A more personal note
I know it’s a holiday week. I also know you’re still checking your email, so of course, this is the perfect time to share a more personal note. (Plus an announcement at the end to help make sure next holiday season you are NOT checking your email. 😉)
Here I am again at the edge of another year older this week. This time last year, I shared I was rewriting my birthday “rules” through the lens of deinstitutionalizing, the time I first used the word in an actionable way in this newsletter. But this really roots back years before, in the long process of self-healing and designing containers to hold the healing of others.
Throwback fact: In December 2021, in another birthday month launch, I announced Reclaim You: Healing from Higher Education. It was my first curriculum built to support those navigating burnout, disillusionment, and the unspoken harms of institutional life.
At the time, it was a response to the post-COVID “return to normal” messaging that demanded people just keep producing, keep overworking, and ignore grief or fatigue. Band-aid fixes of performative self-care were another way to squeeze continued exploitation and overwork from folks. That 15 minutes of yoga in the office wasn’t going to make up for those extra 15 tasks they gave you or you took on. When I raised concerns about burnout to a senior administrator, I was told, “We all just have to do more.”
Nope. Pass. Just no.
Deinstitutionalizing emerged from my own decomposition of decades in education and organizational work. Experiences that opened doors to opportunity and growth while also often shaming me into hiding my true self, into putting on my good worker/girl/student masks or armor. In the years leading up to leaving academia, I felt a hollowing of my soul, a disconnect from purpose. Yet I woke in the middle of the night with urgency. I know many of you know this feeling.
At first, I healed at the most basic levels: starting with the body, which led to the emotions, then shifting the mindsets, all to create a more lasting change. Over time, I discovered the spiritual and soulful dimensions. Through that process, I learned to protect myself from toxic work cultures, overwork expectations, and pervasive bias. I also came to see the potential in organizational spaces to be transformative growth spaces, if we resist the pull of status quo, wounded egos, and isolation.
Today, my approach to deinstitutionalizing is far more expansive. It asks questions that shift us from “What will you produce?” to “How will you live?”
As I mark another trip around the sun this week with big changes up ahead, I’ve reflected on the rules I’ve been rewriting. The rules that once felt unquestioned. The rules that other people try to keep me following. And I’m thrilled to invite you into rewriting these made-up rules together…
Announcing: Deinstitutionalizing, the 2026 Grove Community Theme
In 2026, the Grove community will focus on Deinstitutionalizing: the regenerative practice of reclaiming the parts of yourself that have been locked inside the cardboard box walls of organizational culture. These walls are propped up by the myth that the institution defines your worth, identity, and belonging.
January: Name the Illusion, Break the Spell
The overarching distortions created by institutional myths, which are those subtle forces of culture that shape how you see yourself, your work, and what you believe is possible.
We’re starting with exposing the institutional illusions, especially the ones that sneak in after winter break, and reclaiming your power before the year begins.
Deinstitutionalizing is not a one-time act; it is a living praxis, an embodied unlearning and reclaiming that unfolds seasonally, in alignment with your body, nature’s rhythms, and community. By shedding inherited rules and dismantling myths of scarcity, busyness, saviorism, security, and rigid creativity, you rebuild life and work grounded in connection, sustainability, and joy.
Through workshops, discussions, and practices in 2026, we will challenge these institutionalized myths and explore:
How the “always-summer” mindset of institutions and capitalism depletes us
How to return to seasonal cycles that sustain us, our communities, and the Earth
How to reclaim aliveness, purpose, and agency in our work and life
Deinstitutionalizing is ultimately about returning home to yourself, your body, your rhythms, your communities, while dismantling the old rules that no longer serve us and are actively harming us.
As I celebrate another year of life and reflection, I invite you to join me in this work. To pause. To feel. To reclaim. And to imagine what wants to emerge next.