Category: Uncategorized

  • The Places We Choose to Live

    The Places We Choose to Live

    Over the past year, I have found myself changing more than my routines.

    I have been changing my environment.

    Not simply the places I spend my time, but the conversations I allow myself to remain in. The voices I listen to. The people I keep close enough to influence the way I see the world.

    What surprised me most was not the change itself.

    It was how uncomfortable certain environments suddenly became.

    Conversations I once tolerated now leave me exhausted. Gatherings that once felt ordinary now feel strangely heavy. I find myself noticing how easily some people can take something beautiful and immediately begin searching for what is wrong with it.

    There is an old saying about finding fault in a rose.

    Most of us know people who could walk through a garden and speak only of the thorns.

    They witness kindness and wonder what someone wants in return.

    They hear good news and begin predicting how it will end.

    They receive a blessing and instinctively search for the hidden cost.

    For a long time I wondered why.

    The older I become, the less interested I am in judging those people.

    Life has a way of teaching difficult lessons.

    Pain can narrow our vision.

    Disappointment can convince us that hope is dangerous.

    Betrayal can make suspicion feel wiser than trust.

    Many people are carrying wounds the rest of us will never fully understand.

    Remembering that has made me more compassionate.

    But it has also taught me something equally important.

    Compassion does not require residency.

    You can understand someone’s pain without moving into it.

    You can love someone without adopting their way of seeing the world.

    You can care deeply for another person while quietly protecting the peace you have worked so hard to cultivate.

    That has become one of adulthood’s quiet responsibilities.

    Not every invitation deserves acceptance.

    Not every conversation deserves your attention.

    Not every headline deserves your emotion.

    Not every opinion deserves a room inside your mind.

    We spend so much time protecting our homes from damage.

    We lock our doors.

    We replace broken windows.

    We tend our yards.

    Yet many of us leave the front door of our souls standing wide open, allowing resentment, outrage, cynicism, and fear to wander in whenever they please.

    Eventually, whatever is allowed to stay begins rearranging the furniture.

    These days I find myself less interested in what is popular and more interested in what is nourishing.

    Less interested in what demands my attention and more interested in what deserves it.

    I’m not sure what to call this change.

    Maybe it is wisdom.

    Maybe it is simply growing older.

    Or maybe it is finally understanding that peace is rarely something we find.

    More often, it is something we protect.

    I’ve noticed that when I become careful about what enters my mind, everything else begins to change.

    My thoughts become gentler.

    My patience grows longer.

    Gratitude arrives more often than complaint.

    Even in a world that still contains cruelty, injustice, and heartbreak, I begin noticing small mercies I once hurried past.

    The darkness has not disappeared.

    I simply refuse to make my home inside it.

    Perhaps that is what tending the soul has always meant.

    Not pretending evil does not exist.

    Not closing our eyes to suffering.

    But choosing, again and again, to give more of ourselves to what is true than to what is loud, more to what is beautiful than to what is broken, more to what nourishes than to what merely consumes.

    Because a soul is not unlike a garden.

    It does not become what we admire.

    It becomes what we cultivate.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

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  • They’ll Remember More Than the Score

    They’ll Remember More Than the Score

    Well…

    We didn’t get them this time.

    As someone very new to soccer, I have to admit I was disappointed to see the USMNT’s World Cup journey come to an end. Like so many Americans, I had started believing. Every match pulled me in a little deeper. Every victory made me think, “Maybe this is our year.”

    It wasn’t.

    But if there is one phrase Americans know almost by heart, it’s:

    We’ll get them next time.

    There is hope tucked inside those words.

    Not denial.

    Not pretending we didn’t lose.

    Just the belief that another opportunity is coming.

    Another chance.

    For me, something unexpected happened during this World Cup.

    I didn’t just discover a tournament.

    I discovered a sport.

    A few months ago, I couldn’t have told you much about formations or tactics. Today, I find myself checking match schedules, watching highlights, learning the game’s rhythm, and already looking forward to the next World Cup.

