The best we will ever become is Works in Progress (WIPs). No matter what we do, we will always be like giraffes running on ice — clumsy. Our dreams really will always exceed our grasp, no matter how perfect our plans. I believe that God likes that we dream. We carry...
What is a need? To put it as starkly as possible, needs are deficits that require biological, emotional and spiritual gratification for fulfillment. Deficit fulfillment keeps us fully alive. Needs have to be gratified to be alive. The specific needs we have are the...
According to recent statistics gathered by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), 23.5 million Americans over the age of 12 cast about in daily life addicted to alcohol and/or illegal drugs. That number does not include the millions of...
Lesson 4: “I Don’t Know. Maybe.” is a great answer to many of life’s questions. This is the fourth installment in a series of essays about some life lessons I learned on a recent enduro motorcycle adventure designed to help rejuvenate leaders. In total, we covered...
I wrote a book called The Needs of the Heart. It is a simple book that speaks to how we are created to need, and describes specific needs. It is well written, well edited, and not popular! I suspect it is not popular because it exposes our condition as unavoidably and...
My father died December 18, 2010. The song O Holy Night was sung at his funeral. It was beautiful and fitting. It celebrates a light in the darkness, a rescue for a people in need, and the conquering of death in a world where we still must physically die. It tells us...
I want to share something about Christmas. Before I do, however, I want to state that I have seen enough, experienced enough, learned enough, and have lived long enough to disbelieve what I say below if I were ever going to do so. But I cannot not believe it. It is in...
The heart is the center of one’s being. Out of the heart we feel, need, desire, long, and hope. The heart is comprised of these core areas or roots. They allow us and push us to grow and connect, crave life and imagine, grieve and celebrate, attach and love. The heart...
Sadness is the attachment-caring feeling. It comes when what matters to us turns out differently than what we imagined, hoped, or worked for. And it comes most powerfully to those people who imagine, hope, and work for the most. Sadness is the feeling that presents us...
The river of life never stops and the cycles of living move in never-ending circles. The sparrows keep chirping in the nearby trees while a casket is being lowered into the ground. Life itself stops for no one, but we can. A famous, ancient story tells us about...
A good friend recently took the time to send me a prayer that he has been praying for himself and his friends for some time. I’m very grateful to be someone he prays for. He told me to pass it along, so other friends and loved ones could be reminded to pray for...
No one naturally seeks to become mediocre, the diminishment of excellence. Anyone who thinks that they seek mediocrity, i.e., the uninspired, indifferent, average, lackluster, or forgettable, is confused as to who they are and how they are made. They are actually...
Integrity is what people who have an internal locus of control tend to express in thought and action. An internal locus of control is the term psychologists use to describe a person who behaves responsibly because it feels good and it’s good to do. Integrity...
I It seems paradoxical, but admission of powerlessness can access great gifts. In a movie called Gladiator, Russell Crowe stars as a general named Maximus who is attempting to overthrow the grotesque abusiveness that had possessed Rome. He asks an old, cynical...
There are four realities in living life that we cannot overcome. They are fixed factors of living on earth. We may waste our lives attempting to defeat them, instead of living well within the context of them. Experiencing living within their parameters can actually...
If we love well, allowing ourselves to be “all in,” we will undoubtedly have experiences that bring pain to our lives. We will have vulnerability, the possibility of being wounded. And we will need perseverance, the ability to remain courageous in the experience of...
Please read the words below about the power of love from Song of Solomon 8:6-7. In an intimate whisper, the words tell us about the deepest connection and richest surrender our hearts can ever make. They call us to receive and give our hearts to love. To the...
Children really have only a few essential questions of caregivers. Will you grow with me? Will you help me become grown up? Will you live in the struggle of remaining present with me? Children need to be able to take the affirmative answers to these questions for...
Trust allows us to rely on something or someone. Trust has to do with the next step towards wherever we are headed. If I step off of solid ground on to a swinging bridge to cross a chasm, I am trusting that the bridge will hold me as I take the first and then the next...
Everyone has dreams, the pictures of possibilities that aren’t yet realized. Dreams call us to look up from the ground toward the horizon, or even toward the stars. They offer images of possibilities that make life better. They are far away, and require steps of...
In English when we tell someone, “goodbye,” it can mean much or almost nothing. If we are referring to something final with our goodbye, we have to use more words to communicate finality, or more words to wish great things for the other’s good as we depart. Or goodbye...
As an external description, maturity is the process of reaching full natural growth or development, or something having reached the limit of its time. As an internal description, maturity is the capability of living fully life on life’s terms, emotionally and...
Sadness honors the loss that comes with change. In a world where change and loss are inevitable, the willingness to have sadness allows us to remain fully alive. Put another way, sadness is part of feeling and healing loss that allows us to risk caring and attaching...
I won’t go into all of the details, but I was working towards a major life decision years ago. I had a deep desire to return to my hometown and work from the place my heart could not stop desiring. I did make the move. Years have passed since we moved from my work in...
In short, acceptance is the courage to keep on living and loving in the face of inevitable loss. It can be faked through resignation, which means to “resign” from being bothered, hurt, disturbed, caring, or attached with one’s heart. Resignation is the act of...
