Real Clarity. Lasting Peace. Sustainable Change.
Tools and wisdom for living fully in the beautiful chaos of life.
The Living Unbalanced Ethos
You’re not alone.
More and more of us are waking up—seeking something deeper than burnout culture and band-aid self-help solutions.
Living Unbalanced is here to support that shift.
This isn’t quick-fix wellness.
It’s a return to what matters—and on your terms.
Our Mission
At Living Unbalanced, we’re redefining mental health as something accessible, practical, and deeply human.
The 3 Realities and the Path of Living Unbalanced are the foundation of everything we do. They’re not just ideas—they’re layered, absurd, sometimes uncomfortable, and always human. They’re here to help you live more connected, more intentional, and more alive.
These aren’t steps to success. They’re reminders. Anchors. Invitations to live wide awake.
Living Unbalanced offers what most of us never received—mental health literacy, tools for nervous system regulation, existential clarity, and community support.
At your pace.
Whether through free resources, low-cost memberships, small group programs, or immersive retreats,
we deliver the wisdom and blueprint people need to live with greater clarity, connection, and resilience—
without outsourcing their lives to a broken system.
This is more than a program.
It’s a call to wake up, reconnect, and create a better way of living.
The 3 Realities
1. Existence is absurd—and absolutely beautiful.
Being alive—conscious, aware, breathing—is wildly improbable. Deep living invites awe, wonderment, and purpose. But meaning isn’t handed to us—it’s made. That’s both a gift and a responsibility.
2. We are wired to connect.
Our bodies, minds, and spirits are built for intimacy, belonging, and a reciprocal relationship with the earth. Yet we now live in a constructed, digitized world—disconnected from each other, from nature, and often from ourselves.
3. Balance is a myth.
In our modern era, balance is an illusion. We live in a culture that overworks, isolates, and numbs with quick fixes. Wellness has been co-opted and commodified. Someone is always selling a faster, shinier version of peace. We are living unbalanced—and pretending otherwise only deepens our disconnection.
The Path of Living Unbalanced
1. Accept the Absurdity.
We can’t fully escape our Western, consumer-driven culture. Life is chaotic, unpredictable, and beautifully strange—a swirl of imbalance, awe, and wonderment. Freedom begins when we stop resisting this reality and learn to move with it.
2. Embrace Consciousness.
Awareness is hard. It stirs everything—shame, joy, grief, longing. But it’s the starting point for real change. To live consciously is to face ourselves honestly, choose meaning over avoidance, and show up for what life is really asking of us.
3. Reconnect.
With yourself. With others. With the earth. With what truly matters. Connection is the foundation of healing, purpose, and belonging.
My Why
I’m Ryan Reese—dad, husband, fellow human, and founder of Living Unbalanced—doing my best to make sense of this spectacular, mystifying world.
I hit 40 in 2024—and that year cracked me open. I was returning from sabbatical, re-entering my university role as a tenured professor, and by all accounts, I should’ve felt grounded. I wrote a book, recharged my spirit, and reconnected with my purpose. But instead, I felt more confused than ever.
That’s when it hit me: I had spent years pretending. Going with the flow of a grind culture that rewards burnout and calls it success. Sure, I’d built a respected career—15 years as a therapist and counselor educator, published research, developed a counseling framework, trained hundreds of clinicians. But somewhere along the way, I lost clarity. I began to question everything—especially the mental health system I helped uphold.
Western mental health care is built around a false premise: that the individual is the problem. We treat people after they break down, rarely asking what broke them. We don’t talk enough about the systems, expectations, and cultural stories that shape our suffering. So we label people, medicate them, pathologize their pain—and miss the point entirely.
I’m reclaiming my purpose—and on a larger scale.
I’m here to make that blueprint accessible.
For the burned out. The seekers. The caregivers. The curious.
The Full Story
Curious how all this began—how burnout, disillusionment, and a cracked-open sabbatical turned into a movement?—read the full story.