    That feels like a gift.

    One I didn’t know I was missing until someone handed it to me.

    Even though Team USA is no longer playing, something beautiful is still happening.

    The World Cup is still here.

    The matches continue.

    And so do the people who traveled thousands of miles to experience them.

    Over the past few weeks, I’ve watched countless videos of supporters from Europe, South America, Africa, Asia, and beyond sharing their experiences here in the United States. What struck me wasn’t just their excitement over the matches.

    It was how often they talked about the people.

    The conversations with strangers.

    The restaurant recommendations.

    The unexpected hospitality.

    For all the stories people hear about America before they arrive, many leave talking about something entirely different.

    They leave talking about us.

    Not politicians.

    But People.

    Ordinary Americans.

    The cashier who wished them luck before the match.

    The server who recommended the best local barbecue.

    The family who invited them into a conversation.

    The stranger who pointed them toward the right train.

    The fan who celebrated beside them even though they spoke different languages.

    That is an America I know.

    The America where neighbors wave.

    Where someone stops to help you change a tire.

    Where a plate of food somehow finds its way into your hands if you’ve been around long enough.

    Where we may argue among ourselves, but we still know how to welcome a guest.

    No, we don’t have to go out of our way.

    No one is requiring it.

    But I hope we do anyway.

    Not because we are trying to prove something.

    Because hospitality has always been one of the quiet strengths of ordinary people.

    Governments introduce nations.

    People define them.

    Long after the final trophy is lifted, many of these visitors won’t remember every score.

    But they will remember how they were treated.

    They’ll remember the conversations that made them laugh.

    The meals they shared.

    The cities they explored.

    The strangers who became friends for an afternoon.

    Those memories travel farther than any goal ever could.

    I’m disappointed that Team USA’s run has ended.

    I wanted to see them go farther.

    I wanted to keep cheering.

    But I’m grateful all the same.

    Grateful that this tournament introduced me to a sport I never expected to love.

    Grateful that one conversation opened the door to something new.

    And grateful that the rest of the world still has a chance to experience something that has always existed beyond the headlines.

    The America we know.

    The America we build every day with kindness, generosity, and simple conversations between strangers.

    The world is still watching.

    Let’s give them something beautiful to remember.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

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  • Are You a Lifelong Learner?

    Are You a Lifelong Learner?

    The answer is yes.

    An easy yes.

    I have been learning my entire life, although I am not entirely sure what the question means by “learning.”

    Does it mean school?

    Books?

    Experience?

    Mistakes?

    Because if mistakes count, I may be one of the most educated people alive.

    As a boy, I loved books.

    I was always reading something. Anything I could get my hands on.

    Most of it was science fiction and fantasy, which meant I knew a great deal about dragons, distant planets, magical weapons, alien civilizations, and saving the universe.

    This knowledge has been surprisingly useless during tax season.

    Still, I was learning.

    Books taught me that there were worlds beyond the one I could see. They introduced me to strange places, impossible creatures, difficult choices, and people who were usually expected to save everyone despite having almost no adult supervision.

    At the time, I did not think of reading as education.

    I thought I was escaping.

    But sometimes escaping into a book is how we return to the world with a better understanding of it.

    Stories taught me about courage.

    Friendship.

    Power.

    Fear.

    Sacrifice.

    They also taught me that accepting mysterious jewelry from strangers is usually a bad idea.

    Then came my teenage years, when much of my education moved from books to horror movies.

    I watched far too many of them.

    Still, they taught me several practical lessons.

    If you are camping and someone suddenly goes missing, leave.

    If you hear strange noises in the woods, leave faster.

    Do not investigate.

    Do not split up.

    Do not say, “I’ll be right back.”

    And under no circumstances should you stop in the nearby town to explain what happened.

    The townspeople already know.

    They have always known.

    They will stare at you silently from the diner while someone behind the counter slowly wipes the same glass.

    Just get in your car and go.

