<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" version="2.0" xmlns:itunes="http://www.itunes.com/dtds/podcast-1.0.dtd" xmlns:googleplay="http://www.google.com/schemas/play-podcasts/1.0"><channel><title><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between: 🔑 Gatekeeper Chronicles ]]></title><description><![CDATA[Voices of sacred thresholds—transmissions from the keepers of remembrance, fire, and inner sovereignty.]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/s/gatekeepers</link><image><url>https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VoZl!,w_256,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ffaaaf6a5-b746-4daa-8f39-df0cc2f708e8_1028x1028.png</url><title>Tending The In-Between: 🔑 Gatekeeper Chronicles </title><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/s/gatekeepers</link></image><generator>Substack</generator><lastBuildDate>Mon, 25 May 2026 13:41:24 GMT</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/feed" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/><copyright><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></copyright><language><![CDATA[en]]></language><webMaster><![CDATA[conniecanderson@gmail.com]]></webMaster><itunes:owner><itunes:email><![CDATA[conniecanderson@gmail.com]]></itunes:email><itunes:name><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></itunes:name></itunes:owner><itunes:author><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></itunes:author><googleplay:owner><![CDATA[conniecanderson@gmail.com]]></googleplay:owner><googleplay:email><![CDATA[conniecanderson@gmail.com]]></googleplay:email><googleplay:author><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></googleplay:author><itunes:block><![CDATA[Yes]]></itunes:block><item><title><![CDATA[The Overstimulated Generation]]></title><description><![CDATA[What happens when developing nervous systems are raised inside permanent activation, digital exposure, instability, and emotional overload?]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-overstimulated-generation</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-overstimulated-generation</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 24 May 2026 14:03:24 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" 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1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!RAsl!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fd15a767b-cb95-4fe4-8e96-44bccd4cff15_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;b5ab69a0-717b-41d2-b7c2-11d8c1e8ce07&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:537.6522,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>The curfews are beginning.</p><p>Malls restricting teenagers after certain hours. Security guards standing near entrances now. Store owners pulling gates down early. Viral videos spreading almost daily of teenagers swarming stores, setting fires, destroying property, screaming at strangers, filming fights while people stand around watching through phone screens instead of intervening.</p><p>And beneath the behavior itself, there is something else many people are quietly noticing but struggling to describe.</p><p>A strange emotional vacancy.</p><p>An agitation that feels almost atmospheric now.</p><p>Not just rebellion. Not just disrespect. Something more dysregulated than that.</p><p>You can feel it in public spaces now. The nervous system braces before the mind even catches up. The noise level feels different. The energy feels different. Groups of teenagers moving through stores with a kind of emotionally detached intensity that many adults instinctively react to before a single word is even spoken.</p><p>And what keeps haunting me is this:</p><p>Fully developed adults are already struggling to metabolize the psychological atmosphere we are living inside.</p><p>Adults are openly saying they feel exhausted, overstimulated, emotionally flooded, unable to focus, unable to rest, unable to trust anything anymore. People feel constantly braced. Constantly scanning. Constantly trying to regulate themselves against a world that no longer feels stable.</p><p>So what exactly is happening inside nervous systems that have not even fully formed yet?</p><p>Adults at least remember another rhythm of life.</p><p>We remember boredom. Silence. Unstructured afternoons. Attention spans that were not constantly fractured. We remember conversations uninterrupted by phones. We remember privacy. We remember not being watched, compared, judged, filmed, tracked, and psychologically stimulated every waking hour of the day. We remember adolescence before identity became performance.</p><p>This generation does not.</p><p>Many of these kids were born directly into algorithmic life. Their nervous systems are developing inside social media loops, emotional contagion cycles, viral humiliation, comparison culture, dopamine-conditioning, and nonstop digital exposure. Many of them have never experienced sustained stillness long enough to even know what regulation feels like in the body.</p><p>And that matters more than I think we fully understand yet.</p><p>Because adolescence has always amplified the fractures already present inside a culture. Teenagers act out what societies suppress. They externalize tensions adults try to internalize.</p><p>And right now, society itself feels deeply dysregulated.</p><p>Adults are financially overwhelmed. Families are strained. Attention spans are collapsing. Trust in institutions is eroding. Everything feels accelerated, monetized, emotionally charged, and psychologically invasive. The nervous system rarely gets relief now because interruption itself has become the atmosphere we live inside.</p><p>Even rest no longer feels fully restful.</p><p>But I also think it would be dishonest to reduce all of this entirely to nervous-system overload alone.</p><p>Part of what people are reacting to right now is a visible collapse of boundaries, restraint, accountability, and reverence for shared space. There is an increasing sense of entitlement woven into some of this behavior &#8212; a willingness to intimidate, destroy, dominate, disrupt, or perform publicly without apparent concern for consequence or impact.</p><p>And social media intensifies it.</p><p>Impulsivity is no longer simply impulsivity. It becomes content. Attention. Status. Visibility. Performance. Peer reinforcement. Viral identity.</p><p>When emotionally unregulated behavior is rewarded socially and digitally, escalation becomes inevitable.</p><p>And yet even that entitlement did not emerge in a vacuum.</p><p>Because a civilization that profits from overstimulation should not be shocked when emotional regulation begins collapsing publicly.</p><p>We handed developing nervous systems a world of constant comparison, constant exposure, constant outrage, constant noise, constant emotional activation, and almost no meaningful initiation into adulthood. Very little silence. Very little grounded community. Very little real belonging outside algorithmic identity structures and peer performance systems.</p><p>Instead, identity increasingly forms through virality, online validation, outrage cycles, and nervous-system stimulation loops powerful enough to hijack adult brains, let alone adolescent ones.</p><p>And beneath all of this, I think many young people unconsciously sense something adults sense too:</p><p>the future no longer feels stable.</p><p>That changes human behavior profoundly.</p><p>Hopelessness changes behavior. Fragmentation changes behavior. Overstimulation changes behavior. Meaninglessness changes behavior. Human beings cannot remain disconnected from rhythm, embodiment, stillness, grounded connection, and emotional safety indefinitely without consequences eventually surfacing somewhere.</p><p>And perhaps what we are witnessing now is not simply a teenage problem, but the early visible symptoms of a culture whose nervous systems are approaching overload collectively.</p><p>Which is why the curfews matter symbolically.</p><p>Because institutions are beginning to externally impose containment where internal regulation is weakening. Malls restricting teenagers. Increased policing. Earlier closures. Expanded surveillance. Public behavioral controls.</p><p>Not because society is healing.</p><p>Because society can feel the destabilization spreading.</p><p>And perhaps the most unsettling realization underneath all of this is recognizing that many adults are barely metabolizing this atmosphere themselves. We are watching parents in survival mode attempting to regulate children in survival mode while living inside systems that continuously dysregulate both.</p><p>That is the deeper fracture underneath the headlines.</p><p>Not simply rebellion.</p><p>Not simply bad behavior.</p><p>But human nervous systems pushed beyond what they were designed to absorb without rhythm, meaning, grounding, stillness, or real human connection.</p><p>And maybe the question we should be asking now is not:<br>&#8220;What is wrong with these kids?&#8221;</p><p>Maybe the deeper question is:<br>&#8220;What kind of world are human beings becoming inside?&#8221;</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-overstimulated-generation?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-overstimulated-generation?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Architecture of Freedom]]></title><description><![CDATA[What if humanity&#8217;s deepest exhaustion is not physical, but the weight of living disconnected from itself?]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-architecture-of-freedom</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-architecture-of-freedom</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 19 May 2026 16:02:16 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gp-b!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2ca298f-6220-4465-9b04-d3662c717c85_1536x1024.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gp-b!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2ca298f-6220-4465-9b04-d3662c717c85_1536x1024.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gp-b!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2ca298f-6220-4465-9b04-d3662c717c85_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gp-b!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2ca298f-6220-4465-9b04-d3662c717c85_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gp-b!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2ca298f-6220-4465-9b04-d3662c717c85_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!gp-b!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff2ca298f-6220-4465-9b04-d3662c717c85_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;cbbe7963-77d3-4a2c-bc10-e47840f67cf7&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:431.75183,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Most people think freedom means having more choices. More money. More mobility. More options. More permission.</p><p>But a nervous system shaped by fear will recreate its prison no matter how many doors are opened.</p><p>I do not think most human beings have ever experienced true freedom. Only different versions of managed dependency. And I think, deep down, many people are beginning to feel that now. Not just politically. Not just economically. Existentially.</p><p>There is a growing exhaustion moving through humanity that cannot be explained by work schedules alone. People are tired in ways sleep does not fix. Tired of noise. Tired of performance. Tired of carrying identities that no longer feel real. Tired of trying to locate themselves inside systems that constantly pull their attention outward.