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Essays

This is where I publish reflections on society, mental wellbeing, and sense of self. I also share personal experiences and what I have learned from them. Understanding the world through writing and discussion is one of my biggest passions. 

You can subscribe to get posts sent directly to your inbox by signing up below, or by following me on Substack. 

I love to hear from people, so I eagerly invite you to comment on Substack or email me at michael@michaelzzaki.com to start a conversation! I hope you enjoy reading.

Michael’s Substack •

Reading I Who Have Never Known Men

I recently read I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman (1995, for context). I’m going to describe the plot overall and in some detail, so I’ll say don’t read this if you don’t want spoilers. I do recommend the book—it was interesting and a very fast read, due to being both short and written in a way that made the pages fly by. I think that’s impressive, because there is a lot of interiority which often makes a book slower paced. It has a really sad premise, though, so check out content...
Michael’s Substack •

When I lived by the lake

For three years, I lived in a house with friends a few blocks from a huge lake. I could see the lake from huge living room windows, and it was beautiful. Because the lake was at the bottom of a hill, and my house was at the top, I did not go down to the water very often. It was often painful to hike back up, and I am an anxious person who often tries to over-conserve energy on top of what I actually need to conserve.The whole time, I kept thinking I would regret not taking more advantage of how...
Michael’s Substack •

Why housekeeping talk is so hard

As a person who enjoys clutter, hates dirt, was barely raised, enjoys cleaning, and has sometimes severe fatigue and pain that limit my ability to do any of the things I want to be doing, I have had a hard time communicating with housemates about cleaning and tidiness. I have also seen friends go through the same thing—not able to communicate effectively with the people they live with, feeling frustrated, misunderstood, and unhappy at home.I think part of why this happens is that there is usuall...
Michael’s Substack •

Taking it personally

I’ve been working on not taking it personally when I hear things that aren’t aimed at me personally. The other day I was listening to a podcast, and the people on it were addressing a listener question about wanting their partner to change living habits before they live together. In answering this, they mentioned that some people live in an unsafely dirty environment and that it’s reasonable to want that to change, but short of that, people also just live differently from each other and it’s some...
Michael’s Substack •

A friend who inspires me

I am subscribed to a wonderful Substack called “Whimsical Writing with Wake.” Wake is a friend I met once in person then many times on the internet over the past six or so years. I’m so grateful we met, then connected on Facebook in the time you could so easily connect with all the cool people you met (I’ve since brought myself to make the effort to ask for people’s contact info). Wake writes daily writing prompts, sending them weekly as a list, then daily they send their response to the prompt...
Michael’s Substack •

Is Online a Place?

There have been times in my life where “online” was a place I went, and times where “online” has been something I’m consuming—social media feeling more like a book or a TV show than a social space.I’ve had a few stretches of mostly-online life. One of the longest was just after college, around 2014-2016, just before and after I moved to Seattle. I was heavily present on Facebook at that time, and I was in several groups, many of which were around identities or ideologies; a type of cross-world c...
Medium •

Pets can have just okay lives too

The internet is full of advice and criticism; how much does it matter?

I have two rabbits, and if you know anything about pet rabbits, you may know that they’re a bit fragile. Their digestive systems fully shut down sometimes if you don’t catch symptoms quickly, so it’s understandable that people can be a little extreme with their concerns about them.

But — I’ve seen this about every type of pet: intense, extreme advice and critique, that ultimately seems to be sending the message: if you cann
Medium •

I don’t want to like everyone in my community

Learning what a community is as an adult has been a journey.

I grew up very isolated outside of school; I wasn’t connected to much — not to my neighborhood, not to a religious community, not to any group. I was home a lot, with my family and media. I didn’t know what belonging to people felt like.

When I was able to go away to college, I learned what it felt like to have a community for the first time. In college, community is easy. Everyone is within walking distance, you have some things in
Medium •

Therapy isn’t for everyone

“Not going to therapy is a red flag”

Recently, someone reminded me of what it was like to talk about therapy in 2005. I had literally forgotten, because the transition was so quick, in a lot of ways. Honestly, I thought the positive view of therapy wasn’t actually that widespread, I was just surrounding myself with people who feel positive about seeking mental health treatment. I thought that surely, it’s more widespread, but things must not have fully changed, right?

I’m actually still not su
Medium •

“I can’t wait to see what the rest of this year holds for you!”

Sometimes I see a brief interaction and imagine a lot around it — a place, a relationship, a way of feeling, a way of being in the world.

How does a person who might say that feel about life? They are assuming positive things happen, that they will happen. They want to see others’ happy — not just that they want them to be happy, they want to see it. They anticipate it. Others’ joy gives them joy.
Medium •

The compulsion to control ideas

I have one of those neurodivergent compulsions to correct what feels like misinformation; I always have. That has driven so much of my writing. I have a deep sense of injustice when people have the wrong idea about basically anything. When real injustice is involved, I feel even more strongly, more intensely — I feel more immediately frustrated and activated.

In my early to mid twenties, that involved a lot of yelling at people online. It was exhausting trying to put out the fires I see startin
Photo by Pavel Danilyuk on Pexels
Medium •

Sometimes it’s a puzzle, not an obstacle course

I’m used to obstacles. I’m disabled, and a lot of the time it feels like arbitrary difficulties stand between me and things I need or want to do. Sometimes they are unavoidable difficulties, and sometimes they are situations that would be easily solved by infrastructural accessibility.

Sometimes, however, I’m so used to that, I think that in all challenging situations I just need to try harder. So I try harder, and harder, and harder.

One of my
Medium •

Are you actually failing or just poor?

Are you failing or are you just poor?

I realized one day in 2020 that I had not been irresponsible my whole life, I had been poor. That day, for the first time, I solved a small mistake with money.

I had just gotten a pet rabbit, and bought foam mats to protect my floor, in case of scratching or accidents. He chewed them up immediately. I felt so bad about myself for wasting the money and creating this problem for myself, until I realized I had the money in those days to just go buy something else.
Photo by Mathilde Langevin on Pexels
Medium •

When "self improvement" never ends

It used to be more important to me to be the best version of myself. I used to believe that self improvement was one static, linear thing. Either we’re moving forward or we’re backsliding.

It now feels arrogant, looking back, that I thought in 2015 that I was “improving myself” as a person, and that the only way I could improve further was to try “harder” to keep improving. I had no idea how much people grow without trying so hard, and how trying so hard d
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels
Medium •

There is no moral obligation to be normal

There is so much pressure in various marginalized groups to prove it’s not our “fault” we are certain ways — fat, trans, gay, bisexual, etc.

We feel we have to prove we are healthy fat people. Or genetically fat people. Because it wasn’t our “fault”.

We feel we have to find a gay gene or show how our trans brains are different from cis people’s.

We feel we have to show our health conditions were not our fault.

We feel we have to beg for safety by pr
Photo by Karolina Grabowska on Pexels
Medium •

Therapy isn't a test

Many people talk about wanting their therapist to like them, and to feel like they’re doing a good job at therapy. They will say that they deep down want to be their therapist’s favorite client. They worry that they’re not succeeding at therapy, or bothering their therapist. I always wish someone would tell them that it’s safe to let go of that, so I’m going to try.

If you’re feeling like you’re only safe when you’re liked by people you interact with, I hope that it helps to hear that needing a