Note from Dr. Ming
On Choosing Joy Anyway
This poem is for the part of you that never expected to make it this far. The part that always counted exits.
That never unpacked. That held its breath between good moments, waiting for them to collapse. You know that feeling—the tension that joy is dangerous. That rest is foolish. That love is a setup. And yet… here you are.
Smiling.
Not because everything’s okay.
But because you’ve learned that waiting for disaster isn’t safety—it’s paralysis. Subversive living isn’t reckless. It’s radical self-trust. It’s saying, “I know it might hurt again. And I’m choosing to be here anyway.”
That’s not weakness. That’s courage. And it’s changing you. Let yourself enjoy this. Not because it’ll last forever. But because you do.
Subversive Living
By Dr. Ming
They warned me.
Don’t get too comfortable.
Don’t laugh too loud.
Don’t let your joy
get used to staying.
“Don’t you know?” they whispered.
The other shoe is always coming.
And it was.
And it might still be.
But I’m not flinching anymore.
I’ve lived too long
under the weight of Maybe,
bent into shapes for Someday,
waiting on What If
like it had the right to decide how I breathe.
Now I’m reclining in the soft seat of right now—
belly out,
walls down,
hope on low simmer
but still warm.
This isn’t denial.
It’s defiance.
I’m smiling with my full face.
I’m resting without earning it.
I’m loving without an escape plan.
That shoe can wait.
Let it fall.
I’ve walked through worse barefoot.
This is subversive living:
choosing delight
when dread was easier.
Calling joy holy
even with the tremble in your chest.
I’m not surviving anymore.
I’m living.
And that,
my dear ghost of panic,
is the part you never saw coming.