Hi, I’m Melissa Nadia Viviana. Here’s a few facts about me.

Mid-thirties, half Danish, half American. Born in the mountains of Montana.

Mediums of Expression:

I write books, essays, aphorisms, & host podcasts.

Some genres you’ll find on this website:

• Memoir: stories about life, love, grief, survival

• Human Nature: psychology, philosophy of mind, metacognition, subjectivity, narcissism

• Existentialism: responsibility, free will, authenticity, neuroticism

• Humanism: feminism, equality, diversity, universal human nature

• Activism: world events, social issues, civic responsibility

Dog-Mom:

I have/had three wonderful pups.

• Two Dalmatians: Athena & Kennedy.

• One German Short-Haired Pointer: Freyja.

Kennedy has been my partner through an 8 month road trip, the pandemic, and grief.

My soul-pup, Athena, was only 3 years old when she died tragically in Oct 2024.

Freyja is the puppy who has been tormenting me for the past 6 months.

My dogs are the single most important thing to me other than writing. They’ve stolen my heart.

Living On The Road:

I spent my childhood in the mountains of Montana & high school in upstate New York. I lived in DC for most of my twenties & I’ve traveled to around 12 countries & 45 U.S. states—including living in Russia & Estonia briefly in 2010.

In 2018 & 2019, Kennedy & I traveled across the U.S. for 8 months. We visited 30 states, countless cities, and beach towns. Our cross-country mileage was 15,000 miles.

I spent many months in San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Oregon—before returning to DC shortly before the pandemic.

I currently live in Savannah, Georgia––a charming, artistic, historical, haunted, humid-as-hell city I fell in love with on my road trip.

Humanism:

I believe that all human beings have a universal human core.

I appreciate that we identify ourselves via different ethnicities, languages, & religions, but the basis for my belief system is that below our chosen identity is a core humanity that surpasses our differences and connects us all with each other.

DC is one of the most diverse cities in the United States, and I largely spent so much time living there because it gave me the opportunity to have friends, roommates, romantic partners, & coworkers from around the world.

Organizing Community:

I like to create communities & groups.

In 2019, I hosted philosophy discussions on Twitter & created a private MNV Philosophy Book Club with people all over the world.

In 2020, I hosted a podcast called Voices Outside The Bubble, which only interviewed people outside of the U.S.

In 2021, I founded a local group called Savannah Women’s+ Rights & Activism to fight for the human rights of women.

Organizing Marches

Living in DC, I protested around 25 times in both small and large protests organized by other people. But I also organized some of my own in Savannah.

In 2021 & 2022, I organized three Abortion Rights Marches in Savannah, GA for Roe v Wade.

In 2021, I founded & was the past president of the Savannah Federation of Democratic Women, a non-profit created to support women in leadership positions & politics.

In 2023, I was the Secretary for Georgia’s oldest LGBTQIA organization, First City Network. (I’ve been bisexual since I was a teen).

And in 2025 I created a Resist Rebel Revolt Fascism Discord to stay informed and impassioned about our democratic rights under the current Tech/Fascist Coup.

Psychology & Philosophy of Mind Career

I’m a bit of a book-smart rebel. While I skipped the 6th grade and went to college at 16 years old, I paradoxically took the non-academic route to achieve my aims.

In college, I studied psychology, philosophy, & writing. Initially intending to get a PhD in psychology.

My reasons for walking away are numerous, intentional, & controversial.

Understanding human beings was the only thing I wanted to do with my life. Why would I walk away from a career path that enabled me to do just that?

One main reason is that the problems I had with academic psychology became all the more clear to me in academic philosophy classes—the source.

You see, philosophers were the ones to set the stage for our current academic paradigm, and thus—I knew that what I wanted to change about the system had to be approached from a philosophical angle.

The biggest consequence to walking away is that understanding the human mind is still my true life-long devotion, I just exist outside of the normal psychology circles.

However, as you’ll see over and over again in my Philosophy of Mind writing—freedom is a true feature of my soul—and being outside of academia did not end up being my handicap.

It always allowed me the liberty to approach humans from a completely authentic standpoint.

Outside of academia, I’ve still been writing Philosophy of Mind for 20 years and I’m excited to bring that writing to this website.

How I Got Involved In Existentialism

Existentialism is an all-encompassing, bohemian philosophy that includes philosophers, novelists, playwrights, activists, feminists, atheists, Christians, communists, psychoanalysts and more.

How do all of these different people exist underneath one school of thought?

The shortest description is that Existentialism emphasizes the view that the human is at the center of their own story & has a personal responsibility to live meaningfully & choose their own destiny.

Existentialists often emphasize authenticity, freedom, & responsibility as a backdrop for other themes (whether that be Christianity, atheism, feminism, or psychoanalysis).

By Existentialists trying to understand the human mind through a sense of dominion & responsibility over that territory, they dramatically differ from academic psychologists—who try to understand human nature as a passive recipient of external conditions.

So for example—while psychology, sociology, and psychoanalysis all aim to understand the genetics and external environmental conditions that they claim create our psychology…

Existentialists will, instead, frame the human mind as something we actively create through our choices.

This adds a distinctive layer to any Existential psychologist or Existential activist—in that they aim to show us that our conscious mind & subjective awareness is the game changer in our lives.

In short—our psychology doesn’t direct us. Instead, we direct our psychology with our conscious choices.

In the famous debate of ‘nature vs nurture,’ this would be ‘nature vs nurture vs choice.’

The Beat Philosopher:

I created the name The Beat Philosopher on my 8 month road trip across the U.S.

The name encompassed not just my Existentialist influence, but also the anti-institutional backdrop that the Beat Generation represented—and the experimental mediums that they expressed themselves with.

In short, I needed a unique title that represented my brand of Existentialism. To distinguish it from the historic Existentialists.

This website has sections that discuss both the legacy of Existentialism & my own unique flavor of it.

Stacks Of Writing:

So you may ask—if you’ve been writing for 20 years where the hell is it?

(I get that question from those closest to me a lot).

When you spend 20 years creating literal stacks of writing… millions of words, representing each year of your life, it can be difficult to pull the trigger and publish some of those words.

Sometimes you’re not sure which stack to publish first. And you feel a bit like you worded an idea or a story better elsewhere (in another stack) - you’re just not sure which one.

The Curse:

I will admit that one Achille’s Heel that I have is that I find it difficult to stop writing about current events in order to edit past work.

This means, every day, I write thousands of new words. But I find it tedious to sit down and edit them for publication—particularly as a new stage of life is beginning and I’m immersed in the present moment fully.

As you can probably tell from my biography: I spend all of my time writing, but I rarely stop living long.

This is my curse—our curse. You know the Chinese curse? May you live in interesting times.

The entire premise of this website is to tell the curse to fuck off.

Yes, we’re living in interesting times. But I’m no longer putting the editing on hold.

This website is my attempt to balance the present with the past—and find the impossible method of honoring them both.

Misc Passions:

While I consider writing & philosophy to be my main skills, I am a hobbyist at some other fun things when not in the middle of living a dystopian nightmare.

Some things I enjoy doing:

• Photography

• Graphic Design, Web Design, Interior Design

• Hydroponic Gardening

• Dancing Salsa & Bachata

• Piano

• Yoga

• Making every recipe with puff pastry, instead of the type of dough it calls for