</p><p>Because modern life does not simply demand labor anymore. It demands consciousness itself.</p><p>Attention. Reaction. Participation. Emotional energy. Identity. Fear. Outrage. Comparison. Endless stimulation.</p><p>Human beings are being shaped continuously by forces most barely recognize while they are happening. Media cycles shape emotional atmosphere. Algorithms shape perception. Advertising shapes desire. Social systems shape behavior. Fear shapes compliance. Even spirituality is increasingly packaged into consumable identity rather than lived transformation.</p><p>And beneath all of it sits a deeper question many people are only now beginning to confront:</p><p>What thoughts are actually mine?</p><p>What fears are mine? What desires are mine? What beliefs did I inherit without ever examining them? What parts of me were shaped through survival rather than truth?</p><p>That is the real threshold.</p><p>Because the greatest systems of control are rarely maintained through force alone. They are maintained through internalization. Through repetition. Through nervous systems conditioned to normalize fragmentation.</p><p>A fragmented human is easier to direct. Easier to manipulate. Easier to exhaust. Easier to sell to. Easier to divide.</p><p>And many people are beginning to realize how fragmented they have become.</p><p>Not broken. Fragmented.</p><p>Pulled in too many directions for too long. Disconnected from silence. Disconnected from the body. Disconnected from intuition. Disconnected from their own internal pacing.</p><p>This is why freedom terrifies so many people once it becomes real.</p><p>Because true freedom is not simply the removal of external control. It is the collapse of internal dependency on constant guidance, validation, stimulation, and permission.</p><p>That kind of freedom changes a person.</p><p>It requires discernment. Self-responsibility. Inner stability. The willingness to tolerate uncertainty without immediately surrendering perception to authority.</p><p>And most systems are not designed to cultivate those qualities.</p><p>They are designed to cultivate consumption and compliance.</p><p>This is why so many people feel trapped even when they appear externally successful. They have mastered adaptation while losing connection to themselves in the process.</p><p>The body feels this fracture long before the mind admits it.</p><p>Anxiety. Exhaustion. Numbness. Compulsive distraction. Emotional volatility. The inability to rest without guilt. The inability to sit in silence without reaching for stimulation.</p><p>These are not simply personal failures. They are symptoms of nervous systems living under constant occupation.</p><p>And yet, something important is happening now.</p><p>The spell is weakening.</p><p>Not because the systems are disappearing. They are still powerful. Still pervasive. Still deeply embedded into modern life.</p><p>But they are no longer invisible.</p><p>People are beginning to recognize manipulation patterns in media, politics, advertising, spirituality, technology, and even interpersonal dynamics. The collective is slowly waking up to the realization that convenience and freedom are not always the same thing.</p><p>That realization matters.</p><p>Because once a structure becomes visible, it loses some of its total authority over perception. Not all at once. But enough.</p><p>Enough for questions to begin. Enough for discernment to return. Enough for human beings to start reclaiming pieces of themselves that were handed away unconsciously.</p><p>And perhaps that is where true freedom actually begins.</p><p>Not in escaping all influence. That may be impossible while living inside human society.</p><p>But in learning how to remain internally coherent while influence is happening.</p><p>To know when fear is being amplified. To know when identity is being manipulated. To know when urgency is artificial. To know when the nervous system is being pushed into reaction instead of reflection.</p><p>To know how to return to yourself again.</p><p>Again. And again. And again.</p><p>Because the system does not lose power all at once.</p><p>It loses power each time a human being remembers how to belong to themselves again.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://buymeacoffee.com/tendingtheinbetween&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Buy Me a Coffee &#127769;&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://buymeacoffee.com/tendingtheinbetween"><span>Buy Me a Coffee &#127769;</span></a></p><p>My work here is offered freely, but it takes time, focus, and devotion to create. If these transmissions speak to you and you feel called to support their continuation, you can do so through a paid subscription or a one-time offering.</p><p>Your support helps keep the current flowing &#8212; and I&#8217;m deeply grateful. &#129293;</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The People Pulling Back Are Not Always Lost]]></title><description><![CDATA[The world feels different because people are changing from the inside out.]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-people-pulling-back-are-not-always</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-people-pulling-back-are-not-always</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 14 May 2026 15:02:15 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:306830,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/197226494?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!dJ03!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F92b91d37-2da5-4710-9a96-23134ade1d97_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;4b13e56b-a703-466d-bdec-a9c652a7475a&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:463.25552,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Over the last few years, something has changed in people. Not just politically. Not just emotionally. Something deeper.</p><p>People are more exhausted than they&#8217;ve ever been, but they&#8217;re also less willing to pretend. Relationships that once felt manageable now feel unbearable. Small talk feels heavier. Noise feels louder. Crowds feel draining. Many people are pulling away from things they used to tolerate without question. And at the same time, other people seem to be unraveling completely.</p><p>The world feels more reactive, more aggressive, more emotionally unstable. It feels like the pressure inside people is rising. I don&#8217;t think this is happening by accident.</p><p>I think many of us are reaching a point where the nervous system can no longer comfortably hold the amount of distortion we&#8217;ve been trained to live inside of.</p><p>For years, people survived by overriding themselves. Ignoring exhaustion, ignoring intuition, ignoring grief, ignoring loneliness, ignoring misalignment, ignoring the quiet feeling that something about the way we were living wasn&#8217;t natural.</p><p>We normalized constant stimulation, constant performance, constant exposure, constant noise. And now something in people seems to be rejecting it.</p><p>Not everyone is experiencing this in the same way.</p><p>Some people are becoming quieter, more reflective, more sensitive. They need more solitude now, more honesty, more peace. They don&#8217;t want to force conversations anymore. They don&#8217;t want shallow relationships anymore. They don&#8217;t want to spend energy pretending they feel connected when they don&#8217;t.</p><p>A lot of people think something is wrong with them because of this. But I&#8217;m no longer convinced that all withdrawal is depression.</p><p>Sometimes the body pulls back because it&#8217;s exhausted from carrying what isn&#8217;t real. Sometimes isolation is not punishment. Sometimes it&#8217;s recalibration.</p>
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          <a href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-people-pulling-back-are-not-always">
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Cloud Was Never Weightless]]></title><description><![CDATA[AI, Infrastructure, and the Cost of Acceleration]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-cloud-was-never-weightless</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-cloud-was-never-weightless</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 12 May 2026 15:01:36 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic" width="1456" height="971" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pDjd!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F671d5f2b-e2d2-4ebf-af3f-28dcba541ceb_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;77e945de-51b8-4b89-88c9-3dfe19a0a81a&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:359.83673,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Most people still imagine artificial intelligence as something happening inside a screen &#8212; a prompt, a response, a cleaner search engine, a smarter assistant. Something digital. Something almost ethereal. But the cloud was never weightless. It has a body. And that body is beginning to consume staggering amounts of land, water, electricity, minerals, labor, and infrastructure in order to exist.</p><p>Entire landscapes are now being reorganized around artificial intelligence. Not metaphorically. Physically. Across the world, massive data centers are rising from the ground at extraordinary speed &#8212; vast industrial complexes filled wall to wall with servers, cooling systems, backup generators, transformers, fiber lines, and enough electrical demand to rival small cities. Most people have no idea these facilities even exist. They think AI lives in the sky.</p><p>But its true body is concrete, copper, lithium, cooling towers, substations, rare earth minerals, and millions of gallons of water used to keep the machines from overheating. The internet stopped being weightless a long time ago. Now artificial intelligence is becoming infrastructure. And infrastructure reshapes civilization around itself. Railroads did. Oil did. Electricity did. The internet did. AI is next.</p><p></p>
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      </p>
