2013 in Review

Here are some of my favorites from 2013:

January:
Dead or Dormant?
Choosing Strength
Aggressive Forgiveness
Letting Them Go
Hope for a New Year!

February:
I Asked
Blessed Are Those
The Need for Silence
Not A Reward

March:
New, Undiminishable Hope
Real Manhood and Steubenville
Once You're Motivated
Neuroplasticity and Habits
All Fortune

April:
Emptiness
What You Know vs What You Feel
the Table
Tragedy
Immodesty

May:
Will Himself Restore You
With Deep Affection for the Forest
Awakens
The Problem is Not the Internet - It's Me
Freedom Attracts

June:
Awareness
Law and Freedom
Rigor
Farther Away
Discernment in Solitude

July:
Even If You Fail
Poverty
Our Hands Are Too Full
Pictured Rocks
What I Really Need the Most

August:
Content Of Their Character
8 Things You Should Not Do Every Day
Meaningful Expression of Care
Through Each Other's Eyes
Seasons of Grieving

September:
The Only True Disability
Only He Who Listens Can Speak
The Difference
Killing Our Kids With Kindness
It Is Doubtful

October:
Conformity
Fine Word...and Doubt
Focus - Well You Don't Say
Talking A Good Game About Being Open-Minded
Comparison

November:
Best Football Play of All Time
Boring Romance
Being Honest - I Need Help
Sleep On It
Standardized Test Scores

December:
What We See
The Angels Sing
Dare Not Explain It Away
Nelson Mandela
The Bridge

Opportunity to Experience

Suffering may be someone’s fault or it may not be anyone's fault. But if given to God, our suffering becomes an opportunity to experience the power of God at work in our lives and to give glory to Him.

-- Anne Graham Lotz

What We See

To deny oneself is to be aware only of Christ and no more of self, to see only Him who goes before and no more the road which is too hard for us.

-- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Dog On It!

Riches of Heart

God examines both rich and poor, not according to their lands and houses, but according to the riches of their hearts.

-- St. Augustine

Not To Be Mended

I feel that I am not to be mended, but transformed.

-- Seneca

This, perhaps, is the real energy of our joy...we're not just being fixed or refurbished, we are being made completely new. The old has gone, the new is here!

Joy To The World!

Joy to the World , the Lord is come!
Let earth receive her King;
Let every heart prepare Him room,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven and nature sing,
And Heaven, and Heaven, and nature sing.

Joy to the World, the Savior reigns!
Let men their songs employ;
While fields and floods, rocks, hills and plains
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat the sounding joy,
Repeat, repeat, the sounding joy.

No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found,
Far as the curse is found,
Far as, far as, the curse is found.

He rules the world with truth and grace,
And makes the nations prove
The glories of His righteousness,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders of His love,
And wonders, wonders, of His love.

-- Isaac Watts

No improvement can be offered on these words, this song of joy.

We thank you, our glorious God...as in this prayer.

The Angels Sing

The singing of angels.  Singing seems synonymous with angels to us and yet it is something we hardly ever actually expect to hear.

What would it have been like this night so long ago?  A line from the famous carol snuck into me this year and got my attention:

Christ by highest heav'n adored
Christ the everlasting Lord!
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate Deity
Pleased as man with man to dwell
Jesus, our Emmanuel
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

-- Hark, The Herald Angels Sing

The Highest of Heaven was pleased to dwell with us!  Besides the notion of this being a bit unfathomable, what is it that would make God want to 'live with us'?  ...but, He does.  If we understood the ramifications of this, our response would be much like that of the angels because:

The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight.

-- Oh, Little Town of Bethlehem

 

Pursuit & Force

Pursuit without forcing something is a delicate task.  And, it is easy to give up on the former out of fear of the latter.

Waiting is just hard...we are so inclined to take matters into our own hands.  An active waiting doesn't give up, doesn't quit, but is willing to wait....this may, in fact, be at the heart of love.

...and the goal can't be to 'try without getting hurt' in the process.

Be Still...and Wait Patiently

Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him....

-- Psalm 37:7

Some people I call Christmas Christians. The most important thing about their Christian faith is believing that the Baby Jesus is Immanuel, God with us. Their favorite hymn is "Joy to the World."  Others I'd label Lenten Christians, whose faith revolves around sin, guilt and forgiveness. Their symbol is the cross.  Then there are Pentecost Christians, on fire with the Spirit's energy and gifts.

