Dear friends,

I hope this message finds you rested and recharged! For me, the turning of a new year sparks a confusing and contradictory mix of feelings. The opportunity for a fresh start appeals to the optimist in me, and at the same time, my inner critic reminds me that I have inevitably fallen short of my ambitious goals for the year before. I feel the urge to make resolutions, even though I always aim to resist the relentless, burnout-inducing cultural push to do more and be better.

Dear friends,

Happy fall! How are you? My favorite season has brought a flurry of activity on all fronts, and I am feeling thankful and tired in equal measure.

Dear friends,

How are you? I hope fall is bringing you joy, as it is for me! I am looking forward to festooning my house with Halloween decorations and thinking about how to bring spooky spirit to work. This month I have some random musings rather than a singular topic, and I hope these words are still useful to you. I am on the airplane, flying back from an energizing workshop on Diagnostic Excellence and Health Equity at the National Academy of Medicine.

Dear friends,

How are you? We’re deep into Fog-ust here- I haven’t see the sun in days! I do have some vacation ahead, and I hope you too have a chance to savor the last days of summer. Lately I have been thinking about who holds the ultimate responsibility for our work, and why that matters.

Dear friends,

Happy summer! Even in San Francisco we are enjoying some lovely sunshine, and I hope you are too. How is your work pace? I was looking forward to a summer lull, but it hasn’t happened yet. My days seem more packed than ever, and my usual planning strategies are not keeping me from falling behind. So let’s talk about coping with, if not exactly embracing, work chaos. I’m talking about that feeling of having multiple demands come at you unexpectedly, going from meeting to meeting without surfacing long enough to think through a logical plan, and burning through the work time set aside on your calendar without getting the important stuff done.

Dear friends,

We made it through the crazy month of May! I hope you are looking ahead to some downtime this summer. An early-career faculty member with young kids recently asked me a great question: how do you decide how much to travel? Is there a magic number of trips per year or nights away from home?

Dear friends,

Here we are, in the challenging month of May, when end-of-school-year parent commitments collide with the pre-summer rush at work and the June NIH grant deadline. Fun times! I hope you are setting some boundaries this month. I’m working on it.

Dear friends,

Does it feel like spring yet? I’m writing this on yet another cold and rainy day, cheering myself up with a cup of tea and wildflower daydreams. I hope April brings sunshine to all of us!

We are one month into the new year, how are you doing with those resolutions? In case your best intentions have fallen by the wayside, I would like to suggest some resolutions that I wish my mentees and colleagues would take on.

Hope the cold dark winter days find you warm, cozy, and safe! I find the month of December to be particularly challenging, as everyone tries to clear their to-do list before taking a break. Over the years I have tried several strategies to mitigate this year-end game of hot potato. Here are three practical ideas: (1) block off some work time pre-vacation; (2) put your auto-reply up a couple of days in advance of leaving this office; (3) set a turn-around time with your team and collaborators (e.g., any requests I receive after December 12th will be addressed in the new year.)