   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[This May Not Be About UFOs at All — It’s Us]]></title><description><![CDATA[Why the shift from UFOs to &#8220;anomalous phenomena&#8221; may be changing human consciousness more than we realize.]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-may-not-be-about-ufos-at-all</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-may-not-be-about-ufos-at-all</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 10 May 2026 20:30:54 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic" width="1456" height="971" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/ae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:971,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:331669,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/197096855?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!zDaM!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fae906bb1-c483-40c8-b701-c551319bdf8e_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;dea57d32-c922-4e14-9c65-d5d48ad718c1&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:281.33878,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>For decades, the subject of UFOs lived at the edge of public conversation. Ridicule surrounded it. Governments denied it. Witnesses were dismissed. Serious discussion carried social consequence. And yet suddenly, in the span of only a few years, the language has changed.</p><p>Not just the conversation. The language itself.</p><p>We no longer hear &#8220;UFO&#8221; nearly as often. Now the term is UAP &#8212; Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena.</p><p>That shift matters.</p><p>An object is something physical. A craft. A machine. Something solid and measurable.</p><p>A phenomenon is much larger.</p><p>A phenomenon can involve energy, perception, consciousness, atmospheric anomalies, electromagnetic disruption, unexplained intelligence, or interactions we do not yet fully understand. The doorway quietly widened, and most people did not notice it happen.</p><p>Which raises a deeper question:</p><p>Why now?</p><p>Why would institutions that spent generations suppressing these conversations suddenly normalize them? Why introduce unresolved mystery into the public mind after decades of insisting reality was fully mapped, explainable, and under control?</p><p>Maybe the footage itself is not the point.</p><p>Most people have already seen clearer imagery than what is being officially released anyway. The real shift may not be disclosure of craft, but disclosure of uncertainty.</p><p>And perhaps that uncertainty is doing something profound to the collective psyche.</p><p>What if this administration &#8212; or larger institutional structures moving through this period &#8212; understands that humanity is entering a phase where consciousness itself must become more flexible? Not gullible. Not irrational. But capable of holding more complexity than previous generations were trained to tolerate.</p><p>Because the truth is, reality already feels less stable to many people.</p><p>Artificial intelligence is blurring the line between real and synthetic. Institutions are losing public trust. Narratives contradict each other daily. People feel emotionally suspended between old identities and something not fully formed yet. Many describe heightened intuition, exhaustion, strange detachment, vivid dreams, increased sensitivity, or the persistent feeling that something fundamental is shifting beneath the surface of ordinary life.</p><p>What if the normalization of &#8220;anomalous phenomena&#8221; is not simply about what is in the sky?</p><p>What if it is part of a larger transition away from a civilization built entirely on certainty and into one that must learn discernment instead?</p><p>That does not mean blindly believing everything. In fact, discernment becomes more important than ever during periods like this. Expanding consciousness without grounded awareness creates instability. But refusing to question reality at all creates another kind of blindness.</p><p>Maybe the real shift happening right now is not extraterrestrial.</p><p>Maybe it is perceptual.</p><p>Maybe humanity is being slowly introduced to the idea that reality is more participatory, layered, and mysterious than we were taught. And maybe the nervous system of the collective is struggling to adapt to that widening all at once.</p><p>Not collapse.</p><p>Not apocalypse.</p><p>But the loosening of an old psychological structure that once promised certainty in exchange for obedience.</p><p>And perhaps that is why so many people feel suspended between worlds right now.</p><p>Not because they are losing their minds.</p><p>But because the map of reality itself may no longer be holding its previous shape.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-may-not-be-about-ufos-at-all?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-may-not-be-about-ufos-at-all?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[This Is What’s Coming Next]]></title><description><![CDATA[When the old patterns stop working, something new begins to take shape]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-is-whats-coming-next</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-is-whats-coming-next</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 05 May 2026 16:03:10 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/c772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:86394,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/196268453?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Rav-!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc772475c-ce88-48a7-a3c2-5ae9ecf8118b_1672x941.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;61e73097-200a-419d-8881-f24b70f35c74&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:238.13225,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Things aren&#8217;t just &#8220;off.&#8221; They&#8217;re changing. And the change isn&#8217;t subtle anymore. You can feel it in how quickly your attention drops from things that used to hold it, in conversations that don&#8217;t land the same way, and in the loss of patience for anything that keeps going in circles.</p><p>That&#8217;s not random. That&#8217;s a shift in how you move.</p><p>Over the next stretch, you&#8217;re going to see a clear split between people who can move and people who can&#8217;t. Not because one is better than the other, but because some are still waiting for everything to make sense before they act, and some have reached the point where waiting no longer works.</p><p>For a while, hesitation made sense. There&#8217;s been too much noise, too many mixed signals, and too many things that didn&#8217;t match what they said they were. So people slowed down, questioned everything, and held back. That protected them for a time.</p><p>But that phase doesn&#8217;t last forever.</p><p>What&#8217;s coming next is movement. Not perfect movement, and not fully certain movement. Just movement that doesn&#8217;t wait for everything to line up first.</p><p>You&#8217;re going to feel it in small ways. A moment where you stop replaying something in your head and just decide. A moment where you don&#8217;t ask for a second opinion. A moment where you move forward without needing reassurance that it&#8217;s the right move. It won&#8217;t feel dramatic. It will feel quiet and direct.</p><p>At the same time, you&#8217;re going to start seeing what doesn&#8217;t move. People who stay in the same patterns, conversations that never go anywhere, and situations that always require more explanation but never bring clarity. You won&#8217;t need to analyze it. You&#8217;ll just recognize it faster than you used to.</p><p>And once you recognize it, it becomes harder to keep giving it your energy.</p><p>That&#8217;s where the real separation happens.</p><p>Not everything comes with you into the next phase. Some things fall away because they can&#8217;t hold a clear direction. Not because they&#8217;re bad, but because they don&#8217;t move. And you&#8217;re not in a place where you can stay still just to keep something intact.</p><p>That can feel uncomfortable at first. Letting go of things you&#8217;ve been tied to always does. But it also simplifies your life in a way most people don&#8217;t expect.</p><p>Less noise. Fewer mixed signals. Clearer decisions.</p><p>That&#8217;s what&#8217;s ahead. Not everything being fixed, but things becoming easier to read. You&#8217;ll know faster what works and what doesn&#8217;t. You&#8217;ll see more quickly where your time is being wasted. You&#8217;ll feel, almost immediately, when something is aligned and when it&#8217;s not.</p><p>And once that happens, you stop trying to force things that don&#8217;t hold.</p><p>You move.</p><p>That&#8217;s the difference. You&#8217;re not waiting for everything to stabilize before you act. You act, and stability starts to build from that. It&#8217;s not about having all the answers. It&#8217;s about no longer needing them before you take the next step.</p><p>You&#8217;re not behind. You&#8217;re at the point where hesitation is no longer helping you. And once that shifts, everything else starts to follow.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:&quot;button-wrapper&quot;}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary button-wrapper" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-is-whats-coming-next?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:&quot;button-wrapper&quot;}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary button-wrapper" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-is-whats-coming-next?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[When the Narrative Breaks, the Body Takes Over]]></title><description><![CDATA[The moment you stop trusting what you&#8217;re shown&#8212;and nothing replaces it]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/when-the-narrative-breaks-the-body</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/when-the-narrative-breaks-the-body</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 28 Apr 2026 16:01:45 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!IoSb!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F2641c0c5-7fb4-4ae4-8b1f-d431ee3e0964_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;beeb3a9d-ceb0-495e-96ab-aaf1c014fda2&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:280.05878,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>There&#8217;s a moment most people don&#8217;t admit they&#8217;ve reached.</p><p>It&#8217;s not when you start questioning what you&#8217;re being shown. That part is almost expected now. The cracks are obvious. The gaps are visible. Anyone paying attention can feel that something isn&#8217;t lining up.</p><p>The real moment comes after that.</p><p>When you realize you don&#8217;t trust the explanation&#8212;and there isn&#8217;t a new one waiting to replace it.</p><p>That&#8217;s where the ground actually drops.</p><p>Because once that happens, you&#8217;re not stepping into clarity. You&#8217;re stepping into the absence of it. The usual anchors don&#8217;t hold. The story doesn&#8217;t resolve. The details feel arranged instead of real. And your mind keeps trying to stitch it back together into something stable&#8212;and it can&#8217;t.</p><p>That&#8217;s the threshold.</p>
      <p>
          <a href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/when-the-narrative-breaks-the-body">
              Read more
          </a>
      </p>