I'm an Advent Christian...Advent Christians can't rest content. We long to be what we are not yet.

As an Advent Christian, God's promises help sustain me in hope. I can accept my experience of exile and the existence of suffering in the world. I don't have to pretend that this life is all there is. I can live with my longings; I don't need to deny them. I can be mindful of the reality around me. I can sing of the reality to come.   Read the rest here....

-- Ronald Klug

After a too busy season that has now landed me in a chair with a view to the mountains of Colorado Springs, I am finally able to sit in some stillness today and ponder much of waiting I haven't been doing.

 

Pike's Peak has stayed here the whole time I have been gone...and maybe a few years before that. (I do live some illusion that stillness requires place, when it is actually more of a state of being - but, hey, this scene does help me). I am reminded again of 2 things: 1) that space needs to be created, and 2) that being still is essential to well-being.

I am hoping again for just one more thing...the Hallelujah Chorus, somewhere, somehow.

Chilled Faith

Do not be too quick to condemn the man who no longer believes in God: for it is perhaps your own coldness and avarice and mediocrity and materialism and selfishness that have chilled his faith.

-- Thomas Merton

I appreciate this reminder - it helps pop the bubble of judgment that so easily grows within me.

There Is Still Something Good

Business takes its lumps in our culture today and some of it is most certainly deserved -- greed is alive and well. So it is nice to see an example of the other side of things - good things that often goes on unheralded:



...at the very least, it taps into the spirit of something very human we all enjoy - listening, surprise, and giving to others - especially this time of year.

Dare Not Explain It Away

Twice now in the last month (that I recognize anyway), I have received something from someone that would be easy just to 'explain away'. Both times, once the initial 'that's nice for someone to do' has passed, I have felt tempted to dismiss the 'message' on the grounds someone was just following a protocol or with something like 'well that's just that person doing their job' -- either way, the conclusion tempting me was that it was not really personal (how could it be, if the sources had no first-hand knowledge of my current experience / needs).

But, what I have risked missing in that temptation, is the reality that God is wanting me to know something; and, that He is using others to communicate it to me. If I dismiss the message, I am really dismissing something else, Someone Else, that wants to 'courage' me to continue faithfully in the battles of life.  ...like refusing gifts at Christmas.

"God (himself) wants you to hear what is being said to you...He sees you" is something I am allowing myself to receive. I dare not explain it away. So now I repeat it to myself, "God wants you to hear this...", when I can. The truth of this is vital to both my well-being and sensibilities. I have challenged myself to receive these for what they are, rather than yield to the temptation to toy with what they aren't.

Thank you, God, for impressing this gift upon me...and for the ways you let me know that you Care. Help me to listen, recognize, and receive these gifts of yours to me.

Another Day

Thank you for another day...another chance to give.

...not another day to live, another day to give.

I don't feel this at all...today.  I'm frustrated, tired, and discouraged.  I feel stuffed with myself, with no room in my heart.

But, the thought above...that this is not why I live...gives me courage to at least consider more than just what I feel today.  To unstuff myself.  To allow room to be created.

Today is another day...to give!

Sleep

It's significant that a recent study found that getting enough sleep turned out to be a major preventive in depression.

-- Deepak Chopra

Your Energy, Not Your Time

 

The reason we work 8 hours a day isn’t based on science. It’s just a century-old practiced based on running factories efficiently -- and is irrelevant in today's creative economy. Today the right focus is on your energy, not your hours, according to the author Tony Schwartz, who says, “Manage your energy, not your time.”

Schwartz explains we all need to manage four different types of energies every day:

• Physical energy: How healthy are you?
• Emotional energy: How happy are you?
• Mental energy: How well can you focus on something?
• Spiritual energy: Why are you doing all of this? What is your purpose?

Machines move linearly, humans move cyclically.  

-- Leo Widrich

If you follow the posts below, you can probably see that I am increasingly fascinated with the studies coming out on the organic nature of the human brain. Here's one that I think is quite helpful on what is going on in our society related to stimulus, patterns, focus, and rest and their effect on the brain:  Finish this good read on what research is revealing to us in this area.

Joy

I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.

-- John 15:11

I am grateful for 4 powerful words of Christmas -- their Advent teaches me to wait.

