Making Space

Some weekends feel like progress even when nothing about them feels easy.

This one had a little of everything.

One of the last things I dealt with before the weekend really began was a difficult meeting. The final conversation with an employee who had reached the end of their time with us. HR was on the call. Emotions were involved. These things never feel good, even when they are handled correctly.

When the call ended, the feeling wasn’t victory or relief.

It was exhaustion.

They were a great employee. There are lessons to be learned in what happened, and there will be peace for us to reclaim in time. But leadership moments like that always carry weight. Even when you know you handled them correctly.

Sometimes especially then.

The rest of the weekend was spent doing something much more physical.

I rebuilt my office.

Or more accurately, my family and I rebuilt my office.

Every piece of it came apart. Desks moved. Computers unplugged. Cables everywhere. If you’ve ever torn down a workspace like that, you know the tension that comes with it. Moves like that have taken days for us before. Cables across the floor. Tempers short. Everyone stepping around the same mess trying to make it work.

But this time was different.

The last time we rearranged the room, the kids and I spent a lot of time doing something tedious but important. We culled cables. Removed what we didn’t need. Bundled what we did. Wrapped them in sleeves and labeled the rest.

At the time it just felt like cleanup.

This weekend it paid off in spades.

What normally would have taken two days took about five hours. From the first unplugged cable to both computers powered back on and working.

The whole time I kept waiting for something to fail. It was going too smoothly. Anyone who has rebuilt a workspace knows that moment where you expect the problem to show up eventually.

It never did.

For a while I didn’t quite believe it was done.

Eventually I had to accept it. The machines were running. The room was functional again. We just needed to clean up and settle everything back into place.

And I could continue the work I had been preparing for.

Part of rebuilding the office meant doing something I don’t always do very well.

Making space for myself.

My back has been wrecked lately from rough sleep on a bad bed. We’ll fix that at some point. But the truth is, the room I spend most of my time in needed attention too.

Not work space. Not family logistics space.

Space that works for me.

There were moments over the weekend where I had to explain something simple to the kids.

They have everything they need. Everything they could reasonably ask for.

But this project, this space, this effort…

This one is for me.

Not selfishly. Not at their expense. But intentionally.

Balance isn’t something you talk about.

It’s something you demonstrate.

Sometimes that means letting your kids see you build something that belongs to you.

We also spent a lot of time talking about baseball.

David is still processing the disappointment of not making the school team this year. That’s not an easy thing to navigate as a kid. But he’s beginning to see the purpose and the potential that comes from continuing to play and grow.

And then Jacob surprised me.

He’s always been the one talking about basketball. A sport I’ve never been particularly drawn to. Not because it’s a bad game. It’s just never been mine.

But he knows something important.

If he played, I’d be there.

Every game I could make.

Not because I suddenly fell in love with the sport, but because I love watching my kids become who they’re becoming.

So when he said he wanted to play baseball this year, it wasn’t really about the sport.

It was about his brother.

He wants to be there with him. Support him. Walk through the season together.

That kind of instinct comes from a good and sweet place.

The kind that makes you realize that somewhere along the way, you might actually be doing something right as a parent.

School started its second week today.

New eight week classes. New expectations. New ideas.

The 4.0 is still intact. That was resolved last week. There’s always a little tension about keeping it, but that isn’t the focus right now.

The real work is learning.

Engaging with the material. Asking better questions. Staying present with the ideas each week brings. The grades will land where they land if the work is done honestly.

Right now the goal is simple.

Stay curious. Stay disciplined. Keep building.

And somewhere in the middle of all of this, the office is running again.

What surprised me most wasn’t just how quickly we rebuilt the room. It’s what that speed unlocked.

Because the move went smoothly, I had time and energy left to keep going.

The streaming PC is more organized than it has ever been. Systems are cleaner. Tasks now have purpose instead of piling on top of each other. The foundation is finally starting to look intentional instead of improvised.

When the structure works, progress compounds.

The house feels a little more ordered. The workspace feels ready. Baseball season is beginning.

Momentum is starting to build.

The house feels a little more ordered.
The workspace feels ready.
Baseball season is beginning.

Momentum is starting to build.

Not loud.
Not rushed.

Just steady.

There’s a line that came back to me this weekend while we were tearing apart cables and putting the room back together.

Sometimes setting up the future means breaking parts of the past first.

Old systems. Old layouts. Old expectations.

Sometimes even old assumptions about how your time is supposed to be spent.

You take things apart carefully. You rebuild them with intention. And somewhere in the middle of the process you realize you’re not just rearranging furniture.

You’re making space.

Space for the work ahead.
Space for the people you care about.
Space for yourself.

And if you’re doing it right, the structure that replaces the old one will hold a little stronger than the last.

This is a grounded moment.

And this week, we build from here.