   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Narrative Isn’t the Truth. It’s the Filter.]]></title><description><![CDATA[What you&#8217;re being shown isn&#8217;t the whole field&#8212;and your body knows it]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-narrative-isnt-the-truth-its</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-narrative-isnt-the-truth-its</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 26 Apr 2026 14:03:09 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:361024,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/195350275?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oAMw!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3aaa8db2-e7e0-40d2-8607-85d1b3d97691_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;11bfc062-457a-48fe-88a6-c77b441c3b76&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:363.57224,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>There&#8217;s a point where people stop feeling confused and start feeling managed. Not because of one headline or one event, but because of the way information keeps arriving&#8212;partial, delayed, incomplete&#8212;and somehow always just enough to move on without ever fully understanding.</p><p>That repetition does something to the nervous system. It dulls trust, sharpens instinct, and trains people to listen for what isn&#8217;t being said. You can feel that shift happening in real time. People aren&#8217;t just reacting to content anymore&#8212;they&#8217;re reacting to how it&#8217;s delivered. The pacing. The omissions. The way certain stories surface hard and fast, then disappear just as quickly without resolution.</p><p>And underneath all of that is a growing recognition: this isn&#8217;t just information. It&#8217;s narrative management. Not always through lies, but through control of timing, visibility, and context. What gets highlighted. What gets buried. What gets framed as complete when it isn&#8217;t.</p><p>Once you see that, it&#8217;s hard to unsee. Because it shows up everywhere. Science that advances but never fully arrives. Technologies that are hinted at but never released. Discoveries that feel like they should change everything, and then quietly don&#8217;t. Always partial. Always contained.</p><p>People feel that containment. Not as a theory, but as a pressure&#8212;like something is being held back, not just from the public, but from the natural unfolding of knowledge itself.</p><p>And this is where the fracture deepens. When people feel that pressure, they don&#8217;t just sit still. They start digging. They question what doesn&#8217;t land. They connect patterns across domains. They look where they&#8217;ve been told not to look. And instead of that instinct being recognized for what it is, it gets labeled. &#8220;Conspiracy theorist.&#8221; Not because every conclusion is wrong, but because the act of questioning itself is dangerous.</p><p>So the system does something precise. It withholds enough information to create doubt, and then discredits the people who respond to that doubt. That&#8217;s not random. That&#8217;s control.</p><p>You can see it playing out right now. Stories surfacing around prominent individuals&#8212;especially those tied to science, technology, and advanced research&#8212;turning up dead or disappearing under circumstances that don&#8217;t land cleanly. Not one case. A pattern. And the details never quite close the loop.</p><p>That&#8217;s not the whole story. That&#8217;s the exposure point.</p><p>Because these moments do something very specific to people. They break the spell of passive consumption. You don&#8217;t just read and move on. You pause. You feel the gap. You notice that the explanation doesn&#8217;t match the weight of what&#8217;s being presented.</p><p>And once you feel that mismatch enough times, you stop trusting the format. You start asking why this keeps happening without clarity, why these stories appear and disappear without resolution, why it always feels like something is missing.</p><p>Those questions don&#8217;t get answered. So the perception shifts. Not &#8220;this is what happened,&#8221; but &#8220;this is what we&#8217;re being shown.&#8221; And those are not the same thing.</p><p>That&#8217;s the turning point. Because once people start seeing the difference between reality and the version of reality being presented, the control starts to weaken. Not all at once, but structurally. Because control depends on one thing: trust that what you&#8217;re seeing is the whole picture.</p><p>And right now, that trust is eroding. Quietly. Steadily. Irreversibly.</p><p>This is where the shift begins. Not by thinking harder or consuming more information, but by feeling into what&#8217;s being given. The body registers what the narrative tries to smooth over&#8212;the gaps, the timing, the weight that doesn&#8217;t match the explanation.</p><p>You can feel when something lands. You can feel when it doesn&#8217;t.</p><p>And that&#8217;s the line people are starting to follow. Not the headline, but the resonance underneath it. This isn&#8217;t about rejecting information. It&#8217;s about sensing it. Testing it. Letting it land in the body instead of just the mind.</p><p>Because once you start doing that, the difference becomes obvious&#8212;between something that&#8217;s whole and something that&#8217;s been shaped.</p><p>And the moment that difference becomes clear, people stop trusting the narrative over themselves. They start trusting what they feel over what they&#8217;re given.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://buymeacoffee.com/tendingtheinbetween&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Buy Me a Coffee &#127769;&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://buymeacoffee.com/tendingtheinbetween"><span>Buy Me a Coffee &#127769;</span></a></p><p>My work here is offered freely, but it takes time, focus, and devotion to create. If these transmissions speak to you and you feel called to support their continuation, you can do so through a paid subscription or a one-time offering.</p><p>Your support helps keep the current flowing &#8212; and I&#8217;m deeply grateful. &#129293;</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The System Isn’t Holding. It’s Showing You How It Works]]></title><description><![CDATA[The structure isn&#8217;t failing&#8212;it&#8217;s becoming visible as your perception shifts beyond the surface]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-holding-its-showing</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-holding-its-showing</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 24 Apr 2026 16:01:05 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/f17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:412911,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/194958896?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Tsdd!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff17566d5-bf9d-466f-bc7d-110fb9cceff6_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;8ed12372-64ed-44c2-9034-0896d1cb74d2&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:254.06694,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Something has become impossible to ignore. Not because it suddenly started happening, but because it&#8217;s no longer being contained the way it used to be. The seams are visible now&#8212;across politics, media, institutions, and the structures people were taught to rely on. You can see it in how quickly narratives shift, how often positions reverse without explanation, and how different groups are being shown completely different versions of the same reality and told both are complete. This isn&#8217;t just noise. It&#8217;s exposure.</p><p>For a long time, the system functioned by maintaining a sense of continuity. It didn&#8217;t need to be perfect. It just needed to feel stable enough that most people wouldn&#8217;t question how it was held together. That stability is thinning&#8212;not in one place, but in many places at once. Policies don&#8217;t align. Messaging contradicts itself. Processes no longer produce outcomes people recognize as fair or coherent. And what&#8217;s becoming more visible is how much of that stability was never structural&#8212;it was perceptual. It relied on timing, framing, repetition, and the quiet assumption that most people wouldn&#8217;t look too closely all at once.</p><p>That assumption is breaking. Information moves faster than containment now. Contradictions sit side by side without being resolved, and the gap between what is said and what is experienced is harder to ignore. So people try to make sense of it. Some lean harder into one side. Some withdraw completely. Some try to fact-check their way back to clarity. But the deeper frustration is the same: things aren&#8217;t lining up the way they used to. And when that happens at scale, it doesn&#8217;t just feel confusing&#8212;it feels destabilizing.</p><p>Most people weren&#8217;t taught how these systems actually operate. They were taught how to live inside them. So when the structure starts to show its inconsistencies, it doesn&#8217;t just raise questions about what&#8217;s happening now&#8212;it raises questions about what&#8217;s been happening all along. That&#8217;s the part people are trying to process. Not just the headlines, but the pattern. Why decisions look disconnected from outcomes. Why messaging doesn&#8217;t match reality. Why accountability feels selective. Why the same event can be framed in completely different ways depending on where you&#8217;re standing.</p><p>This isn&#8217;t about one issue or one moment. It&#8217;s about the loss of a shared frame. And without that frame, people don&#8217;t just disagree&#8212;they experience the world differently. That&#8217;s why everything feels more volatile. Not because everything is new, but because more of it is visible at the same time. You&#8217;re not imagining the inconsistencies. You&#8217;re noticing them. And noticing them changes how the whole structure feels, because once you see how something is being held together, you can&#8217;t unsee it.</p><p>And once that happens, the question shifts. It&#8217;s no longer just &#8220;What is happening right now?&#8221; It becomes &#8220;What has been happening underneath this the entire time?&#8221; It doesn&#8217;t mean everything disappears overnight. It means what used to feel solid no longer carries the same weight. And that shift&#8212;watching something continue while also seeing its fractures&#8212;is what people are trying to make sense of right now.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-holding-its-showing?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-holding-its-showing?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The System Isn’t Speeding Up. Your Reference Points Are Falling Away]]></title><description><![CDATA[What feels like acceleration is actually the collapse of the structures you&#8217;ve been using to orient yourself]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-speeding-up-your</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-speeding-up-your</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 22 Apr 2026 16:02:48 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:397454,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/194957611?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!ywVB!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4b5bf3b8-5d53-4f0d-8ebd-ef86943d27e5_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;147e1e59-f08f-42f6-b231-65f64498d3bc&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:192.86205,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Something has shifted in the last few weeks. Not in a way that&#8217;s loud or dramatic, but in a way that&#8217;s hard to ignore once you feel it. Things don&#8217;t land the same. Time doesn&#8217;t feel consistent. Even simple decisions feel heavier than they should.</p><p>People are trying to describe it in different ways. Some say everything feels faster. Some say nothing feels stable. Some say they can&#8217;t find their footing no matter how much they try to settle. But underneath all of that, it&#8217;s the same experience: the things you used to use to orient yourself are no longer holding in the same way.</p><p>Time isn&#8217;t behaving the way it used to. Your sense of rhythm feels off. Reactions that once felt automatic now feel delayed or out of sync. Even your own internal responses don&#8217;t always match who you&#8217;ve known yourself to be.</p><p>So the mind tries to solve it. It assumes you need to catch up, get ahead, figure it out, stabilize. But that&#8217;s where the misread happens.</p><p>This isn&#8217;t something you can get ahead of. Because what&#8217;s shifting isn&#8217;t your pace. It&#8217;s your reference system.</p><p>The structures that quietly held your sense of direction&#8212;your internal timing, your expectations, your sense of cause and effect&#8212;are loosening. And when that happens, the immediate response is disorientation. Not because you&#8217;re lost, but because the map you were using is no longer accurate.</p><p>That&#8217;s why effort isn&#8217;t fixing it. That&#8217;s why trying to &#8220;get back to normal&#8221; feels like pushing against something that won&#8217;t move. There isn&#8217;t a return point. There&#8217;s only a recalibration.