Still Here, Still Trying

Season 2, Episode 17: Wherever You Go, There You Are How much of what you call “who I am” is still open to change? A good friend used to say, “Wherever you go, there you are,” when we were in high school. Back then, it was something funny we said. Thirty-plus years later, I’m fifty, raising a family, leading an organization, and wondering how many decisions I’m still making based on an old idea of...

The Team in Front of You: What Hockey Taught Me About Trust, Leadership, and Performance Four beer-league hockey games. One very average goalie. Four completely different results. In one game, I only let in two goals. In the others… several more. My skill did not suddenly change, and neither did my effort. What changed was the team in front of me. When teammates communicated, covered the extra pla...

Two years. That was the “good” outcome. People with endometriosis commonly wait four to twelve years for a diagnosis. Our family received an answer in two—and somehow that made us lucky. That is completely unacceptable. This episode is not a takedown of doctors. Most healthcare providers I know have enormous hearts and entered this work for the right reasons. But good people still need better trai...

The Work Should Lead Back to People MikeBakerHQ has changed, and this episode marks where the work is headed next. For the last few years, Mike Baker has explored artificial intelligence through art, music, writing, and a long list of creative experiments. Those tools helped him bring ideas to life that once would have stayed inside a notebook or in his head. They remain part of his creative proce...

Good intentions matter, but the people closest to us experience our follow-through, attention, tone, and the work we leave behind. In this episode of Still Here, Still Trying, Mike begins with a very 2026 attempt to connect Google, Apple, Outlook, and an AI assistant named Mira to finally solve the family calendar. Somewhere between the daily brief and the birthday reminders, the technology led hi...

Something is shifting. You can feel it in relationships beginning to heal, communities finding their voices, and people becoming less willing to live under fear, division, and toxic leadership. You can also feel it in the growing desire for something more grounded: real connection, honest conversation, time outside, meaningful work, and a little more joy. In this episode, Mike explores the Human F...

Season 2, Episode 11Why I Released 10 Books at Once: The Human First Story Behind Mike Baker HQ Why did Mike Baker release 10 books at once? In Season 2, Episode 11 of Still Here, Still Trying , Mike talks through the heart behind his 10-book release and the larger Human First world taking shape through Mike Baker HQ. This is part release-week author note, part map for readers and listeners who fo...

This week on Still Here, Still Trying , Mike records a quick road episode from his hotel room in Carlisle, Pennsylvania while attending the U.S. Army War College. This one is intentionally simple. No studio setup, no Mira intro, no closing song, no extra polish. Just a portable mic, bad hotel lighting, and a few thoughts worth capturing while they are still fresh. After a week surrounded by milita...

This week on Still Here, Still Trying , Mike talks about the kind of week that makes life feel full, beautiful, hard, and a little too fast. After a few episodes focused on the upcoming Human First books, this one brings the question home. Sammie graduated. The family went to the Oregon Coast. Jacob was there, recently moved to Moscow and building his electrical company. Cameron was home before he...

This week on Still Here, Still Trying , I’m pulling the camera back on the full Human First book series, releasing June 30. Last week, we started with Believe Her the First Time and the question at the heart of that book: when a woman says her body hurts, do we believe her before she has to prove it? This week, I’m walking through the bigger body of work behind the series and the question undernea...

Human First: Believe Her the First Time The first book in the Human First series starts with women’s pain, endometriosis, and what love does when belief becomes action. The Human First book series releases July 1, and this episode kicks off the run by going straight to the heart of the first book: Believe Her the First Time: A Father’s Guide to Endometriosis, Pain, and Showing Up When It Matters ....

What Are We Doing With the Life We Still Have? Memorial Day, hockey, family, and the ordinary joy we almost miss Episode 51 of Still Here, Still Trying starts at the rink and moves into something much deeper. After a weekend playing in the Inland Northwest Girls Hockey Foundation tournament, Mike Baker reflects on hockey, Memorial Day, family, growing up, grief, gratitude, and the life we still ge...

What Kind of Community Do We Want to Be? Episode 50 of Still Here, Still Trying is about what happens when good people get tired of the noise, step back from public life, and leave the room to the loudest voices. Mike Baker reflects on leadership, local politics, healthcare, Idaho women’s health, and the cost of staying silent when the edges keep pulling communities toward fear and division. This...

