imprisoned, tortured, and brutalized to win us the 40-hour work week, to win women the right to vote, to end Jim Crow segregation. We tend to idolize the historical figures who led these movements because they recognize that these leaders built a better world for common people, yet many people mock modern-day leaders who want to push the boot up while despotic leaders are trying to crush our necks again.

I learned how dependent we are on the global economy; how disconnected many of us are to the effort it would take to live apart from it. How drastically different our lives would be apart from it. We would realize that none of us are truly independent, but rather we benefit from the collective efforts of the people around us and generations before us.

I learned how, despite our flaws, humans can be truly amazing. Our economic and technological development has advanced our quality of life in incredible ways. It is easy to lose sight of that when we’ve never lived in a time before modern medicine, consistently-stocked grocery stores, the ability to travel relatively easily, instant communication, and more choices than we know what to do with. We’re able to collectively advance in remarkable ways, yet we keep returning to the same, archaic social ideas. Again and again throughout history. But it’s not entirely our fault.

Despite the technological brilliance, abundance, and connection of this era, we’re still vulnerable to our worst impulses and assumptions. Powerful people manipulate our worldview and teach us to fear one another. They’ve made one our greatest strengths - connectivity through social media - one of our greatest weaknesses. We’re wary, we’re suspicious of each other, and we’re more isolated than ever. That’s by design. It distracts us from who’s really robbing us blind. Social media algorithms amplify divisive, scapegoating rhetoric. It rewards rage. It rewards causing rage. So, the cycle of fear and hate continues. Even though we advance technologically, we’re socially stagnant.

So, back to the question. What is the world like now that I’ve grown up? 

We’re dealing with many of the same problems we were 20 years ago, but with a lot more stacked on top of it. Piled higher and deeper.

The U.N. concluded that we will inevitably exceed the 1.5 C climate warming threshold; the point at which we won’t escape some of the worst impacts of climate change. Extreme weather is getting worse, growing seasons continue to become more challenging, the supply chain is strained, extreme heat is driving climate migration, biodiversity is dwindling, and ordinary life is becoming more difficult. We can adapt, but the impacts of climate change are far more apparent now than they were even 20 years ago and things will continue to get harder.

We’re ten years into the age of the modern-day despot, Trump. The age of (un)Christian Nationalism, ICE shooting people in the streets, innocent people dying in detention centers from deplorable conditions, firing tens of thousands of government workers while keeping government spending higher than ever, cutting valuable research programs, cutting cancer and other medical research, cutting climate and environmental protections, the Iran War, which has no purpose other than to appease the whims of his majesty (no new wars?), “suckers and losers,” sending weapons to Israel (many administrations are guilty of this one), Project 2025, unwashed incels shouting “Repeal the 19th,” “your body my choice,” using national park lands for oil drilling, data centers accelerating water scarcity and straining our aged power grid, cutting food regulations (causing an insane uptick in food recalls), alienating our world allies, tanking our standing on the world stage, destroying the White House, building a giant ballroom, “grab her by the pussy,” the Epstein files, tens of thousands of lies, and a cabinet filled with some of the richest, least qualified, most evil people in the world who could give the legion of doom a run for their money.

Corrupt leaders can roll back the rights of ordinary citizens alarmingly quickly. In the U.S., we’ve enjoyed a brief, shining few decades of relative peace and freedom. Don’t get me wrong, we’re far from perfect. But like clockwork, a leader emerges who seeks to be a king, and his bootlickers and allies are out in the open, trying to shove people back into boxes and erase the existence of others. They didn’t disappear in 1940. They’re becoming louder, bolder, trying to take a place in the light. 

Historians can attest to the fact that periods of relative peace and freedom rarely last long without challenge. Things get too quiet. The powerful become restless, unsatisfied with less than total control, and rear their ugly heads. They leverage economic pressure to make false promises that prompt the people to elect them. They create a scapegoat. They separate people into “us” and the “other.” They rob us while we fight amongst ourselves.

In 50 years or so, this period will be an important one in history. We’re stepping off a cliff. Vulnerable people will fall… are currently falling. People who the empire needs but won’t cooperate (for example, women who won’t have kids) face forces that want to dramatically roll back their rights. It’s already happening. We’re at the beginning of the “Christian” Nationalists’ plan for women, for example. They’re trying to erode our choices. To put us “back in our place.” To make us dependent. Their ideal outcome is that they control our lives.

We still have freedoms protected by law (in an official sense. Social protections are another story). Most women here in the U.S. live freely, but protections are waning.

Abusers are becoming even more emboldened, because the law protects them more often than it protects their victims. It is becoming easier for employers to discriminate on the basis of gender and pregnancy. Violence against women, especially at the hands of romantic partners (1 in 3 women experience it), is only getting worse. Social media platforms are amplifying “manosphere” content that radicalizes boys and young men. It teaches them that women are the cause of all their problems and to blame for their shortcomings. It teaches them to say “your body, my choice,” and to act on it. It teaches them that violence against women is trivial. That it can be justified. Manosphere content is the surge of an all-too-familiar set of misogynist ideas.