Joy is one that seems more...elusive, harder to grasp.  What does it mean to know joy?  Even more, what does it mean to know it completely?  This was Jesus' desire.  Something really powerful going on...powerful enough that he would die in order to realize it with us:

Fix our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross...

-- Hebrews 12:2

Conner's 20th Birthday Present - UM vs #1 Arizona

 

And almost a victory to add to a great game...SO CLOSE!!!  More pics here....

Won't Apply To Me

Its funny, you can observe what happens to your parents and relatives. But for some reason, you just don't believe those circumstances will ever apply to you.

1. Your son-in-law will see you old and naked.
2. In sickness and health, for richer or poorer are not exceptions. They are accurate predictions.
3. Your life will be magical.

Sad, funny, true...really worth reading.

-- Lisa Earle McLeod

Two Most Important Days

The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.

-- Mark Twain

Cages

We all live in cages with the doors wide open.

-- George Lucas

Most Powerful Thing

To realize that someone who wants to change and cannot do so, without our forgiveness, is a most powerful thing.

This thought woke me recently after watching the movie, The Warrior, with my son; a powerful story about fighting...for relationship.

Nelson Mandela

Resentment is like drinking poison and hoping it will kill your enemies.

As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.

No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.

-- Nelson Mandela, Nelson Mandela Foundation

More on the story of his death here.

Waiting and Resurrection

Waiting for Christ’s second coming and waiting for the resurrection are one and the same. The second coming is the coming of the risen Christ, raising our mortal bodies with him in the glory of God. Jesus’ resurrection and ours are central to our faith. Our resurrection is as intimately related to the resurrection of Jesus as our belovedness is related to the belovedness of Jesus. Paul is very adamant on this point. He says: “If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ cannot have been raised either, and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is without substance, and so is your faith” (1 Corinthians 15:13-14).

Indeed, our waiting is for the risen Christ to lift us up with him in the eternal life with God. It is from the perspective of Jesus’ resurrection and our own that his life and ours derive their full significance.

...as followers of Jesus we can look far beyond the limits of our short life on earth and trust that nothing we are living now in our body will go to waste.

-- Henri Nouwen

Yeah, Baby! Dance-Cam Duel

Not your typical Dance-Cam after the first 30 seconds...gotta watch the kid and usher duelin'!



...you just can't not smile, if not laugh out loud!

OK, OK, as long as we're video-ing today...check this one out. I don't even like the song that much, but the musicality of this one is...well, you just can't beat it!

The Bridge

The bridge from fear — and its redeemed form, hope — to peace is active waiting....

We all long for peace, and at many levels.  We would desire love and joy, even more.  But, we'll take peace...there is so little of it.

The kernel of this longing is hope that it can still happen.  And, if hope can crawl into our view, the prospect of peace is aroused.  But, we can't strive for it.  The troubled effort to achieve peace does not work...ever.

We have to wait for it.  When we have hope for peace and are willing to wait for it, strangely, it unexpectedly arrives (Lamentations 3:24-26)...

...and it rings like Longfellow's bells of Christmas within us.

The Waters Below

The waters below are tempestuous.  Every truth becomes real, when a story surrounds it...reveals it.

The past couple of months have been increasingly anxious for me.  Obligations at work require that I make decisions that are impacting people's lives in tangible ways.  If we don't make them, we will not long have a business.  ...the rationale comes fairly easily, in the big picture; it's just business.

But, the disruption doesn't settle quite this easily - it isn't what we want to be.  It isn't what I want to be.  And, something lurks beneath the roiling, splashing surface - deeper things, deeper pains, personal memories of when I was the recipient of the decisions I now have to make.  It reminds me....

It reminds me that there isn't complete disconnect that I, myself, could be in the very same situation again...like the very ones I am creating.  How to prevent!?  ...instinct galvanizes my attention.  But, the solutions remain elusive.  Things I am attempting to control are really...out of my control.  And my memories remind me of how true this is.  The days continue...relief is not emerging, as the waters rage on towards a waterfall.  I dig at myself...questioning - looking for something, at least, I can control for (I tell myself).

...I have not been embracing Peace - peace itself or the Giver of it.  I have been seduced away...believing that I have to work harder at something, in order to save myself, if I could just find it.  The rain-waters fill up the gorge; the banks are increasingly separated.  As I dangle above them, I am closer to falling in...and being swept away.  Or, so it seems....