    If the car will not start, then unfortunately, the movie has already decided your future.

    The most important thing I learned, however, was that the more you know, the more you realize how much you do not know.

    This was unfortunate news for me.

    I had a rather inflated opinion of myself when I was younger.

    I was confident.

    Very confident.

    The kind of confident that can only exist when a person has not yet encountered enough information to become confused.

    I thought I knew almost everything.

    Not because I had learned everything, of course.

    I simply had not yet discovered how much everything included.

    Then I kept reading.

    I kept watching.

    I kept listening.

    I kept living.

    And slowly, the world became larger.

    Every answer introduced another question.

    Every subject revealed ten more subjects I had never considered.

    Every person knew something I did not.

    This was humbling.

    Annoying, but humbling.

    I look back at that cocky boy now and laugh.

    Not because he was foolish.

    At least not entirely.

    He was simply standing at the edge of a very large ocean, holding a cup of water, convinced he had discovered the sea.

    There is something beautiful about that kind of confidence.

    There is also something dangerous about it.

    The older I become, the more I understand that learning is not about reaching a place where no one can correct you.

    It is about listening to people whose experiences are different from your own.

    It is changing your mind when new information gives you a good reason to do so.

    That last one can be difficult.

    People become attached to their opinions.

    Sometimes we carry an opinion for so long that it begins to feel like a family member.

    Not necessarily a family member we like.

    But one we feel obligated to defend at gatherings.

    Lifelong learning requires us to let some of those old opinions go.

    It requires curiosity.

    Humility.

    And the willingness to accept that the younger version of ourselves occasionally had no idea what he was talking about.

    I still love books.

    I still love discovering something new.

    I still enjoy the feeling of reading a sentence that makes me stop and reconsider something I thought I understood.

    But I no longer think learning is a journey toward knowing everything.

    That sounds exhausting.

    Learning is simply remaining teachable.

    It is keeping the windows open.

    It is allowing new ideas to enter, while occasionally asking the old ones to gather their things and leave.

    The older I get, the less interested I am in being the smartest person in the room.

    Mostly because the smartest person in the room usually knows enough not to announce it.

    I would rather stay curious.

    I would rather keep reading.

    I would rather keep learning.

    And somewhere inside me, that boy is still holding a science-fiction book, ready to travel to another world.

    The teenager is probably still watching a horror movie and yelling at the screen, “Do not go into the woods.”

    They are both still confident.

    Still curious.

    Still slightly convinced they can save the universe.

    The difference is that now they understand two important things:

    Read the instructions first.

    And if the woods start making strange noises, leave.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • Fireworks, Smoke, and the Light We Share on July 4th

    Fireworks, Smoke, and the Light We Share on July 4th

    I remember the Fourth of July first through the body.

    Not through history books.

    Not through speeches.

    Not through the careful language of founding documents.

    I remember it through smoke.

    Smoke rising from grills in backyards. Smoke drifting over alleyways. Smoke clinging to shirts and hair and folding itself into the memory of summer. I remember children running with sparklers, paper plates bending under ribs, baked beans, deviled eggs, and potato salad that everybody quietly judged but still ate.

    I remember laughter louder than the cheap fireworks we lit off in the alley.

    We did not talk much about the Declaration of Independence. We did not sit around quoting Jefferson. We talked about who cooked what. Who brought the good ice. Who made the punch too sweet. Who showed up with store-bought chicken and tried to pass it off like they had been standing over grease all morning.

    But we were celebrating something.

    Maybe not the country in the way textbooks wanted us to.

    Maybe not independence in its cleanest form.

    Maybe what we celebrated was presence.

    The gift of still being here.

    The gift of people gathered close enough to call your name across a yard.

    The gift of neighbors who knew your mother, your children, your business, and sometimes your middle name.

    As I grew older, the smoke stayed the same, but the fire changed.

    Sparklers became firecrackers. Firecrackers became bottle rockets. Bottle rockets became whole nights spent standing outside, daring the sky to answer us. Later, it became more organized. City festivals. Parades. Firework shows over rivers, stadiums, parks, and fairgrounds.

