Category: On Second Thought

  • When Conversation Stops Feeling Like Work

    When Conversation Stops Feeling Like Work

    Some conversations feel exhausting long before we admit they do. Not because anything bad happened — but because we spent the entire interaction translating ourselves into more socially manageable forms.

  • The Music He Carried

    The Music He Carried

    by Ezra Nadav Murray Cohen never told his story all at once. It came in fragments—over coffee, in passing comments, in the space between one story and another. You had to sit with him long enough to understand that what sounded like a memory was often a doorway. And if you stayed, really stayed, he…

  • In the Between: Four Movements Toward Becoming

    In the Between: Four Movements Toward Becoming

    By Ezra Nadav Author’s Preface These four poems emerged over time, each one finding me at a different stage of unlearning. They began as small acts of reflection — scraps of light in long stretches of quiet — and slowly became a conversation between solitude, surrender, and self-return. In the Between traces the cyclical movement…

  • Why Resilience and Mental Toughness Matter More Than Positive Thinking

    Why Resilience and Mental Toughness Matter More Than Positive Thinking

    Part of the ‘Not Quiet What You Meant’ series By: Ezra Nadav For years, “positive thinking” has been marketed as the secret to success. From self-help books to Instagram mantras, the message has been consistent: if you just focus on the good, the good will follow. But life is more complicated than a motivational poster,…

  • The Power to Love: Courage to Know Pain

    The Power to Love: Courage to Know Pain

    A part of the ‘On Second Thought‘ series We often talk about love like it’s easy. Gentle. Healing. But the truth is — to love deeply is to be brave.Because real love doesn’t come without risk.It stretches us. Wounds us. Changes us. In my latest blog, I explore what it means to love not in…

  • I Am Not What I Know

    I Am Not What I Know

    A part of the ‘On Second Thought‘ series By: Ezra Nadav I’ve spent most of my life gathering knowledge, storing it, curating it, offering it to others in the hope it will matter. In classrooms and consultations, workshops and webinars, I’ve been praised for clarity, for insight, for translating the complex into the digestible. It’s…

  • The Kindness You Don’t Remember Giving

    The Kindness You Don’t Remember Giving

    You may forget it. They may not. A part of the ‘On Second Though’ series By: Ezra Nadav When I was not yet twelve, I watched my grandfather do something I’ve never forgotten. We were stopped at a McDonald’s just outside of Waco, Texas, one of those roadside moments that usually blends into the background…