But, it isn't really true.  Fear, not Peace, is prevailing.  I am recognizing these waters...and that everything that really matters is actually still OK (even if life becomes more painful).  I am secure.  I can stand in this moment...trusting, waiting.  ...waiting for something far greater than simply the relief from the threatening waters below me.

...a Bridge is forming beneath my feet.

A Sense of Oneness

They are inspired. Not by being shown, which is only the first step in the leader’s task, but by connecting their personal needs and values with what the leader is proposing. Connecting is an act that arises from within the followers out of their own sense or degree of alignment. The success of the large vision aligns with their own personal vision of success---material, financial, but mostly spiritual---so that their involvement serves both the larger as well as their personal ambition. The only difference is a matter of scale.

The act of inspiration is equivalent to capturing the imagination of those who join and in that sense a oneness is created -- a non-manipulated, organic unity of spirit and effort.

A leader not only has a message he/she delivers in words but in spirit even more profoundly.

-- Jim Sniechowski

Inspiration

Inspiration exists, but it must find you working.

-- Pablo Picasso

Now

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago.
The second best time is now.

-– Chinese Proverb

Boast Your Merits?

If you are to receive your due, you must be punished. What then is done? God has not rendered you due punishment, but bestows upon you unmerited grace. If you wish to be an alien from grace, boast your merits.

-- St. Augustine

Best Football Play of All Time

Since there probably won't be much to cheer about in Ann Arbor today; this should give anyone something to cheer about:



...well, after seeing the last play of the Alabama vs Auburn game:



...I'm not sure which is the best now (too bad this one couldn't have happened for Michigan), but the first one above is still a wonderful story.

Give Up Being Worried

You must once and for all give up being worried about success and failures. Dont let that concern you. Its your duty to go on working steadily day by day, quite quietly, to be prepared for mistakes, which are inevitable, and for failures.

-- Anton Chekov

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving:

Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed,
  for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning;
  great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion;
  therefore I will wait for him.”
The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him,
  to the one who seeks him;
it is good to wait quietly
  for the salvation of the Lord.

-- Lamentations 3:22-26

 

I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought, and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.

-- G.K. Chesterton

Essence...is Gratitude

The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Transformation and Thankfulness

Transformation is the natural consequence of thankfulness for the understanding of who you really are.

No Person Can

No person can consistently behave in a way that's inconsistent with the way he perceives himself.

-- Dr. Neil Anderson

Not Some Holy Huddle

The should be no walls of defense towards God or each other, even if we have been hurt. The pain we experience in life can be overwhelming, but we aren't meant to go through it alone. We are here on earth to be a home and a refuge for the lost and broken, but first we must learn the art of togetherness and celebration.

...to be on a journey -- suffering and laughing together, not some holy huddle where we all pretend that everything is OK, but a real community who believes not only in the God of miracles, but in the God of trials.

-- Rend Collective Experiment, CAMPFIRE

The Mind Is Everything

The mind is everything. What you think you become.

-- Buddha

Certain traditions would dismiss this observation, simply because of the source. But, if another source was named (which certainly seems like it could be), this would quickly be deemed as true.

This statement is worth both pause and serious consideration.  I think it is true. The mind is a wonderful and terrifying thing, especially in its influence over our being. Redemption makes the difference.

No Negatives Friday

I am fascinated by the dynamics of the human mind and brain (more to follow on this):

Like it or not—although this one’s really hard to like—we all have a natural bias towards negativity. While we appreciate positive experiences, we are much more finely attuned and give much greater weight to negative experiences like fear, threats, or even just bad news.

According to neuropsychologist Rick Hanson, our "brain is like Velcro to negative experiences and Teflon to positive ones.”

Or as my non-neuropsychologist father used to say, “It takes five pats on the back to make up for one, ‘Ah, (crap).’”

Read more

-- Jeff Haden

Not Abstinence

It is not abstinence from pleasures that is best, but mastery over them without being worsted.

-- Aristippus

Boring Romance

Romance isn’t measured by how viral your proposal goes. The internet age may try to sell you something different, but don’t ever forget that viral is closely associated with sickness....

The real romantics imagine greying and sagging and wrinkling as the deepening of something sacred.

-- Ann Voskamp, A Holy Experience

Continue Reading...it's worth your boring time.

Best Things Are Nearest

The best things are nearest:  breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of God just before you.

-- Robert Louis Stevenson

As If Nothing Ever Happened

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick  themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened.