    You would drive somewhere with a blanket, a cooler, and just enough patience to sit in traffic afterward. Then the first burst would open above you, and for a moment, everybody stopped pretending to be separate.

    We all looked up.

    Together.

    That was always the part that mattered most to me.

    Not just the color.

    Not just the sound.

    But the shared looking.

    The brief agreement that something beautiful was happening above us, and we were willing to be quiet long enough to receive it.

    Now, I often watch the fireworks on television.

    I sit in the quiet of a home I work hard to keep. The sound comes through speakers. The colors fill the screen. There is no smoke in the room. No uncle yelling, “Don’t blow your fingers off.” No cousin running too close to the grill. No auntie guarding the good aluminum foil pans like national treasure.

    And some years, I have wondered what the Fourth of July is supposed to mean.

    I have wondered how to celebrate a nation that has so often complicated celebration.

    I have wondered how to hold joy in one hand and history in the other without dropping either one.

    Because for Black folks, America has always asked a strange thing of us.

    It has asked us to love a house we helped build while reminding us which rooms were never meant for us.

    It has asked us to sing while carrying memory.

    It has asked us to wave flags that did not always wave for us.

    And yet, somehow, we kept making room for joy.

    We made room around tables.

    We made room in church basements.

    We made room on porches, in parks, on folding chairs, beside grills, under trees, and in the middle of neighborhoods the world too often misunderstood.

    That is no small thing.

    To still find laughter, cook, dance, gather, and still look up.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • What Are We Rehearsing?

    What Are We Rehearsing?

    Sometimes another person’s question stays with you longer than their answer.

    This week, I found myself thinking about a conversation sparked by singer India Arie. She wondered aloud what it means when the songs we celebrate become the stories we live by. She was not asking for censorship. She was not asking anyone to stop making music. She was asking whether what we repeatedly consume eventually begins to shape us.

    That question has followed me around.

    Maybe I’m seeing too much.

    Or maybe I’m finally paying attention.

    I have been thinking about repetition.

    Not just in music, but in every part of life.

    A basketball player takes thousands of jump shots until the movement becomes instinct.

    A pianist practices scales until the fingers no longer ask permission from the mind.

    A grandmother makes cornbread so many times that measuring cups become unnecessary.

    We call it practice.

    We call it discipline.

    We call it muscle memory.

    We already understand that repetition changes the body.

    So why do we become uncomfortable when someone asks whether repetition might also shape the heart?

    Long before neuroscience gave us language like neural pathways and habit formation, people understood that words carried power. Communities repeated prayers because they believed repetition strengthened faith. Parents repeated lessons because they hoped they would become character. Freedom songs were sung over and over because they reminded weary people that they were more than the conditions surrounding them.

    Some people called those rituals sacred.

    Others believed repeated words could become something darker.

    They believed that speaking certain things over and over invited them into your life.

    Whether we call it ritual, conditioning, or simply human psychology, perhaps they were all reaching toward the same truth.

    What we practice eventually begins to feel natural.

    That thought has stayed with me as I watch our culture.

    Not just Black culture.

    All culture.

    We live in an age where algorithms have become our DJs.

    They decide what rises.

    They decide what repeats.

    They decide what millions of people hear before breakfast.

    I am not interested in arguing that music alone determines the future of a community.

    It doesn’t.

    No song can explain generations of segregation, economic inequality, underfunded schools, broken public policy, or the many burdens that Foundational Black Americans have carried across centuries. To pretend otherwise would ignore history.

    But I also refuse to believe music is powerless.

    If songs had no influence, companies would not spend millions of dollars making sure certain ones reach our ears.

    Advertising exists because repetition works.

    Political campaigns exist because repetition works.

    Religious liturgy exists because repetition works.

    Education itself depends on repetition.

    Why would we imagine music is somehow exempt?

    This is not about blaming any one artist.

