Patrick Cleveland LMFT, Daybreak Counseling Center

01/27/2026

I keep coming back to this.

Not as something abstract or political, but as something deeply personal and everyday.

Empathy is what lets us slow down before judging.
It’s what helps us remember there’s a nervous system, a story, and a whole lifetime behind every face we pass.

Without it, we harden. We simplify. We stop seeing each other.

And when that happens, we don’t just lose connection, we lose our humanity.

Maybe the work right now isn’t to fix everything.
Maybe it’s just to keep choosing softness in a world that keeps asking us to toughen up.

healingjourney mentalhealthawareness humanconnection compassion traumainformed nervoussystem emotionalhealth therapyworks collectivehealing mindfulness selfreflection innerwork gentlewithyourself communitycare longbeachtherapy californiatherapists

01/11/2026

I’ve interviewed 606 of the highest-performing people on earth.

Here’s what I’ve learned on the 5 core human motivators (and how to use them to build a strong team).

1. Purpose

Your purpose must create a physiological response when you talk about it.

I started Quest because my mom and sister were morbidly obese my entire life - I wanted to create food they would choose for taste that happened to be good for them.

When you hit roadblocks, you'll ask: ""Why am I doing this?""

Without a killer answer, you'll quit. The same applies to your team.

2. Meaning

People need to know their work matters:

• Create monthly meetings where customers share how your product changed their lives
• Print customer success stories and hang them in your office.

Show your team exactly how their daily tasks connect to the larger mission.

3. Progress

Humans need to feel they're moving forward.

• Create a physical scoreboard everyone can see
• Set 90-day challenges with clear win conditions
• Build skill development paths for every role

Progress that can't be measured doesn't exist to the human brain.

4. Autonomy

Nobody likes being micromanaged - set clear outcomes but let your team control how they work:

• Create ""maker days"" where people work without meetings
• Allow team members to pitch their own projects quarterly
• Test a 4-day workweek for roles that can handle it

Freedom within a framework beats rigid control every time.

5. Money

Most founders think this is #1, but it's actually #5.

Money gets people in the door but won't keep them through the hard times.

That said, pay people fairly so money isn't a distraction.

But remember: doubling someone's salary won't double their performance.

Using all five motivators creates a sustainable culture.

Miss even one and your business becomes suboptimal.

If this was helpful, I share more in my newsletter every week.

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01/05/2026

Inner peace ☮️

Developing an inner refuge where we feel loved and safe enables us to reduce the intensity of traumatic fear when it arises.

01/05/2026

Live with love. Every day is a miracle.

The spirit of awakening is to live with a loving, wise, kind, connected, and compassionate heart. 💛

01/05/2026

Modern day

“By our trust in the divine beauty in every person we develop that beauty in ourselves.” ― Hazrat Inayat Khan

11/17/2025

Some moments don’t need to be fixed—they just need to be felt. 💛 Acknowledging “this is really hard” can be the most compassionate thing we do for ourselves. It’s a quiet act of courage and care.

What helps you stay present with yourself when life feels heavy?

11/17/2025

One tool of mindfulness that can cut through our numbing trance is inquiry. As we ask ourselves questions about our experience, our attention gets engaged. We might begin by scanning our body, noticing what we are feeling, especially in the throat, chest, abdomen, and stomach, and then asking, “What wants my attention right now?” or “What is asking for acceptance?” Then we attend, with genuine interest and care, listening to our heart, body, and mind.

11/12/2025

"True love is the recognition of another in yourself." —Eckhart Tolle

11/10/2025

When we meet our pain with tenderness instead of resistance, we discover an inner strength that surprises us. Self-compassion expands what’s possible within us—it’s how we learn to hold life’s challenges with courage and care.

11/10/2025

Often our deepest suffering is the sense that something we have done—something about us—is fundamentally wrong and unacceptable. Finding a way to make peace with our human imperfections is the ground of all healing.

10/31/2025

Happy Halloween 🎃 I thought I’d share something a little creepy today…

Let’s talk about the bio-psycho-social model of mental health — through the lens of one of the most chilling Netflix documentaries in recent years: Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.

When we think about extreme human behavior, like Dahmer’s, the bio-psycho-social model helps us move away from the idea that there’s a single cause and instead look at how biology, psychology, and environment interact to shape a person’s mind and behavior.

🧬 Biological: Dahmer’s mother reportedly took large amounts of prescription drugs while pregnant — which may have affected his developing brain.

🧠 Psychological: His father exposed him to roadkill in hopes of sparking an interest in anatomy — a choice that might have unintentionally reinforced a fascination with death. Add to that the psychological conflict of being a closeted gay man in a deeply stigmatizing era.

🌍 Social: Dahmer was a socially awkward and isolated kid who didn’t fit in — bullied, rejected, and alone.

When you put these pieces together, you start to see a “perfect storm” — not an excuse, but an understanding of how multiple forces can converge to shape someone’s internal world in dangerous ways.

The truth is, we’ll never know which factor “caused” his crimes — but the bio-psycho-social model reminds us that human behavior is never one-dimensional.

👥 In therapy, we use this same model to understand our clients — not to excuse behavior, but to understand it, to see the whole person, and to find the right path forward.

10/25/2025

We often forget to care for ourselves the way we do for others.

What’s one way you’ll be kind to yourself this week? Let me know in the comments!