-- Winston Churchill

Worship and Terror Are Leadership Bedmates

As a kind of liturgy, I stand before our five-year-old church every September and ask a question: “Should we continue to exist as a church for another year?” You can hear pins drop every time.

The entire community—new comers, old comers, elders, parents—are always caught off guard by my question. Surveying the faces, I can see their intuitive responses. I enjoy the awkwardness. They think that something tragic has happened. Is he quitting? Is he rejecting the Trinity? Is there some glaring moral failure we’re about to hear?

Of course the answers are always no. But it’s that immediate, guttural reaction of uncertainty that I’m after; even if for a moment everyone imagines worst-case scenarios. For me, there’s intention and rationale behind simply asking the “should we?” question about our future.

As the pastor, I never want to assume that we should keep our ministry going just to keep it going. I desire Jesus to breathe freshly into us each year. Now, I certainly hope that our folks affirm our existence. I hope that they say yes, we should continue for another year. But it appeals to me to ask if God wants the same thing.  Continue Reading...

-- A.J. Swoboda

Moscow Subway Ticket Machine

Being Honest - I Need Help

I often take things for granted -- things like being honest.

But it is helpful to be honest with one's self.  In fact, it is needed.  I think this is true because it puts us back in touch with our needs.  Often honesty becomes simply an effort 'not to lie'. But, being honest is more than just 'not lying'.  It is also an effort to face something that is true.

I had to communicate difficult decisions to people at work today.  It was hard to do.  People's lives were affected.  I knew going into it that I needed some kind of help.  A selfish kind, to be sure, but also a kind that would allow me to be in the moment and truly offer myself to the situation, not just the decisions I had to deliver on behalf of the company.  I knew my role.  But, I also needed to be more than that.  I needed help, to be myself, to be fully human in the situation - to be reminded of the kind of things that often recede in these kinds of moments.

I needed to be honest...to acknowledge the truth that I needed help.  So, I prayed...half unsure of what I was praying for and half sure that I needed to do it.

The anticipated situation came.  I did my job.  And, at the very end, I stopped and said a very human thing, "I'm sorry.  I'm sorry that we have to do this."

Later, one of the people affected mentioned to me how significant it was to her when I completed my task, but then acknowledged the human element of it through my apology.  Though the pain of the situation was still quite evident, something was released through the simplest act on my part.

In retrospect, I am kind of startled that I nearly missed that final moment.  I am even chagrined that it had nearly escaped me.  I wonder about my prayer earlier; about what it had done.  Had it been answered, in that 'moment'?  I suspect so.  Perhaps, even more significant is the notion that if I had not been willing to be honest, with myself, I might not have prayed for the help I surely needed.

I need to be more regularly honest; in part, so that doing so can lead me to acknowledging my need...and not mine only, but also those of others.

Honesty

The single most important element in any human relationship is honesty -- with oneself, with God, and with others.

-- Catherine Marshall

What is the key to leading people?

"No one cares how much you know until they first know how much you care about them.

When they know you care, then they will listen to you... and then they will do anything for you."

...Continue Reading

-- Jeff Haden

Crisis

When written in Chinese, the word crisis is composed of two characters.  One represents danger, and the other represents opportunity.

Leader?

A brilliant leader will recognize the limits of his or her tenure and will continue in leadership only by remaining sensitive to and aware of his or her personal strengths and weaknesses and align with the changing needs of the time. Such a leader will adapt and learn in order to remain in leadership. But the question is put -- does the situation still require leadership or has it become an issue of personal desire?

Someone who does not adapt to the situation but insists on his or her own way is not a leader but an autocrat, a dictator, perhaps a tyrant.  Continue Reading....

-- Jim Sniechowski

Desires

God speaks to us through our desires. Then as we lay them at his feet, he helps us sort them out and quiets our hearts to accept what he has already prepared.

-- Rosalind Rinker

Measuring Stick

Walk through life with a measuring stick – and your eyes get so small you never see God.

-- Ann Voskamp, A Holy Experience

Sleep On It

While we need no science to tell us sleep matters, science can enhance our understanding of all the reasons why. Over recent years, no doubt due largely to our preoccupation with the epidemic obesity we keep choosing to lament rather than fix, the links between sleep and weight have received particular attention.