    Every generation has created music that unsettled the one before it.

    Hip-hop, like jazz before it, has given voice to neighborhoods that were often ignored. It has documented struggle, celebrated creativity, challenged power, and preserved stories that might otherwise have disappeared.

    Some of the greatest poetry I have ever heard arrived wrapped in a beat.

    That deserves respect.

    But every art form also contains choices.

    Some songs call us toward dignity.

    Others celebrate revenge.

    Some remind us that love requires sacrifice.

    Others convince us that commitment is weakness.

    Some tell young people they are worth more than what the world has offered them.

    Others invite them to build an identity around excess, exploitation, or self-destruction.

    Those differences matter.

    What troubles me even more is not that those songs exist.

    Art has always reflected both light and shadow.

    What troubles me is what gets amplified.

    There are artists creating music about healing.

    About fatherhood.

    About faith.

    About perseverance.

    About accountability.

    About joy that does not require someone else’s humiliation.

    They exist.

    Yet they rarely seem to receive the same machinery behind them.

    That should make us curious.

    Not angry.

    Curious.

    Why do stories that flatter our impulses often travel farther than stories that challenge us to grow?

    Why does outrage outperform wisdom?

    Why is self-control so difficult to market while excess is endlessly profitable?

    Those are questions worth asking.

    Especially for those of us who are descendants of people who once sang their way through unimaginable suffering.

    Our ancestors understood something about repetition.

    They sang hope until hope became endurance.

    They repeated Scripture until it became courage.

    They gathered around kitchen tables and church pews, telling the same family stories until children understood they belonged to something larger than themselves.

    Those songs did not erase injustice.

    But they strengthened people enough to survive it.

    I wonder what songs we are teaching ourselves now.

    Not because I believe every lyric becomes destiny.

    But because I know that what surrounds us eventually begins to sound like home.

    And what sounds like home eventually becomes normal.

    The most dangerous ideas are rarely the loudest.

    They become dangerous because they stop sounding unusual.

    They become ordinary.

    That is how repetition works.

    It does not always convince.

    Sometimes it simply familiarizes.

    And familiarity is powerful.

    I think about food often.

    Anyone who has spent time reading Salt, Ink & Soul knows that.

    A single meal will not make you healthy.

    Neither will a single meal make you sick.

    But years of eating eventually shape the body you live in.

    Perhaps the soul works the same way.

    Perhaps one song changes very little.

    But thousands of repetitions…

    Thousands of rehearsals…

    Thousands of small invitations toward the same vision of success, love, relationships, wealth, and identity…

    Perhaps those leave fingerprints we cannot always see.

    This is not a call to fear music.

    It is not a call to silence artists.

    It is certainly not a call to stop creating.

    It is a call to become more intentional listeners.

    To ask ourselves a simple question before we press play.

    What am I rehearsing?

    Because every day we are practicing something.

    Compassion or contempt.

    Discipline or indulgence.

    Hope or cynicism.

    Dignity or degradation.

    None of us escapes rehearsal.

    The only choice we have is deciding what kind of life we want to become fluent in.

    Maybe I’m seeing too much.

    Or maybe I have simply reached an age where I understand that nothing enters the soul without leaving something behind.

    If that is true, then perhaps one of the quietest acts of freedom is choosing carefully what we allow to echo there.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • We’re Still Standing

    We’re Still Standing

    Last night, I watched Team USA win.

    Not just play.

    Win.

    And there is a difference.

    There is a difference between hoping and seeing hope answer back.

    A difference between leaning forward on the couch and suddenly finding yourself standing up, clapping, talking to the television like the players can hear you.

    They beat Bosnia and Herzegovina.

    They advanced.

    They are still here.

    And maybe that is why the win felt like more than a score.

    Because in a World Cup, every match starts carrying the weight of memory. Every pass feels a little heavier. Every mistake feels louder. Every goal becomes something you not only see but also feel.

    Last night, Team USA gave us that feeling.

