staceybooks

There is a very specific kind of confusion that only happens at 3:00 am. It is dark. It is quiet. The world is asleep. And yet my brain is clocking in for its most productive shift. So tell me, is 3:00 am early morning or late night? Because my ADHD brain cannot decide. If it’s…

Look at the Skills, Not the Label There is a moment in every interview when a résumé stops being paper and starts becoming a person. For justice impacted individuals, that moment often carries more weight than it should. Because before you see their certifications, their work ethic, or their grit, there is a silent label…

There is something no one explains about turning fifty. You do not suddenly feel settled. You do not suddenly feel finished. You do not suddenly feel like you have arrived. You feel reflective. You start lining up the decades and realizing how much they carried. At 20, I was building a family. At 30, I…

I went to bed with my back giving out. So naturally, my brain decided to build an entire dream around it. I woke up from a dream where my back just kept giving out. Not once. Not for dramatic effect. Over and over. In the dream, Persevere was building a new men’s transition home in…

There comes a moment when you realize a chapter has ended even if no one announced it. There is no ribbon cutting. No applause. Just a quiet understanding that what once fit no longer does. Sometimes closing a chapter looks dramatic. Other times it looks painfully ordinary. It is packing boxes and leaving a state…

Anyone else wake up at 3am after dreaming about a series you’ve been watching – where the finale leaves you hanging so hard your brain decides to finish it for you in your sleep? Yeah. Hi. That’s me. 🙋‍♀️ Prodigal Son on Netflix did that to me. Full-on cinematic dream continuation. No credits. No closure.…

There is a unique kind of weight that comes from the mistakes you can’t outrun. Not the small missteps that fade with time, but the ones that linger. The ones that altered the course of your life. The ones that still echo in relationships, opportunities, and memories long after you’ve grown into someone wiser. Those…

Leadership does not always look like big announcements, viral wins, or shiny new initiatives. Sometimes leadership looks like staying. Staying when the funding gap feels heavier than the vision. Staying when the mission has not changed, but the path forward is still coming into focus. Staying when you are holding responsibility for people, programs, and…

I am not actually waiting for the microwave to finish. I am lying awake in Tallahassee, here for work, on the 6th floor of a building with walls so thin they feel more like a suggestion than a structure. I can hear people talking. Not muffled talking. Actual conversations. At this point, I could contribute.…