</p><p>And recalibration doesn&#8217;t feel like clarity at first. It feels like pauses where there used to be momentum, uncertainty where there used to be decision, stillness where there used to be direction.</p><p>Nothing is wrong with you. You&#8217;re not falling behind.</p><p>You&#8217;re adjusting to a different set of conditions than the ones you&#8217;ve been living inside. And that adjustment happens quietly, underneath the surface, before anything makes sense again.</p><p>So if things feel unstable right now, or harder to read than they should be, it doesn&#8217;t mean you&#8217;ve lost your ability to navigate. It means what you&#8217;re navigating has changed.</p><p>And until your internal reference points reset, it&#8217;s going to feel like everything is slightly off.</p><p>That&#8217;s not failure.</p><p>That&#8217;s transition.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-speeding-up-your?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-isnt-speeding-up-your?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The System Is Breaking in Plain Sight]]></title><description><![CDATA[What you&#8217;re feeling isn&#8217;t confusion &#8212; it&#8217;s recognition without interruption]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-is-breaking-in-plain-sight</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-is-breaking-in-plain-sight</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 19 Apr 2026 15:07:04 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/f82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:288815,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/194700305?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!vgBZ!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff82fc5f2-6ede-411d-93a4-84528c3f03dd_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;d61b804a-71c3-452b-be57-3c8f078c67b8&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:330.9453,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Everything is coming apart.</p><p>You can see it now. There&#8217;s no way around it. What used to feel stable doesn&#8217;t hold the same way. What used to make sense doesn&#8217;t land clean. The structures you relied on don&#8217;t carry the same weight they once did. And it&#8217;s not subtle. It&#8217;s happening in real time, in full view, without slowing down or correcting itself.</p><p>You&#8217;re watching a visible push to break and remake parts of the system while it&#8217;s still running. Rules that used to hold are being ignored. Guardrails are being tested. Institutions are being pressured past what they were built to carry. And it isn&#8217;t stopping just because people can see it.</p><p>That&#8217;s what&#8217;s different now. Before, there was still a sense that things might stabilize. That something would step in. That it would resolve. That&#8217;s gone. Now it just continues.</p><p>Because the truth underneath it is this: the structure that&#8217;s coming apart was already failing. Not visibly enough for everyone to agree on it, and not dramatically enough to force immediate change, but functionally it was no longer holding what it was built to hold.</p><p>And systems like that don&#8217;t get gently upgraded. They get broken. Not cleanly, and not all at once, but enough that what was holding everything in place can&#8217;t keep doing it the same way anymore.</p><p>So what you&#8217;re watching isn&#8217;t random. It&#8217;s a forced transition out of something that no longer works, into something that hasn&#8217;t fully formed yet. And that&#8217;s why it feels like this.</p><p>You&#8217;re not standing in a stable system being disrupted. You&#8217;re standing in a system that is being dismantled and rebuilt at the same time.</p><p>And you&#8217;re still expected to function inside it. Still expected to show up, make decisions, and move forward like the ground underneath you isn&#8217;t shifting. That&#8217;s the part that doesn&#8217;t get said. Not the unraveling, but the fact that it&#8217;s happening while everything keeps moving.</p><p>You don&#8217;t get to step outside of it and watch from a distance. You&#8217;re inside it. And your body knows it. You feel it in the fatigue that doesn&#8217;t match your day, in the way your energy drops without warning, and in how your balance feels slightly off, like you&#8217;re out of sync with everything around you.</p><p>Things that used to be easy take more effort. Not because you&#8217;re doing anything wrong, but because what you&#8217;re moving through isn&#8217;t stable anymore. You can feel the mismatch. You can feel that what you&#8217;re standing in doesn&#8217;t hold the way it used to, even if everything around you is still acting like it does.</p><p>And that creates a kind of pressure that doesn&#8217;t release. You try to push through it. You try to normalize it. You try to keep moving the way you always have. But your body doesn&#8217;t respond the same way. It doesn&#8217;t hold energy the same way. It doesn&#8217;t recover the same way. It doesn&#8217;t stabilize the same way.</p><p>Because you&#8217;re not just dealing with stress. You&#8217;re dealing with reality shifting underneath you. You can see what&#8217;s happening, and once you see it, you don&#8217;t get to go back to moving unconsciously inside it.</p><p>That&#8217;s the split. Part of you still operating the way you always have, and another part of you fully aware that the environment you&#8217;re operating in has changed. That awareness has weight, because there&#8217;s no clean adjustment for it. There&#8217;s no moment where everything pauses long enough for you to recalibrate. It just keeps going.</p><p>So you end up carrying both at once. Functioning, and feeling the instability at the same time. Moving forward, while knowing nothing under it is fully settled. That&#8217;s why everything feels heavier.</p><p>Not because you&#8217;re failing to keep up, but because you&#8217;re trying to stay steady inside something that isn&#8217;t. And your body is the place that registers that truth first.</p><p>You can override it for a while. You can push past it. But eventually, it shows up anyway, in your energy, in your movement, and in your ability to hold what you used to hold.</p><p>Nothing is wrong with you. You&#8217;re responding to something real. You&#8217;re moving through a moment where everything is shifting, not because it&#8217;s broken for no reason, but because what was there was no longer enough to hold what&#8217;s coming next.</p><p>And there is no clean edge to stand on while that happens.</p><p>So you move. Aware. Unsteady at times. Feeling more than you used to, because there&#8217;s nowhere outside of this to stand.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-is-breaking-in-plain-sight?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-system-is-breaking-in-plain-sight?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[The Weight of Not Knowing]]></title><description><![CDATA[A quiet disorientation is settling in&#8212;and learning to trust your own discernment may be the only way through it.]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-weight-of-not-knowing</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-weight-of-not-knowing</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 12 Apr 2026 14:03:00 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic" width="1408" height="768" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:768,&quot;width&quot;:1408,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:85427,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/193889774?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!i61l!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8a63da53-3611-4383-ba9f-9ce6380f9f16_1408x768.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;701cecf2-2eef-4911-91a2-3ba11f9e7120&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:214.38693,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>We don&#8217;t know what&#8217;s going on. Not really.</p><p>We&#8217;re being fed fragments from every direction&#8212;conflicting, incomplete, constantly shifting&#8212;and none of it holds long enough to become something we can stand on. Every version contradicts another. Every explanation collapses under the next one that follows it. The instinct is to keep reaching, to keep listening, to keep trying to find the thread that makes it all make sense. But there isn&#8217;t one. Not right now.</p><p>And this isn&#8217;t confusion you solve by paying closer attention. It&#8217;s not a gap in understanding. It&#8217;s sustained. Layered, repeated, reinforced&#8212;just enough to keep you engaged, never enough to let anything resolve.</p><p>Stay in that loop long enough and it starts to do something precise. It separates you from your own read. You hesitate. You second-guess. You wait for confirmation that never arrives&#8212;not because you know nothing, but because nothing is allowed to settle long enough for you to trust what you&#8217;re seeing.</p><p>That&#8217;s where most people get stuck. Still trying to figure it out. Still waiting for clarity to come from somewhere outside of them.</p><p>But that&#8217;s not what&#8217;s being built here.</p><p>What&#8217;s being built is tolerance&#8212;the ability to hold unresolved information without collapsing into it, without needing immediate answers, without handing over your perception just to relieve the pressure of not knowing.</p><p>Because that pressure is real. It doesn&#8217;t spike like fear or announce itself loudly. It sits there&#8212;constant, unresolved&#8212;a pull to close something that won&#8217;t close.</p><p>Most people aren&#8217;t used to that. They&#8217;re used to closure. Used to movement. Used to knowing where they stand. This removes all of it. And if you don&#8217;t recognize what&#8217;s happening, you&#8217;ll keep trying to force resolution where there isn&#8217;t any.</p><p>But if you do, something shifts.</p><p>You stop chasing clarity in places that aren&#8217;t designed to give it. You stop outsourcing your sense of what&#8217;s real. And you start paying attention to something else&#8212;not what sounds right, but what holds. What doesn&#8217;t pull you out of yourself. What doesn&#8217;t require you to override your own perception just to make it fit.</p><p>That&#8217;s discernment. Not loud. Not reactive. Just steady.</p><p>And right now, that matters more than answers. Because this isn&#8217;t a moment that rewards certainty. It&#8217;s a moment that reveals whether you can stay with yourself when certainty isn&#8217;t available.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-weight-of-not-knowing?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-weight-of-not-knowing?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Field Note: When Peace Is Declared Too Early]]></title><description><![CDATA[You saw a statement today calling it a &#8220;big day for world peace.&#8221; But what sat underneath it didn&#8217;t feel like peace.]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-when-peace-is-declared</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-when-peace-is-declared</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 10 Apr 2026 16:11:36 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!oN33!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6659f0d5-d425-4f61-9c45-9937c7cdac99_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;803d0c5b-7756-4369-98e4-ea6d2317e3ec&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:164.31021,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>You saw a statement today calling it a &#8220;big day for world peace.