    They gave us belief.

    They gave us nerves.

    They gave us the kind of night where the clock moves too slow when you are ahead and too fast when you are waiting for the next chance.

    And even when the match got difficult, even when the road tightened, they held on.

    That matters.

    There is something beautiful about watching a team refuse to disappear.

    Something stirring about seeing them keep their shape, keep their fight, keep their eyes fixed on the next whistle, the next ball, the next moment.

    I am still new to soccer, so some of this is new to me.

    But I am deep enough now to know this:

    I care.

    I care about the result.

    I care about the next match.

    I care about this team moving forward.

    So today, I am not trying to make the night heavy.

    I am just celebrating.

    Team USA is advancing.

    The dream is still alive.

    Belgium is waiting.

    And so are we.

    Come on, USA.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • Tonight, I Am Letting Myself Be a Fan

    Tonight, I Am Letting Myself Be a Fan

    Normally, I come here trying to write something deep.

    Something thoughtful.

    Something that reaches a little beneath the surface and tries to pull meaning from the ordinary things.

    Sometimes that means memory.

    Sometimes that means grief.

    Sometimes that means a recipe, because I still believe food can say what the heart does not always know how to speak.

    But today, I have to be honest.

    I cannot seem to concentrate.

    Team USA has a match tonight in the World Cup against Bosnia and Herzegovina, and yes, I will be watching.

    Not with the game on in the background while I pretend to do something else.

    I mean watching.

    Leaning forward.

    Talking to the television.

    Believing every pass might become something.

    Feeling that small, ridiculous, beautiful hope that comes with being a fan.

    And maybe that is worth writing about too.

    Sometimes the soul does not want to sit in the heavy room. Sometimes it wants to stand up, clap its hands, wear the colors, and believe that something good might happen before the night is over.

    My road into soccer did not begin with some grand childhood memory. I did not grow up studying formations or arguing about clubs from across the ocean. I did not have the language for the game yet.

    A co-worker named Tracy helped open the door.

    Sometimes that is how new loves find us.

    Not through some dramatic conversion.

    Just a person saying, “You should watch.”

    And you do.

    Then you watch again.

    Then the game starts to make sense.

    I have been watching and learning

    And tonight, I am excited.

    I want Team USA to move forward.

    I want that next round.

    I want that feeling of possibility that comes when the country is watching together, even if we are watching from different couches, different cities, different little corners of the day.

    There is something beautiful about a World Cup in this country.

    I have also been watching videos online, seeing the reactions of fans from Europe and other parts of the world who have come here for the tournament. I have watched them walk through American cities with surprise on their faces. I have watched them talk about the food, the crowds, the stadiums, the welcome they have felt.

    And something about that has stayed with me.

    Because for all the things this country is, for all the arguments we have, for all the wounds we carry and the contradictions we live inside, there is still something moving about seeing people arrive here and feel received.

    welcomed.

    Fed.

    Cheered with.

    Talked to.

    Pointed in the right direction.

    Given a memory to carry back home.

    That matters to me.

    Maybe because I know how hard it can be to feel welcomed anywhere.

    Maybe because hospitality has always meant more than politeness. It is a way of saying, for this moment, you are safe here. For this moment, you are not a stranger. For this moment, pull up a chair.

    And maybe that is part of what has pulled me deeper into the game.

    Soccer feels global in a way few things do.

    Different languages.

    Different flags.

    Different histories.

    Different songs rising from the stands.

    And still, everybody understands the ache of a missed chance.

    Everybody understands the miracle of a late goal.

    Everybody understands what it means to hope.

    That hope has started working on me.

    Enough that I have found myself thinking about going to a New Mexico United game.

    There is a difference between watching something from a distance and letting yourself enter it.

    And I think I want to enter it.

    I want to hear the noise.

    I want to feel the rise in the crowd when the ball moves with purpose.

    I want to be around people who care enough to yell.

    I want to learn not just from the screen, but from the stands.

    Maybe that is what fandom is.

