Change is the best and worst thing about being human. Everything is so wonderfully unstable. We are constantly longing for change, for growth, for betterment. And yet, at the same time, we find a way to loathe it. We are scared of change. We are afraid of what it means for us. Why are we so terrified of something we long for so deeply? The Unknown When we desire change, what we really want is more control. We want... Read more
For the last three days, we’ve been in San Francisco with some friends. The first two days were perfect. The trolley ride was better than expected, and we had high expectations. The buses showed up quickly, the routes were easy to find. The weather was great. And then came day three. Not so good. Everything was a struggle – delays and false starts, confusion and annoyance. One painful fact is clear to me: life is full of good days and... Read more
We have a pair of friends who have been together for a long time. They live together and own a home together. They are not technically married, but have made a lifetime commitment to one another. We hosted them in NYC recently and the day before they got here, they shocked us (and many others, I presume) with a civil ceremony. When we asked them why, the answer was fascinating. It said a lot about the culture we live in... Read more
We live in a world of extremes. The middle ground is losing ground. Whether it be politics or sports fandom, we have turned affection into a binary endeavor: love or hate. One of the side-effects to this is we are losing a perspective about the difference between acceptance and approval. In modern society, they are one and the same. Withholding approval is tantamount to full out rejection of one’s identity. But there are differences and they are not that hard... Read more
We are always surprised when relationships don’t work out. It is a weird phenomena that a person we at one time wanted to spend all our time with suddenly warrants none of our time. It’s a dramatic and baffling shift. There are a lot of things we tell ourselves to ease the blow. Excuses and reasons. Sometimes they are true. But while we are in a relationship, we never want to admit there might be a problem. We’re afraid we will jinx it if... Read more
We love to blame others. It is a favorite pastime, as much a part of American culture as baseball and apple pie. There are two major reasons we blame one another. The first is we have a false narrative about life that suggests something is wrong if it is not perfect, easy, comfortable, and completely filling. The second is a need for self-preservation. If something is wrong, it can’t be my fault. Has to be somebody’s fault. But can’t be me. This leads... Read more
We live in New York and walk by thousands of people every day. A group of friends was talking recently about whether or not New Yorkers are rude or if they are just busy, unable to stop and see every one of the millions of others in the city. The conversation made me think about what it takes to truly see someone. As much as New Yorkers can’t interact deeply with every person they come across, there is a large... Read more
The Book of James talks about a man looking at his face in the mirror and then, after walking away, completely forgetting what he looks like. The metaphor is about the gap between knowing and doing. Faith and works, in this specific case. There is a tension between knowing and doing. We all feel it. We know we should drink less coffee or take more walks. We know we shouldn’t worry so much. We read books, gobbling up insights that... Read more
We have become experts at avoidance. Our ability to avoid is so thorough and so effective, we can even deceive ourselves. Most of us are actually better at deceiving ourselves than we are at deceiving others. In an effort to avoid, we are confused and angry. We are hurt and chronically dissatisfied. We overcompensate with narcissism and a grandiose sense of self-importance. Which is just an attempt to avoid the deep insecurity we feel. The truth is elusive. If we’re not careful,... Read more
We recently went to the doctor for a yearly check up and found out my cholesterol is pretty high. This is cause for concern because I have a family history of heart disease. We talk a lot on the blog about perseverance and perspective. But I have to confess, the news scared me a little. Fear has a way of feeding on itself. It becomes a sort of cannibal. You think giving it attention would deteriorate it, but it seems to... Read more
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