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Oh, The Stories We Tell Ourselves
Have you ever thought someone was angry with you, disappointed in you, or avoiding you, only to find out you were wrong? Our minds are great at filling in the blanks, especially when the people or relationships matter a lot to us. Sometimes we get so attached to our own explanations that we start treating them as facts.
For years, I worried that I’d somehow upset an old friend whose simple act of love and acceptance had meant more to me than he probably ever realized. When my occasional attempts to reconnect mostly went unanswered, I started to wonder what I’d done wrong. Eventually, I sent a heartfelt note, apologizing for anything that might have happened. His reply showed me how wrong my assumptions were.
Almost 2,000 years ago, the Stoic philosopher Epictetus warned us not to treat our judgments about events as if they were the events themselves. I was surprised to learn how much modern psychology agrees with this old idea. The founders of cognitive behavioral therapy were influenced by Stoic thinking, and years of research show the value of questioning the assumptions that cause us stress. It seems those old Stoics were onto something.
In The Stories We Tell Ourselves, the first essay in my new Ten Lessons in Living Well series, I look at how easily our thoughts can mislead us, especially when love, friendship, and uncertainty get mixed together. It’s a personal story about a friendship that still means a lot to me, and a reminder that not every thought in our minds deserves our belief or attention. Read the full essay and think about how often you’ve worried about a story your own mind made up.
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Mike Beltran’s Voting Record Deserves a Closer Look
Mike Beltran wants to represent Hillsborough County in Congress. Before voters send him to Washington, they may want to look more closely at what he did during his six years in Tallahassee. From local zoning and tenant protections to public schools and nursing homes, Beltran often voted for laws that changed what local communities could decide for themselves.
He supported laws that lowered minimum nursing-home staffing requirements, expanded taxpayer-funded private-school vouchers, and required school districts to share more of their local construction funds with charter schools. He also backed limits on what teachers could teach about race and discrimination, as well as Florida’s abortion restrictions. It seems Tallahassee believed it knew what was best for almost everyone.
Meanwhile, Congresswoman Kathy Castor helped secure nearly $1.47 billion in federal grants for the Tampa Bay region, along with more funding for local infrastructure, housing, and community projects. Beltran’s record shows a different set of priorities. If he believed Tallahassee should have so much control over Hillsborough County, it raises questions about what he might do in Washington.
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Ken Gay’s Campaign For Hillsborough School Board Deserves a Much Closer Look
Ken Gay brings nearly four decades of experience in Hillsborough County public schools to the District 6 School Board race. His long career gives voters plenty to respect. But a detailed candidate questionnaire offers a much fuller picture of the political and social views he would bring to the Board.
Gay identifies himself as a conservative Republican and has taken clear positions on school choice, transgender students, sex education, books, guns in schools, religion and the federal role in education. These are not assumptions about his politics. They come from answers Gay submitted himself.
His campaign finances add another layer. The campaign is largely self-funded, while a recently formed company called Faith in Policy has received a substantial share of Gay’s campaign spending. I took a closer look at Gay’s record, his own words and where his campaign money is coming from.
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Who Is Building Stacy Hahn’s Campaign?
Campaign finance reports rarely contain a smoking gun. Mostly, they contain checks—and Stacy Hahn’s reports include many from industries most affected by County Commission decisions. At least $63,850, or about 38% of her total contributions, came from construction, development, real estate, engineering, and architecture interests.
There is also the Tampa Bay Rays’ new ownership group. After Commissioner Donna Cameron Cepeda questioned public funding for a new stadium, more than $40,000 was donated by Rays owners and related companies to Hahn, her Republican primary opponent. It seems all those builders and developers decided on their own that Hillsborough County really needed Hahn on the Commission. Sometimes, civic enthusiasm spreads quickly.
Legal contributions do not prove corruption. But campaign money is not charity, either. With roads crowded, schools full, and neighborhoods often asked to make way for new projects, voters should ask a simple question: Can Hillsborough County afford more development-at-any-cost government, and who is paying for it?
Cool Classrooms and Common Sense: Why Hillsborough Must Renew the Half-Penny Promise
Florida summer heat is not theoretical. It is a relentless physical reality. Anyone who expects children to concentrate on algebra or reading in an eighty-eight-degree classroom with a dead air conditioner and water dripping into plastic buckets has never spent an afternoon inside an aging Florida school building. You cannot build academic excellence when students and teachers are simply trying to survive the humidity.
Hillsborough Referendum 3 asks voters to renew the half-cent sales tax for another ten years to pay for air conditioning, roof repairs, and security at schools. Opponents talk about tax fatigue, but this is not a new tax. It keeps the same rate as in 2018. If it ends, your grocery bill will not go down, but school maintenance will lose $120 million a year.
The results speak for themselves. Since 2018, the Half-Penny Promise has funded over 750 projects, including air conditioning upgrades at 177 schools, all overseen by an independent Citizen Oversight Committee. Tourists pay about a quarter of the cost, and over $716 million has gone to local contractors and workers in Hillsborough County.
While the state Capitol stays busy manufacturing political culture wars and diverting public funds into private vouchers, local communities must take care of their own. Read the complete breakdown on why renewing this capital surtax is an investment in our kids, our local workforce, and our neighborhood schools.
The Free Lunch Mirage: How Florida Amendment 3 Squeezes Renters and Municipalities
Every politician knows that promising a giant tax cut is an easy way to win an applause line. Florida Amendment 3 dangles that exact bait, promising homeowners an expanded homestead exemption and tighter assessment caps. It sounds like an effortless win until you calculate what actually pays for the fire rescue station down the street.
State analysts project this measure will strip over $8 billion from local budgets across Florida in a single year. That is not trimming bureaucratic fat; it is a fiscal sledgehammer aimed directly at 911 dispatchers, sheriff’s deputies, paramedics, and neighborhood road repairs. When both the Florida Sheriffs Association and statewide firefighter unions sound the alarm, voters need to look past the political marketing.
Because essential emergency services cannot simply be shut down, local communities will be forced to raise utility fees and regressive sales taxes to survive. That leaves working families, retirees on fixed incomes, and renters footing the bill for a tax break they will never see. Read the full analysis on why defunding your local first responders is too high a price to pay for a campaign slogan.
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