    Not just knowing the names.

    Not just understanding the rules.

    Not just buying the shirt.

    But allowing yourself to care about something you cannot control.

    Allowing yourself to be lifted and disappointed and lifted again.

    Allowing yourself to join a chorus that was already singing before you arrived.

    So tonight, I am not going to force myself into some deeper essay.

    I am not going to pretend my mind is somewhere else.

    Tonight, my mind is on Team USA.

    My hope is wearing red, white, and blue.

    My attention is on that field.

    And my heart, maybe more than I expected, is in the match.

    Come on, USA.

    Give us something to remember.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • Becoming Careful About What Enters the Soul

    Becoming Careful About What Enters the Soul

    Years ago, for reasons I could not fully explain, I found myself moving in the opposite direction of everyone around me.

    People were talking about The Sopranos. They loved it.

    I tried.

    More than once.

    I could appreciate the acting. I could see the craftsmanship. I understood why people were drawn to it.

    But I never enjoyed it.

    Then came The Wire.

    Again, I tried.

    Everyone said it was brilliant. Everyone said it was important. Everyone said I simply needed to give it another chance.

    I did.

    Several times.

    Yet something in me remained unmoved.

    Then came Breaking Bad.

    The same story.

    The same recommendations.

    The same praise.

    And the same feeling that this was not for me.

    At the time, I thought perhaps I was missing something.

    Maybe I was.

    But as the years passed, I began to realize I was not rejecting great storytelling.

    I was becoming sensitive to what those stories required me to sit with,

    so many of them invited me to spend hours living inside darkness.

    Crime, violence, manipulation, corruption, and Greed.

    The slow collapse of the human spirit.

    The older I became, the less interested I was in making those places my home, even temporarily.

    What surprised me most was that the change did not stop there.

    Movies I once enjoyed began losing their appeal.

    Military films.

    Action movies.

    Stories built around guns, revenge, and destruction.

    Eventually I found myself turning away from anything that seemed determined to convince me that darkness was depth.

    Then I began noticing something else.

    Many stories no longer seemed interested in heroes.

    Even stories that claimed to be about heroes often spent most of their time glorifying villains.

    The villain was smarter.

    The villain was more interesting.

    The villain got the best lines.

    The villain became the person audiences secretly admired.

    Goodness became boring.

    Decency became weakness.

    Kindness became naïveté.

    And somewhere along the way, I realized I was growing tired.

    Not physically.

    Spiritually.

    I began asking myself a simple question.

    What am I feeding my mind?

    We understand this concept when it comes to food.

    No one is surprised when a person feels different after changing their diet.

    Yet we often act as though the soul can consume endless negativity without consequence.

    Hour after hour.

    Day after day.

    Year after year.

    Violence.

    Conflict.

    Anger.

    Fear.

    Contempt.

    Cynicism.

    Then we wonder why peace feels so difficult to find.

    So I started making changes.

    Not dramatic changes.

    Just intentional ones.

    I became more selective about what I watched.

    More selective about what I listened to.

    More selective about the conversations I participated in.

    I began paying attention to the words I spoke.

    I tried to spend less time discussing people and more time understanding them.

    Less time dwelling on problems and more time looking for solutions.

    Less time feeding outrage and more time feeding gratitude.

    Something changed.

    Not overnight.

    But slowly.

    Quietly.

    The way sunrise arrives.

    You do not notice it all at once.

    Then suddenly the darkness is no longer where it was.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • If You Could Live Anywhere in the World, Where Would It Be?

    If You Could Live Anywhere in the World, Where Would It Be?

    If I could live anywhere in the world, I would still choose Albuquerque.

    And I am proud to say that.

    I know that might sound strange to some people.

    There are places with bigger skylines.

    Places with more water.

    Places people put on postcards, bucket lists, and travel shows.

    But I have lived in different places around the world, and sometimes the place you choose says more than the place you came from.

    I was raised in the Midwest.