Lack of sleep tends to mean lack of energy, which is apt to discourage exercise. Sleep deficiency also tends to produce irritability, and all the wrong foods tend to provide, albeit briefly, all the right comfort to dull this pain.

There is an important argument here for approaching our health holistically. Perhaps you want to lose weight, or avoid diabetes- you could decide, reasonably, to focus on diet and exercise. But if you ignore other aspects of your health, such as sleep, your own daily routine may conspire against your objectives. A culture widely prone to both obesity and sleep deprivation may be a quintessential case of meeting the enemy, and finding it is us.

I have seen just such patterns in my practice over the years, and a holistic view of health, orchestrating into a logical sequence of tweaks, can be just the fix. Often, with the requisite insights and skillpower, you can oversee just such troubleshooting on your own – no docs or drugs required.

Continue Reading

-- David L. Katz, MD, MPH

Road to Truth

There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth - not going all the way, and not starting.

-- Buddha

This Isn’t Capitalism — It’s Growthism, and It’s Bad for Us

Has capitalism failed? Or, if you like, is it failing? Let me be clear. I don’t mean: is capitalism useless, awful, worthless? I do mean: is capitalism failing at being the best possible means of organizing human work, life, and play?

Maybe what’s practiced in the USA isn’t capitalism at all. It seems to be a toxic admixture of capitalism for the poor, who are ruthlessly whittled down, in brutal Darwinian contests; and socialism for the rich, for whom there appears to be no limit to bailouts, subsidies, and privileges. It’s a lethal cocktail of cronyism for the powerful; and endless struggle for the powerless. It’s neither fish nor fowl; but a chimera.

So what is this system that is faltering, precisely, if it’s not quite capitalism?

I’d call it “growthism.” It’s not just a system or a set of institutions. It’s a mindset; an ideology; a set of cherished beliefs. And one that’s hardened into dogma. A dogma which is palpably failing; but can’t be dislodged—because it’s become an article of faith, the central belief of a cult, whose priests and acolytes threaten mysterious, terrible, divine revenge whenever their authority is questioned.

Growthism says: growth must be achieved at all costs. When growth is achieved; societies are said to be successful; when it is not, they are said to be failing.

...

The truest wealth of life is having lived a life that matters.  

Continue Reading

-- Umair Haque

Fall 2013

2013's Fall is now competing with the best of them:

 

Standardized Test Scores

"My daughter's new elementary school principal sent this message to all students as they received their state standardized test scores:

'We are concerned that these tests do not assess all of what it is that makes each of you unique. The people who create these tests and score them do not know each of you the way your teachers do, the way I hope to, and certainly not the way your families do. They do not know that many of you speak two languages. They do not know that you can play a musical instrument or that you can dance or paint a picture. They do not know that your friends count on you to be there for them or that your laughter can brighten the dreariest day. They do not know that you write poetry or songs, play or participate in sports, wonder about the future, or that sometimes you take care of your little brother or sister after school. They do not know that you have traveled to a really neat place or that you know how to tell a great story or that you really love spending time with special family members and friends. They do not know that you can be trustworthy, kind or thoughtful, and that you try, every day, to be your very best. The scores you get will tell you something, but they will not tell you everything. There are many ways of being smart.'

"My daughter, who did well on the test, shrugged about her scores, but read the letter over and over and held it close to her heart announcing, 'I really love this.'"

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

NOTE: This message originated with a group of principals from several districts, who worked together to write it and get it out. They want to remain anonymous so that any attention the message receives will focus on children and their needs, not on praise for the principals. They hope that other educators will convey a similar message to the children in their care.

More here

-- Parker Palmer

Swords vs Prayer

Where we, like Peter, tend to grab for our swords, Jesus turned to prayer.

Finding God in Silence

It's a long listen; I did it in chunks over several weeks.

Lot's of 'nuggets' - here's a few I've found:

• Silence is primordial.
• The foundation of being itself is silence. It creates a sypathetic resonance with what's right in front of us.
• You can only appreciate something that you've already begun to experience.
• The ego uses words to get whatever it wants. We pull out the words that give us power, that make us right.
• The soul doesn't use words. It surrounds words with space - silence.
• ...if we're not willing to sit in the poverty of our silence.
• Beauty emerges from the silence around it.
• Time increases inside of silence - from chronological time to kyros.
• Whenever emptiness becomes its own kind of fullness, you've just experienced silence.
• Dualistic thinking is making things about sides (where you separate everything) and you pick one, and reject the other. We call this being educated. (min 40)
• Arguments are more often not love of truth, but love of victory (min 1:04)
• The dualistic mind loves to exaggerate the differences.
• The psychological defect...the need to exaggerate differences.
• Non-dualistic thinking is contemplation. The contemplative mind is being rediscovered.
• In the Christian tradition, knowing and not knowing are balanced - they are put together...it is called faith. (min 41)
• Enlightenment has come to mean rational. We've lusted after certitude.
• The paths to contemplation are great love or great suffering.
• Trinity (min 52)
• Faith and silence are practicing for death.

