A blind man once asked a wise man, “Is there anything worse than losing your eye sight?” The wise man replied, “Yes…losing your vision.” One of the most important character traits a leader possesses is vision. As a culture we are losing our most valuable resource—male leadership. We have lost our vision of what role a man should play in life, and we have let young men drift along dangerously like disabled ships at sea. Cultures that allow families and... Read more
My 16-year-old daughter traveled with me to Southern California where I taught a parenting workshop earlier this year. Afterwards she was bombarded with parents asking her “teenaged” opinion about some of the guidelines I proposed. One parent asked her candidly: “So do you agree with all your dad’s guidelines?” I had shared a few of the guidelines we have in our home. One was the fact that my wife Lori and I reserve the right to read any of Alyssa’s... Read more
Every month of the year is some kind of an “awareness month.” In fact, for any given month, multiple causes claim that month as a time to make people aware of a particular need, disease, condition, fact, etc. Unfortunately, because of the abundance of these dedicated times, very few actually are able to draw a significant amount of attention to their cause or make an impact. I hope that National Bullying Prevention Month becomes one of those causes that makes... Read more
Early in the movie, GoodFellas, Ray Liotta’s character is a teenage boy working for the neighborhood “wiseguys” or members of the Mafia. When he is arrested for the first time he is greeted as a conquering hero by all the older “made” wiseguys after he walks out of the courtroom. These powerful, rich men now consider him worthy of being a man. He is given money, cheered on, and welcomed to the club of men by older men he idolizes. ... Read more
During my senior year of college I started feeling sick. It began with a rough-seas hollow in the bottom of my stomach. Nothing I ate tasted right. Then I began to throw up—involuntarily—on a regular basis. Every day for months I felt nauseous until noon. The doctors hemmed and hawed. Tests were done. It might be a cyst on my kidney, one thought. I lost 19 pounds. Finally they arrived at a diagnosis everyone seemed to smile at: an inflammation... Read more
Whenever you assume, you make an… well… you know the rest. I don’t like the fact that I sometimes jump to conclusions about people. I guess you could really call that “judging people.” I don’t like doing it, but I do it… way too often. I see someone and I immediately stereotype them in my brain. “Look at this guy driving the Porsche. He’s obviously…” This last weekend I jumped to conclusions about someone…er…some thing. I saw a lady carrying... Read more
Have you ever thought how much better the world would be if we could get rid of bullying? Don’t hold your breath; that’s not going to happen. Bullies aren’t going away. They never have, and they never will. October is Anti Bullying Awareness Month and I think that it’s a good thing. Too often, bullied children feel isolated and alone. They feel like they have no one to talk to or confide in. I applaud those who are calling attention... Read more
While I was eating my cereal the other morning I was looking for something to read. The only thing I could find was a sales brochure that had came in the mail from a local beauty supply store. Since I was still half asleep I thought I would look through it and see what kinds of products women were buying. What I found was a surprising blend—at least to me—of mixed messages. We all know how the media and Madison... Read more
They say a picture is worth 1,000 words… perhaps so is a magazine cover. In a world where young girls are overwhelmed with pressure to look pretty and try to measure up in so many ways, it’s amazing to me that parents don’t mind their girls digesting this kind of material. Exhibit A: last month’s cover for SEVENTEEN. Hmmmm… what do you think our girls are gleaning from this? Read more
Mutual understanding and communication are the best way to strengthen a marriage. But what’s a wife to do if her husband won’t talk? It is no big secret that most men have difficulty understanding and expressing their feelings. It’s also no surprise that this frustrates women, who tend to be very good at getting in touch with their own feelings. Indeed, many marital problems can be traced back to a breakdown in communication between husband and wife. Scores of books... Read more
A Few Grown Men
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