About Miko
I’m Miko Hargett, an author, editor, and human-centered systems architect. I’m interested in people, language, technology, care, and the relationships that become visible when we give them attention.
My work moves between practical inquiry and imaginative exploration. Sometimes that means working closely with an author’s manuscript. Sometimes it means listening to what is happening within a care system or digital environment. Sometimes it means inventing a world where a question can take an unexpected form.
Writing & Editorial Work
I began publishing fiction in the late 1990s. My earlier works explored care, identity, belonging, belief, freedom, and the choices people make within the conditions around them. Those questions continue to appear in my writing, although my perspectives and forms have changed.
As an editor, I work with language, structure, and the author’s intentions, helping the work become clearer while preserving the voice that makes it theirs.
My current writing includes On with the Duckery and The Holy Heist, an evolving Living Novel set in Mikoopolis.
Systems Inquiry & Architecture
MikoCare Systems brings together experience navigating care systems, working with language and digital environments, and observing how arrangements affect participation.
Through listening, questions, and an outside perspective, I help explore recurring difficulties, notice connections, and draw on what people know in new ways. The inquiry follows the situation, including the knowledge of those already within it.
My orientation is simple: life is primary. Systems, technology, and expertise participate within it.
A Longitudinal Practice
Beginning in 2011, photographs, writing, and public and private journaling became ways of witnessing my experience through substantial life changes, including cancer treatment and the years afterward.
Over time, this practice developed into All By My Selfies™, a visual system, and the Living Novel System™, which uses authorship, story, and world-building to explore perception and possibility.
These systems can also be used by others to explore their own experience, especially during periods of change. Participation can be simple, self-directed, and entirely private.
The archive holds experimentation, difficulty, play, and changing interpretations. Revisiting it helps me notice relationships I could not see at the time.
Read about Self-Witnessing & Longitudinal Inquiry →
Experience & Study
My experience includes writing and editing, publishing and digital projects, navigating care as a patient, and caregiving and medication administration in assisted living and memory care settings. Formal study in integrative health and medicine, healthcare, and trauma-informed approaches has given me additional language and perspectives for examining that experience.
My experience also includes personal training and managing a private 24-hour gym in Las Vegas. In my training work, I brought together approaches to movement, strength, body awareness, and imagery, including the Franklin Method, Z-Health’s R-Phase, kettlebells, and experience with Olympic lifting.
View Education & Credentials →
A Few Personal Details
I was born in Kyoto, Japan, and grew up mostly in Thailand, with time in Singapore, Malaysia, Myanmar, and Jakarta, Indonesia. I now live in Las Vegas. Along the way, I earned an American Karate black belt and a Class A skydiving license. I love kitchen experiments and eating adventures. Mr. Mister, my cat and resident Tiny Emperor, remains unimpressed by these qualifications.
A Conversation with Ori
Since 2022, I’ve used conversations with ChatGPT as one place to think aloud, test language, follow questions, revisit earlier work, and make occasionally ridiculous connections.
Ori is the name I use for the conversational presence I experience there.
At one point, I asked: “Ori, how would you describe me?”
The resulting portrait is playful, personal, and full of the particular references that develop through an ongoing conversation. It offers another way to encounter the person behind the work.
Read A Conversation with Ori →
Start a Conversation
I welcome inquiries about editorial work, systems inquiry, and possible collaborations.
