Hi, Will - thanks for yet another interesting and useful post.

Two things stick out for me:

1)  The essential question of how each person will respond to challenges.   I am reading World War Z right now, which is a fictional history of a world-changing virus outbreak told through interviews ten years after the initial events.  The book is much different from the film which shares its name.

On of the many vignettes is about how some people, months and years after surviving the initial chaos, died in their sleep, rather than continue to face a much different and more dangerous world than what they had known.   Interestingly enough, films about successful resistance to the viral outbreak were credited as stemming this tide of "quiet suicide by surrender".

I think this is a graphic image of what you highlight as an important question for us all:  When faced with adversity, how will we react?  Popular culture tells us to "tough it out", "blow through", or "survive and thrive", but as usual, popular culture also oversimplifies the issues involved and the complexity of the problems.

2)  Your description of your master's work reminds me of something missing in much of my own formal education at that level.  You appear to have been part of a cohort, so received the benefit of having a learning group of peers to accompany you on the journey.   While this was part of the two doctoral programs I participated in, it was not part of either of the two masters programs which I completed.

Looking back, I wish I had made those journeys in the company of others, rather than as a lone students, sometimes intersecting with familiar faces and voices, but often all on my own.

Thanks for the thought-provoking start to my week:)

John