Valentine’s Day is approaching and it has me thinking about the nature of true love. My wife and I are in our seventh year of marriage and it has been so different than I thought it would be. Wonderfully so. The key to experiencing a life of love is understanding the difference between experiencing the validation of love and sharing love together. As an illustration of this, consider a story I read in a book recently: a young college woman... Read more
I realize the title is a mouthful, so you have either decoded it or are very curious. We will take it one phrase at a time. This is basically a blog about how important it is to try to recognize the factors that have influenced who we are and how we think. One of the reasons this matters is because the way we have been influenced (partly) determines the way we influence. You may have heard the phrase “hurt people... Read more
Kylie and I are currently watching a show, which shall remain nameless, and it has fallen prey to the most annoying thing about the stories we tell in popular culture (in my humble opinion). The hero in this show is the “leader” of a little gang. I put the word in quotes because he is not really leading. He is just in charge. What is systemically wrong about the way we portray leaders is this: the guy who will do... Read more
Today is Groundhog Day. The one day a year Americans put their jovial hope in a furry terrestrial creature. That is what is fun (and strange) about Groundhog Day. After a long winter, we are looking for a little relief. A little hope. But I am probably not alone in turning my thoughts to the movie starring Bill Murray. If you haven’t seen it, you should. It is a fantastic story. The movie is ironic because far from the hope... Read more
Kylie and I work as Leadership Coaches with The Crossroad. And one of the terms we use most often is “intentionality”. There are two ways people do things. The first is on purpose, what we call “with intention”. It is doing things aimed at a target, for a reason. The other is circumstantial, sort of haphazard and subconscious, following the wind wherever it blows today. The problem with the way we use the word “intentional” is that both of these strategies... Read more
As a writer, I generally consider myself a creative person. I think all of us are “creative” whether we are an artist or a mathematician. Creativity is about building toward an enigmatic purpose rather than crumbling under faults and risk-factors. To write a story can sometimes feel like I am the god of the little universe I have “created”. It sure seems as though I have carte blanche, as if I can do anything I want. But there is another... Read more
Conflict is one of the most challenging of human enterprises. It happens when expectations are not met, when two (or more) people have a divergent perspective on truth, or when our emotions tell us a value is in danger. Despite its negative connotation, conflict is a neutral entity. It is how we respond within it that makes it a positive or a negative. Conflict can help – it can build intimacy and bring clarity. Or, it can destroy and divide. The choice... Read more
American society is in a right-and-wrong tug-o-war. We are wrestling with one another. We are all discerning and standing up for “my morals” or “my truth”. And we often hear of the “culture war” happening in our country. In my opinion, we are in dangerous territory. Not because “they” might win. But because in the midst of the war for what is right, we are losing a sense of ourselves. Why is that? Perhaps it is because being right is... Read more
It has been nearly sixty years since Martin Luther King Jr. famously declared “I have a dream” from the steps of The Lincoln Memorial. Well, we are still working on making that dream a reality. Some might argue the practical reality is worse (or the same) as it was sixty years ago. I would argue we have made some improvements as a society but still have a long way to go. We live in a world that is obsessively practical.... Read more
I don’t really like time travel movies. It feels like they don’t really work through the true repercussions of being able to travel through time. They usually hone in on one consequence they want to erase and ignore, or half-heartedly explain away, the can of worms time travel would open. Thinking about this recently, I realized that we are all time travelers. We are traveling pretty slowly and consistently through time, but traveling nonetheless. None of us are truly paused... Read more
Victorious Living
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