    That part of the country has its own beauty. Its own rhythm. Its own kind of strength. But it is also the home of tornado alley, and I learned early that I do not need the sky turning dark and angry above me to feel alive.

    I am not a fan of hurricanes.

    I am not a fan of earthquakes either.

    Yes, I know New Mexico has earthquakes, but not like the West Coast. And yes, we have monsoon season, but to me, that does not compare to the hurricanes of the East Coast.

    The constant rain of the Northwest would be too much for me.

    Some people need green everywhere.

    Some people need water close enough to hear it.

    I understand that.

    But I have fallen in love with the high desert.

    There is something about the open sky here.

    Something about the mountains standing in the distance like witnesses.

    Something about the way the light changes everything it touches.

    Albuquerque has a quiet honesty to it. It does not try too hard to convince you of what it is. It simply is.

    There is beauty in that.

    There is also the food.

    The kind of food that does not feel like decoration, but memory. Food with heat, history, and personality. Food that tells you where you are before anyone says a word.

    Green chile does that.

    Red chile does that.

    A plate here can feel like a map.

    A reminder that place is not just where you sleep at night. Place is what seasons you. What teaches your tongue. What slows your pace. What makes you look up and notice the sky.

    I did not end up in Albuquerque by accident and stay by mistake.

    I chose it.

    And if I had to choose again, I would choose it again.

    Not because it is perfect.

    No place is.

    But because it fits something in me.

    The high desert has a way of making room for a person. It gives you space to think. Space to breathe. Space to become quieter without becoming smaller.

    And maybe that is what home is after a while.

    Not the place everyone else understands.

    Not the place with the best reputation.

    Not the place that looks most impressive from the outside.

    But the place where your spirit unclenches.

    The place where the weather, the food, the land, and the light begin to feel like part of your own language.

    For me, that place is Albuquerque.

    The high desert.

    The mountains.

    The chile.

    The wide sky.

    The quiet invitation to keep becoming.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

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    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times

  • Is a Little Chaos Actually Good for Us?

    Is a Little Chaos Actually Good for Us?

    I think a little chaos can be good for us.

    Not the kind that destroys everything and leaves people wounded trying to gather pieces of themselves from the floor.

    But the kind that interrupts comfort.

    The kind that knocks on the door and says, Are you sure this is the best you can do?

    I am someone who likes consistency; it’s comfortable

    I like knowing what works.

    I understand the old saying, “If it’s not broke, don’t fix it.”

    There is wisdom in that. Not everything needs to be touched. Not everything needs to be changed just for the sake of change. Some things are steady because they have earned the right to be steady.

    But sometimes something can work and still not be as good as it could be.

    Sometimes something can be fine and still be slow and inefficient.

    and still holding us back in ways we do not notice, because we have grown comfortable with its shape.

    That is where chaos has its place.

    Chaos reveals things.

    Problems reveal things.

    A disruption can show us where the weak spots are. It can show us what we have been avoiding, what we have outgrown, what we have been calling peace when it was really just familiarity.

    I do not always like that in the moment.

    Most growth does not feel like growth while it is happening.

    Sometimes it feels like frustration.

    Sometimes it feels like an inconvenience.

    Sometimes it feels like being forced to learn something you would not have chosen to learn on your own.

    But afterward, when the dust settles, you can look back and realize the chaos did not come only to disturb you.

    Sometimes it came to sharpen you.

    Sometimes it came to make you more honest.

    Sometimes it came to show you that the way you had always done something was not the only way.

    And maybe not even the best way.

    There is a kind of growth that only comes when life refuses to let us stay too comfortable.

    A little chaos can make us pay attention.

    It can make us adjust.

    It can make us build better systems, ask better questions, and stop confusing survival with success.

    Kyle J. Hayes

    kylehayesblog.com

    Please like, comment, and share

    Resources for Hard Times

    If you’re looking for practical help, food support, or community resources, you can visit the Salt, Ink & Soul Resources Page.

    👉 Resources for Hard Times