Many people in the U.S., but even more so across the world, don’t live freely. Slavery, oppressive rule, and domestic control restrict the freedoms of a significant portion of the world’s population. It breaks my heart that, given a little bit of power, people are so quick to use it to control others. To control their lives and bodies. To exploit them. To extract from them. I don’t think any other species on earth exploits their own even a fraction of the degree that we do. We’re taught to value dominance and control, a message primarily delivered to men. People who break away from that thought pattern are cycle breakers. They overcome something incredibly destructive. It takes a lot of cycle breaking to squash the idol of dominance and promote collaboration and mutual understanding as the norm.

I used my own car, my own money, my freedom to sit on a mountain ridge and write out my candid thoughts, where I am now sharing them because no one was here to pry the pen from my grip. I didn’t need to get permission from anyone. No one controls my movements, my expression, my voice. It breaks my heart to think about how rare that is. Every person deserves to live free from oppression. To speak their piece. To live their dreams. To reap the rewards of their efforts instead of having them snatched away. To live the way I have had the privilege to.

How many people - their lives, their ambitions, and their talents - have been squashed by people with power? Have had their path replaced by a script they had no choice but to follow? I’m sure plenty of people who long for freedom (In the Land of the Free) dot the landscape I am looking over. People who live very different lives, much of which is dictated by circumstance; by factors outside of their control. We are all humans who deserve the same rights, opportunities, kindness, and decency. But no one gets what they deserve.

It’s easy to look at it all and fall into hopelessness. How is it so easy to unravel decades of progress? It’s going to take many more decades to clean up the mess than the time it took for the current despots to make the mess. If that’s our reality, and we keep repeating it, is meaningful change even possible?

…

Wait. How did your mind get here? You should probably process that. It wasn’t even a question when you were a kid, because the answer was obvious. “Yes, of course it is! How can you even ask that??” You would respond if anyone dared to ask.

Maybe that’s the kind of optimism we need right now. The kind that will keep shoveling water out of a sinking ship when it seems like the water is filling the ship ten times as fast. This world is our only home. We can’t give up, no matter how dark it can be. Even if we can’t see the light sometimes. Even when cruel people seem to have immensely more power and influence than ordinary people with empathy (which is somehow toxic?).

Islands of goodness are sending out distress signals. Their lighthouses stand in a tumultuous sea, trying desperately to pierce through the storm. The black sky, heavy fog, and crashing waves have them convinced that there’s nothing else out there. That they stand alone. But storms don’t last forever. When the clouds part and the waves calm, each lighthouse will shine through the clear sky like a beacon, and realize that they were never the only source of light. They were never alone. Even when the sky was darkest and they couldn’t see a thing.

Powerful people are trying to make us feel alone in our convictions. They are flooding the zone with propaganda, trying to convince us that what’s happening now is “normal” and nothing can change. To render us hopeless. But we can’t give in to “doomerism.” We can’t become convinced that there is nothing worth fighting for. That we can’t create something better.

We’re not islands. Not really. Even if it seems like it.

I still believe there is more that unites us than divides us. I see the excellence of humanity in our innovation, our artistry, how deeply we are capable of loving one another, how we create joy and share it, how we can adapt in the face of adversity, how we can organize behind shared values, how we can challenge power. How we can talk to one another to overcome the narratives being thrown at us. We are capable of learning from one another and having fellowship with people who are different from us, even people we were taught to fear. We are capable of being kind, generous, and uplifting, even in the face of personal struggle. We can support each other and build each other up even if others have tried to tear us down. Shattered hearts still beat. We can be persistent in pursuing things that matter to us. We can think critically, form our own perspectives based on experience, and make our communities a better place. Even our smallest actions towards our neighbors and community change the world, because everything we do has a ripple effect.

The sun's setting now. Evidence that the world's still turning. We still have time, and we’ll come out on the other side of this.

As I was typing this up, I realized how timely it is. The Midterm Elections are right around the corner. 

The Midterms can shift the balance of power back toward relative sanity, but it takes collective effort. We must elect House and Senate representatives who can overcome the damage caused by the “stable genius” in the White house and his sociopathic minions. Those who have exploited and divided us for years. Who commit monstrous acts but seem untouchable. Who feed us thousands upon thousands of lies. Who cut valuable programs and safety nets without lowering taxes. Who waste our hard-earned money. Who destabilize international relations. Who perpetuate war and conflict around the world. 

The race looks different depending on your state, but it is more critical than ever to elect Senators and Representatives that will stabilize the economy, challenge Trump’s pointless wars and other assorted insanity, prioritize sustainability, protect our public lands, protect the rights, privacy, and dignity of all people, and invest in schools, healthcare, and valuable research programs.

They just so happen to have a “D” next to their name, more often than not. 

Make sure to get out and vote. It’s still a freedom of ours, one that shouldn’t be taken for granted.

Appendix:

There's far too much AI slop on the internet, but I will never have AI write for me.