Everybody looks fine until you realize most people are surviving quietly. This week’s episode almost didn’t happen. I was tired, late, and running on fumes, which made me realize that might be the exact thing worth talking about. In this episode of Still Here, Still Trying , I talk about the kind of exhaustion people carry when life keeps asking more from them than they’ve had time to recover from...

Episode 48 | Season 2, Episode 4 Beautifully Unfocused: How to Love Someone With ADHD If you love someone with ADHD, there’s a good chance you’ve misunderstood them at least once. And if you have ADHD, there’s a good chance you’ve spent a lot of your life feeling misunderstood before anyone ever asked what was actually happening inside you. This episode is a field guide from the inside. I’m talkin...

Episode 47 | Season 2, Episode 3 Build Your Life, But Don’t Lose Your Soul Everybody loves the message: build your life, chase the dream, start the thing, stop waiting. I do too. But there’s a harder question underneath all that ambition: What kind of person are you becoming while you build? In this episode, I’m talking about ambition, power, men, women, leadership, and the ugly truth that some pe...

The Real Cost of Always Being Right What if the thing you’re most certain about is quietly costing you the people you care about? In this episode of Still Here, Still Trying , I get into something that’s been bothering me more and more. The way certainty has taken over how we think, how we talk, and how we show up with each other. It feels like strength in the moment. It feels like clarity. But un...

I almost quit paying attention to all of this. Not life. Not my work. Not my family. Just the noise. The constant pressure to pick a side. The way conversations turn into fights before they even begin. Something feels off right now. And if you sit in it long enough, it starts changing you. This episode kicks off Season 2 of Still Here, Still Trying . It’s not polished or balanced for the sake of i...

Episode 44: What People Need Most Right Now The world feels loud right now. People are stressed, tired, overloaded, and trying to function while carrying more than they are saying out loud. In this episode of Still Here, Still Trying , Mike Baker talks about what people need most right now, and it is not another hot take, another lecture, or one more person yelling into the noise. It is to be hear...

The Moment I Realized This Wasn’t Normal I went to the Endo Summit thinking I’d learn more about endometriosis. What I didn’t expect was to walk out of there thinking about something way bigger. This one stuck with me. Not because of one moment. Not because of one story. It was the pattern. The same thing showing up over and over in different ways. Women being told their pain is normal. Being told...

What happens when you’re the one everyone depends on… but you don’t feel okay yourself? In this episode of Still Here, Still Trying , Mike Baker gets honest about something millions of people are feeling right now but rarely say out loud. The pressure to stay strong. The weight of responsibility. The quiet exhaustion that comes from showing up every day while carrying more than anyone sees. If you...

Does Any of This Actually Matter Anymore? That question shows up for a lot of people who are trying to build something meaningful. You’re putting energy into your work, your family, your ideas, your community. You show up every day and try to do things the right way. And somewhere along the line a quiet thought crosses your mind. Is any of this effort actually reaching anyone? In Episode 41 of Sti...

The Quiet Sabotage: Passive-Aggressive and Avoidant Patterns Podcast Description Earlier this year, Mike Baker began a series inside Still Here, Still Trying exploring the personality patterns that shape relationships, leadership, and the environments we live and work in. The first conversation in the series, “God Complex: Narcissism in Life and Leadership,” looked at the louder pattern. Ego, cont...

Episode 39: Guarding Your Mind Everything around us seems designed to pull our attention into chaos. Open your phone and the loudest voices rise to the top. Every problem feels urgent. Every headline demands a reaction. Over time, that constant pressure starts to feel normal, even though it slowly drains the clarity we need to live well and lead well. In this episode, Mike talks about the quiet di...

Episode 38: We’re Going to Be Okay Everything feels loud right now. Scroll for five minutes and you’d think the whole thing is unraveling. Anger sells. Extremes trend. The sharpest voices get the most attention. But that’s not the whole story. In this episode, Mike reflects on a recent trip to New Zealand to visit his son Cameron, the people he met there, and the powerful reminder that real life l...