Cole VonNiessen, MC, RCC

Every year around this point, people start describing the same thing. Harder mornings. Less interest in plans. A heaviness that wasn't there in August and can't quite be attributed to anything specific. Reduced daylight has a measurable effect on mood, sleep and energy for a significant number of people, and in the Interior the shift is compounded by the inversion and grey stretches that can settle in for weeks. What It Looks Like Seasonal low mood often presents differently from depression...

A lot of people spend years quietly wondering about their drinking without saying it out loud. They don't think they have a problem in the way that word is usually meant. They're functioning — working, parenting, showing up. But something has shifted, they've noticed, and they haven't told anyone. That's a reasonable place to start a conversation. You don't need a crisis, a label, or a rock bottom to be allowed to look at this. Better Questions Than "Do I Have a Problem?" That question is a...

Screen time is one of the most common sources of conflict between parents and teenagers, and one of the least productive arguments to have directly. The useful question isn't how many hours. It's what the screen is doing. Three Different Situations For many young people, gaming and social platforms are simply where their social life happens. The friendships are real, the connection is real, and the screen is the venue rather than the substance. This looks alarming to a generation that...