&#8221; But what sat underneath it didn&#8217;t feel like peace. It felt like movement still in motion being named as resolution.</p><p>The language was confident, certain, final. Peace. Positive action. Reconstruction. A golden age. But layered inside that same frame was something else. Military presence still active. Positioning still in play. Control language woven through the tone. Not hidden, just sitting there.</p><p>And that&#8217;s where the dissonance shows up. Because peace, when it&#8217;s actually present, doesn&#8217;t need to be constructed that way. It doesn&#8217;t need to be reinforced with momentum, framed through gain, or stabilized through continued control. It holds on its own.</p><p>What this felt like instead was something still moving being named before it settled. And you can feel what that does to people. The moment the word &#8220;peace&#8221; enters the field, something in the body reaches for relief. It wants to land somewhere. It wants the tension to resolve. So it accepts the label before it checks the structure underneath it.</p><p>But relief and peace are not the same thing. Relief is the release of pressure. Peace is the absence of conflict. And when those two get confused, perception closes too early.</p><p>That&#8217;s what this moment is showing. Not whether something is good or bad. Not whether it&#8217;s right or wrong. But how quickly people accept resolution when it&#8217;s offered, even if the conditions haven&#8217;t actually changed.</p><p>Because staying with something that hasn&#8217;t resolved yet requires stability. It requires the ability to feel the tension without rushing to name it. Most people don&#8217;t wait. They take the word, attach to it, and move on.</p><p>But if you stay with it just a little longer, you can feel the difference. Peace doesn&#8217;t need to be announced that loudly. And it doesn&#8217;t need to be layered with everything else to hold.</p><p>When it&#8217;s real, it&#8217;s unmistakable. And it doesn&#8217;t ask you to decide anything at all.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-when-peace-is-declared?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-when-peace-is-declared?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[This Isn’t About Sides. It’s About Stability.]]></title><description><![CDATA[A pressure field is forming beneath the surface&#8212;and it&#8217;s revealing how quickly perception collapses under strain.]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-isnt-about-sides-its-about-stability</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-isnt-about-sides-its-about-stability</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 09 Apr 2026 16:11:42 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:171859,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/193512454?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!I-Iu!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F143bf6c1-8207-443e-8f14-fe7786960049_1672x941.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;5e4e2cd6-e40d-48be-bf7a-4206f59d89b7&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:374.54367,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>What&#8217;s happening right now isn&#8217;t about a person or even a war.</p><p>Those are the visible anchors. The mind needs something to point to, something to argue about, something to align with or against. But what&#8217;s actually moving is underneath that layer, and you can feel it in the way people are responding before they even understand what they&#8217;re responding to.</p><p>This is a pressure field. Not sudden. Not chaotic. Sustained. And what it&#8217;s doing is compressing perception.</p><p>You can see it in how quickly people move into certainty, how fast positions harden, how little space there is between exposure and conclusion. That compression isn&#8217;t coming from information alone. It&#8217;s coming from something deeper, something that&#8217;s pushing people to resolve tension before they&#8217;ve actually processed what they&#8217;re seeing.</p><p>There are figures within the system that function as polarity generators. Wherever they appear, perception organizes around them, opposition, defense, projection, allegiance. People don&#8217;t just observe. They orient themselves through them.</p><p>That&#8217;s why the reactions are so disproportionate to the surface events. These figures aren&#8217;t just part of the system. They are nodes the system uses to reveal how people assign meaning, how quickly they attach identity to position, how easily perception collapses into alignment.</p><p>And right now, that function is being intensified, not in isolation, but alongside the war field.</p><p>What you&#8217;re watching now with the attempted ceasefire, extended, agreed to, and already destabilizing, is not a failure in the way people will frame it. It&#8217;s a reflection of the same compression.</p><p>Even moments that are supposed to create pause are being pulled back into acceleration. There is no space being held long enough for anything to settle, and without space, perception doesn&#8217;t deepen, it hardens.</p><p>Because war does something very specific to human perception. It accelerates identification, narrows the field, and creates urgency that bypasses integration. People don&#8217;t just take in information during conflict, they absorb it into their sense of self.</p><p>That&#8217;s why the two are moving together. You&#8217;re watching a convergence of pressure sources that are forcing faster and faster internal resolution. Pick a side. Define your position. Decide what&#8217;s true.</p><p></p><blockquote><p><em>What comes next isn&#8217;t about what&#8217;s happening out there.</em></p><p><em>It&#8217;s about what this pressure is doing inside you, and whether you can actually feel the moment before you resolve it.</em></p><p><em>Because that&#8217;s where everything changes.</em></p></blockquote>
      <p>
          <a href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/this-isnt-about-sides-its-about-stability">
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      </p>
   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Field Note: Nothing Closed]]></title><description><![CDATA[The moment people felt&#8212;but no one finished]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-closed</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-closed</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 08 Apr 2026 16:11:49 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OZ7I!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa03a9914-d33e-445e-b434-87f462211c68_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;a4c4fff4-ecd9-40f9-8ac9-9e91ceeed8fc&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:119.2751,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>There&#8217;s a moment after something becomes clear where nothing else moves. Not because nothing is happening, but because what you were using to orient yourself is no longer there. It&#8217;s quiet in a way that can feel unfamiliar. Not peaceful, not resolved. Just still.</p><p>And the instinct is to do something with that. To name it, to fix it, to move it forward so it doesn&#8217;t sit in your body the way it does right now. But this part doesn&#8217;t respond to movement. It isn&#8217;t waiting for you to act. It&#8217;s waiting for you to stop trying to change what you&#8217;re seeing.</p><p>That&#8217;s the shift. Not in what&#8217;s happening around you, but in the moment you realize you&#8217;re no longer adjusting your perception to make it easier to hold.</p><p>Most people don&#8217;t stay here. They reach for something to replace the ground that just gave way. A new explanation. A better framing. Something that restores a sense of direction. And it works, just enough to feel like relief. But it also puts you right back inside the same structure you just saw through.</p><p>This space you&#8217;re in now doesn&#8217;t offer that. There&#8217;s no immediate reassurance. No clear next step. No version of this that feels finished. Just the absence of what was holding you before. And you, still here.</p><p>That&#8217;s the part that matters. Not what you build next. Not how you explain it. But whether you can remain here long enough to recognize what doesn&#8217;t fall away when everything else does.</p><p>Because that&#8217;s what&#8217;s real. And it doesn&#8217;t need to be rushed into anything else.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-closed?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-closed?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Resurrection Is Not a Glow-Up]]></title><description><![CDATA[Clarity costs more than becoming ever will]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/resurrection-has-a-cost</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/resurrection-has-a-cost</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 07 Apr 2026 16:11:49 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic 848w, 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data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:971,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:444025,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/192838869?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!z-Xg!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7c5c0f7b-ab2f-4993-942e-021890e116d4_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;36091c2f-56bd-43b9-ba9e-cdb94abf7f46&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:311.35345,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><div><hr></div><p></p><p>There is too much noise right now to think clearly. Not just information&#8212;pressure, urgency, a constant pull to react before anything has settled. Most people can feel something shifting, but they can&#8217;t locate it, so they reach for whatever gives them a sense of ground, even if it isn&#8217;t real. You can feel when you&#8217;re doing that&#8212;the small adjustment where you reshape what you&#8217;re seeing just enough to stay comfortable. That&#8217;s where distortion begins.</p><p>Not because you&#8217;re weak, but because what&#8217;s being exposed is moving faster than your ability to integrate it. Exposure is happening in real time. Integration is not. And when those two separate, something in you starts to fracture&#8212;not out there, but in here&#8212;because once you can&#8217;t trust what you&#8217;re seeing, you start reaching for something else to hold onto. A narrative, a position, a belief that gives you back a sense of control. But most of those aren&#8217;t chosen because they&#8217;re true. They&#8217;re chosen because they reduce pressure. You already know where you&#8217;re doing that. That&#8217;s the place this is asking you to stay.</p><p>Clarity is not neutral. It costs you the ability to lie to yourself. And there is a point where seeing clearly stops feeling like insight and starts feeling like loss. Most people step back right there, and that&#8217;s the moment everything turns.</p><p>Structures aren&#8217;t just failing. They&#8217;re being revealed. And once something is revealed clearly enough, it doesn&#8217;t function the same way anymore. That&#8217;s what you&#8217;re feeling&#8212;not just change, but the loss of assumed ground. Because if what you were standing on isn&#8217;t solid, then your orientation was never coming from truth. It was coming from agreement.</p><p>This is where most people leave themselves. They soften what they see so they don&#8217;t have to feel it, or they amplify it into fear so they can justify reacting to it. Both are exits. Both avoid the same thing: staying present with what is actually happening without altering it.</p><p>There is a way through this that doesn&#8217;t require panic or withdrawal, but it is not comfortable. It requires you to remain in contact with reality even when it doesn&#8217;t give you anything back right away&#8212;no resolution, no reassurance, no immediate meaning. Just truth, without buffering.</p><p>This is where the language of resurrection gets distorted. People want something new to rise, but they don&#8217;t want to look at what they&#8217;re still carrying that can&#8217;t come with them. That&#8217;s the real threshold&#8212;not what&#8217;s happening around you, but what you are unwilling to release because it still feels like identity, safety, or control.</p><p>Resurrection is not a glow-up. It is what remains when everything false is no longer sustainable. And that includes parts of you&#8212;patterns, interpretations, ways of relating to the world that only worked when the structure around you held them in place. Those don&#8217;t collapse gently. They fall apart in your awareness. And once you see them clearly, you don&#8217;t get to go back to not seeing them. That&#8217;s the part most people are trying to avoid.</p><p>You don&#8217;t need to rush to rebuild anything. In fact, rebuilding too soon is how the same structure returns in a different form. What matters now is whether you can stay long enough to see what is still standing when there is nothing left to hold you up artificially. Because what&#8217;s real doesn&#8217;t need reinforcement. It becomes visible when everything else fails.</p><p>And that&#8217;s where movement changes&#8212;not because things are fixed, but because you are no longer moving from something that isn&#8217;t true.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/resurrection-has-a-cost?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/resurrection-has-a-cost?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[You’re Not Crazy—The Timelines Are Out of Sync]]></title><description><![CDATA[Three timelines are running at once&#8212;and they no longer move together]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/youre-not-crazythe-timelines-are</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/youre-not-crazythe-timelines-are</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 05 Apr 2026 14:02:22 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:819,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:381105,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/193002094?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!5acP!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F77c98b0d-df66-4438-856f-c58fd1ba52db_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;5939a47a-fda9-4ad3-961b-1dc2a32bd885&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:395.02368,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>We are in a moment where something no longer lines up&#8212;and most people can feel it before they can explain it. There&#8217;s a quiet disorientation running underneath daily life. Not dramatic, not loud, but persistent. You move through your day, you handle what needs to be handled, but there&#8217;s a subtle question sitting just beneath the surface: why doesn&#8217;t this feel the way it&#8217;s supposed to feel? Things look functional on the outside. Systems are still in place. Nothing has visibly collapsed. But the internal experience of living inside it has shifted.</p><p>There is a gap now&#8212;between what was expected and what is being lived, between what is said and what is seen, between what should be happening and what actually is. And that gap is not small. It shows up when relief doesn&#8217;t arrive when it was supposed to, when alignment at the top doesn&#8217;t translate into change on the ground, when the things that were promised remain conversations instead of reality. It shows up in conversations that don&#8217;t land, where two people can look at the same situation and feel like they&#8217;re describing entirely different worlds. It shows up in the body as fatigue, irritation, a low-level sense that something is off even when nothing obvious is wrong.</p><p>This is the point where people start reaching for language. Some call it instability, some call it transition, some call it collapse&#8212;but the word that actually lands is timeline shift. Not because we&#8217;ve jumped into a different world, but because the version of reality people thought they were stepping into no longer matches the one they&#8217;re living in. And when that mismatch becomes collective, it doesn&#8217;t just feel like change. It feels like reality itself has split.</p><p>What is actually happening is simpler and more precise than that, but it requires naming it clearly. We are not in one timeline right now. We are in the overlap of three, and they are no longer moving together.</p><p>The first is the Institutional Timeline&#8212;the timeline of government, policy, systems, and official movement. This timeline is slow, heavy, and resistant. It runs on procedure, negotiation, internal conflict, and layers of approval. Even when there is visible alignment at the top, this timeline does not suddenly accelerate. From inside it, things look like they are being worked on. Plans exist. Conversations are happening. Movement is implied. But very little is felt on the ground in real time. This is the timeline that tells you things are in motion.</p><p>The second is the Economic Pressure Timeline&#8212;the timeline people are actually living inside their bodies. This is cost of living, housing, food, gas, debt, stability. This timeline does not wait for policy or promises. It moves through pressure, compounding strain, and real-time impact. And right now, it is accelerating. From inside this timeline, things feel tighter, not later but now. This is the timeline that tells you something is off, and it&#8217;s getting harder.</p><p>The third is the Perception Timeline&#8212;the timeline of belief, narrative, and what people think is happening. It is the most unstable. It is shaped by media, personal experience, community, and internal filters, and right now it is fractured. Two people can live in the same place, experience the same conditions, and come away with completely different realities. One sees improvement, one sees decline, and both feel certain. This is the timeline that tells you what reality is, but it is no longer consistent across people.</p><p>The timeline shift people are feeling is not random and it is not imaginary. It is the result of these three timelines falling out of alignment. The Institutional Timeline says movement is happening. The Economic Timeline says pressure is increasing. The Perception Timeline says reality depends on where you&#8217;re standing. When those three no longer move together, the experience is disorientation. It feels like a split because the story no longer matches the lived experience.</p><p>And depending on where your attention is anchored, one timeline will feel more real than the others. If you anchor in institutions, you will feel patience. If you anchor in economics, you will feel pressure. If you anchor in perception, you will feel division or confusion. This is not about choosing a timeline. It is about recognizing that all three are active at once, and they are not currently synchronized.</p><p>This is what a real transition looks like. Not a clean shift, not a dramatic flip, but a period where multiple versions of where we thought we were going and where we actually are are sitting on top of each other. This is a convergence point, and convergence points are unstable by nature. They do not hold indefinitely. They resolve. The only question is which direction solidifies.</p><p>This isn&#8217;t the world breaking. It&#8217;s the moment the illusion of alignment drops&#8212;and you&#8217;re forced to see what&#8217;s actually moving, and what isn&#8217;t.</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://buymeacoffee.com/tendingtheinbetween&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Buy Me a Coffee &#127769;&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://buymeacoffee.com/tendingtheinbetween"><span>Buy Me a Coffee &#127769;</span></a></p><p>My work here is offered freely, but it takes time, focus, and devotion to create. If these transmissions speak to you and you feel called to support their continuation, you can do so through a paid subscription or a one-time offering.</p><p>Your support helps keep the current flowing &#8212; and I&#8217;m deeply grateful. &#129293;</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Field Note: It Didn’t Settle]]></title><description><![CDATA[The moment people felt&#8212;but nothing resolved]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-it-didnt-settle</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-it-didnt-settle</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 03 Apr 2026 16:11:50 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic" width="1456" height="971" data-attrs="{&quot;src&quot;:&quot;https://substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com/public/images/a8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic&quot;,&quot;srcNoWatermark&quot;:null,&quot;fullscreen&quot;:null,&quot;imageSize&quot;:null,&quot;height&quot;:971,&quot;width&quot;:1456,&quot;resizeWidth&quot;:null,&quot;bytes&quot;:226101,&quot;alt&quot;:null,&quot;title&quot;:null,&quot;type&quot;:&quot;image/heic&quot;,&quot;href&quot;:null,&quot;belowTheFold&quot;:false,&quot;topImage&quot;:true,&quot;internalRedirect&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/i/192861856?img=https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic&quot;,&quot;isProcessing&quot;:false,&quot;align&quot;:null,&quot;offset&quot;:false}" class="sizing-normal" alt="" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!VqeD!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8719c97-1c01-4383-b2d8-04b3904afc51_1536x1024.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;0088a5cb-eed1-4ec4-9f90-9c221f00beb2&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:352.78366,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Nothing resolved. That&#8217;s the part people aren&#8217;t saying out loud. Things were seen, named, exposed, and instead of relief there&#8217;s a low, persistent hum sitting underneath everything, like something opened but never closed. You can feel it in conversations that don&#8217;t quite land, in decisions that feel premature or strangely weightless, in the way the body doesn&#8217;t fully relax even when nothing is actively wrong. It&#8217;s not confusion. It&#8217;s unfinished recognition. The system&#8212;internally and externally&#8212;was shown something it can&#8217;t return from, but hasn&#8217;t reorganized around yet, so everything keeps moving, but without coherence. People are speaking with certainty while something in them knows it isn&#8217;t settled. Structures are continuing as if nothing has changed, while the ground beneath them no longer holds in the same way.</p><p>There&#8217;s a quiet dissonance running through it all, not loud, not dramatic, just constant. And the nervous system feels it, that subtle tension that doesn&#8217;t fully release, that sense of waiting for something to click into place&#8212;but it never quite does. Because the old reference point is gone, and nothing new has stabilized enough to replace it. So the body keeps scanning, keeps trying to orient, keeps looking for completion in something that no longer functions the way it used to. This is where people start to rush, to label it, to resolve it, to move past it. But this isn&#8217;t a moment you move past. This is a space you either stay present in or distort to escape.</p><p>Because what&#8217;s actually happening here is not breakdown. It&#8217;s reorganization without announcement. Not everything that&#8217;s exposed integrates immediately. Some things destabilize first. Some things linger. Some things stay open long enough that you&#8217;re forced to stop relating to them the way you used to. And that&#8217;s where the discomfort sharpens, because there&#8217;s no clean narrative to hold onto, no clear &#8220;this is what it means,&#8221; just the undeniable sense that something has shifted and you don&#8217;t get to go back to how you understood it before. This is the part most people try to skip, but this is where the real work is happening, not in the exposure, but in what happens after.</p>
      <p>
          <a href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-it-didnt-settle">
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      </p>
   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Field Note: Nothing Happened]]></title><description><![CDATA[The question people asked&#8212;but never got answered]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-happened</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-happened</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 01 Apr 2026 16:11:18 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!1KxT!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F93136db9-df5d-4dd8-9361-9bd4846d85d4_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;f8bf57c9-8e6f-4191-b3ea-9fabb6d3113a&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:152.05878,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><div><hr></div><p></p><p>Let&#8217;s stop circling this.</p><p>Since 2020, people watched decisions get made that affected every part of life. Access. Movement. Work. Choice. People lost jobs. Lost time. Lost connection. Some lost far more than that. Rules were enforced. Lines were drawn. And those lines were not optional.</p><p>That part is not unclear.</p><p>What&#8217;s unclear&#8212;what people keep trying to explain away&#8212;is what came after.</p><p>Nothing.</p><p>No real accountability that matched the scale of what was done. No visible consequence. No moment where anyone at that level was required to answer for it in a way that changed anything. Everything just&#8230; continued.</p><p>And at some point, whether people said it out loud or not, the question came up:</p><p><em><strong>Why are these people still walking free?</strong></em></p><p></p>
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          <a href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/field-note-nothing-happened">
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   ]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[🌑 The Absence of Accountability]]></title><description><![CDATA[What continued without consequence was never meant to resolve]]></description><link>https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-absence-of-accountability</link><guid isPermaLink="false">https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-absence-of-accountability</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Tending The In-Between]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 31 Mar 2026 16:11:44 GMT</pubDate><enclosure url="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic" length="0" type="image/jpeg"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<div class="captioned-image-container"><figure><a class="image-link image2 is-viewable-img" target="_blank" href="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic" data-component-name="Image2ToDOM"><div class="image2-inset"><picture><source type="image/webp" srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_424,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_848,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_1272,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_1456,c_limit,f_webp,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw"><img src="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic" width="1456" height="819" 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srcset="https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_424,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 424w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_848,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 848w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_1272,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 1272w, https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!msA2!,w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa26cec9b-98a4-43bd-a37e-42e05011adf6_1536x864.heic 1456w" sizes="100vw" fetchpriority="high"></picture><div class="image-link-expand"><div class="pencraft pc-display-flex pc-gap-8 pc-reset"><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container restack-image"><svg role="img" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 20 20" fill="none" stroke-width="1.5" stroke="var(--color-fg-primary)" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg"><g><title></title><path d="M2.53001 7.81595C3.49179 4.73911 6.43281 2.5 9.91173 2.5C13.1684 2.5 15.9537 4.46214 17.0852 7.23684L17.6179 8.67647M17.6179 8.67647L18.5002 4.26471M17.6179 8.67647L13.6473 6.91176M17.4995 12.1841C16.5378 15.2609 13.5967 17.5 10.1178 17.5C6.86118 17.5 4.07589 15.5379 2.94432 12.7632L2.41165 11.3235M2.41165 11.3235L1.5293 15.7353M2.41165 11.3235L6.38224 13.0882"></path></g></svg></button><button tabindex="0" type="button" class="pencraft pc-reset pencraft icon-container view-image"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" width="20" height="20" viewBox="0 0 24 24" fill="none" stroke="currentColor" stroke-width="2" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-linejoin="round" class="lucide lucide-maximize2 lucide-maximize-2"><polyline points="15 3 21 3 21 9"></polyline><polyline points="9 21 3 21 3 15"></polyline><line x1="21" x2="14" y1="3" y2="10"></line><line x1="3" x2="10" y1="21" y2="14"></line></svg></button></div></div></div></a></figure></div><div class="native-audio-embed" data-component-name="AudioPlaceholder" data-attrs="{&quot;label&quot;:null,&quot;mediaUploadId&quot;:&quot;152cb1c5-6383-4865-be58-b11a79c4f5c8&quot;,&quot;duration&quot;:322.14203,&quot;downloadable&quot;:false,&quot;isEditorNode&quot;:true}"></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><div><hr></div><p></p><p><em><strong>The Absence of Accountability Isn&#8217;t a Failure. It&#8217;s a Message.</strong></em></p><p>Since the beginning of what we lived through in 2020&#8212;what was named a global health crisis&#8212;something has been sitting just beneath the surface. Not confusion. Not lack of information. Recognition. People watched decisions being made that affected every aspect of their lives&#8212;movement, work, connection, access, choice. People watched narratives form, shift, and solidify. People watched entire populations reorganize overnight. And now, years later, with everything that has surfaced, everything that has been questioned, everything that has been seen from multiple angles&#8230; there has been no real accountability that matches the scale of what occurred. No pause that reflects the magnitude. No visible consequence that closes the loop. And more than that&#8212;everything continued anyway.</p><p>That&#8217;s the part that doesn&#8217;t resolve. Because it&#8217;s not meant to. You&#8217;re not watching a system fail to hold itself accountable. You&#8217;re watching a system reveal what it actually protects. And it&#8217;s not you. It&#8217;s not fairness. It&#8217;s not truth. It&#8217;s not even consistency. It&#8217;s continuity.</p><p>The structure doesn&#8217;t break itself to prove integrity. It sustains itself to preserve control. So when something happens that should fracture trust, the response isn&#8217;t correction&#8212;it&#8217;s absorption. Language softens. Focus redirects. New information enters before the previous layer is ever fully acknowledged. Not because the past was resolved&#8230; but because it was bypassed.</p><p>And the body feels that. Even if the mind tries to move on, the nervous system registers the gap. Because it expects something simple: that actions of that scale would carry visible consequence. But when that consequence never arrives, something shifts internally. People begin to question their own perception. They minimize what they saw. They tell themselves they must not have the full picture. Not because they&#8217;re incapable&#8212; but because the external world offered no reflection back.</p><p>That&#8217;s how internal distortion begins. Not through force. But through absence. And over time, something deeper settles in. The expectation of accountability dissolves. Wrong no longer guarantees consequence. Impact no longer guarantees response. And instead of rejecting that, most people slowly reorganize around it. They normalize what should have never been normalized. Not because they agree&#8212; but because nothing in the external field confirms that resistance would land anywhere.</p><p>That&#8217;s where the deeper control sits. Not in overt restriction. Not in visible force. In the quiet conditioning that tells you: &#8220;This is just how it is.&#8221; But it isn&#8217;t. It&#8217;s how it&#8217;s been allowed to be&#8212;repeatedly, consistently, without interruption.</p><p>And that repetition teaches the body something: where the limits are&#8230; and where they aren&#8217;t. Because once that expectation sets in, the system doesn&#8217;t have to enforce anything. It&#8217;s already been integrated.</p><p>But something is changing now. Not outside&#8212;inside. Because more people are noticing the gap. The lack of closure. The absence of consequence. The way everything moved forward without ever resolving what came before. And that recognition doesn&#8217;t collapse you. It clarifies you.</p><p>You stop waiting for the system to validate what you already know. You stop expecting resolution from a structure that sustains itself by withholding it. And you begin to hold your own line&#8212;not loudly, not performatively, but steadily. Without needing their acknowledgment to confirm your reality.</p><p>The absence of accountability was never the oversight. It was the signal. And whether people want to admit it or not&#8230; the system showed you exactly what it will protect. The only question now is: what will you protect in yourself?</p><div><hr></div><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Subscribe now&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/subscribe?"><span>Subscribe now</span></a></p><p class="button-wrapper" data-attrs="{&quot;url&quot;:&quot;https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-absence-of-accountability?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share&quot;,&quot;text&quot;:&quot;Share&quot;,&quot;action&quot;:null,&quot;class&quot;:null}" data-component-name="ButtonCreateButton"><a class="button primary" href="https://tendingtheinbetween.substack.com/p/the-absence-of-accountability?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&action=share"><span>Share</span></a></p><p></p>]]></content:encoded></item></channel></rss>