What We Care About

Motivation is just a word to describe the natural energy boost that people get when they're connected to their own power source (which can be different for each of us).

When we're at home, do we worry about being motivated? We do the next thing that we need to do, whether it's fun (cuddling the baby or having sex, for instance) or not-so-much-fun (like paying bills, unless you're into that). The motivation is baked into the activity. If we don't pay bills, they turn off the lights eventually. If we don't cuddle the baby, we won't get our baby-cuddle vitamins for the day and neither will our precious baby.

It's no different at work. We've constructed a whole realm of pseudo-science that tries to tell managers they can dial motivation up or down through incentives and penalties. This is one of the most counterproductive and insulting substructures in the Godzilla machine that rules modern-day business, government and academia. We follow a motivation model that features a donkey as a leading character (the donkey is that put-upon creature who chases that carrot and fears the stick). We've forgotten how humans get motivated - how we motivate ourselves, for instance.

We care about things that are interesting and fun, and when we get the voltage we need from our power source at work, no one has to fiddle with carrots or sticks to get us to heave-to. The carrots and the sticks are unnecessary and distracting when we're in the zone where working people naturally go when barriers to passion and creativity come down.

-- Liz Ryan

OPI - Opportunity for Positive Impact

Opportunity for positive impact is a high-motivator for many people.

Emphasis has shifted from output to impact – from how many products are sold to how much the products enrich people’s lives in the broader society.

According to Rosabeth Moss Kanter, these 3 things foster OPI:

Mastery: Help people develop deep skills.

Membership: Create community by honoring individuality.

Meaning: Repeat and reinforce a larger purpose.

...Continue Reading

Inspiration

The biggest unmotivator, in my experience, is low expectations. People don't ask enough from themselves and the life they lead.

Life evolves when you set higher aspirations for yourself. In the field of motivation, the highest level is inspiration, the best motivator of all. When people are inspired, they are willing to undergo trials, setbacks, and discomforts because they have such a strong belief in what they're doing. Whatever you might think of religious missionaries, Arctic explorers, and sailors who cross the Atlantic single-handedly, their aspiration gives them endurance, courage, and the ability to overcome hardships.

-- Deepak Chopra

Today's Work

The best preparation for tomorrow is to do today's work superbly well.

Furnace

As sure as ever God puts his children in the furnace, he will be in the furnace with them.

-- C.H. Spurgeon

Awareness, Prayer, and Waiting

It had been a long week. Two weeks actually. And, usually Friday nights have ended up being my first chance to breathe, to not complete an agenda, to not anticipate something, to not have to plan for something. This Friday evening was full and most of Saturday, too. ...and still more to do.

My family was gone and it would be a few hours before their return. I started to notice not only my fatigue, but also my longing for something. I recognized this moment; I should do something constructive, I thought.

But, other offers started coming in - watch a movie (not a good one either), get some junk food (and lots of dessert), call someone to come over, and on and on. I wanted something. I was wanting to get away from something. I knew the consequences of the options that were showing up - I have tried those many times before. There had to be an alternative. I knew I needed to turn to something. I knew I needed to turn to God. I went to Walmart instead - Ben & Jerrys (pistachio) ice cream was my goal (in addition to the distraction I was wanting).

I got home and ate the ice-cream and ended up at the same place I was before I went out.

 

I turned to God. It retrospect it was both a "I'll give you a try" and an act of faith, at the same time. Funny how such opposite things could be true.... I prayed and asked for help, I asked for protection, I asked for insight...only to return again to 'help!' I went to bed with a faint sense that I would be more pleased in the morning, if I chose that option than the others.

This morning I awoke a hour later than normal and felt the sunrise coming. I headed out to find it, continuing to pray as I went. God and I talked and He gave me the following:

It is important to acknowledge that you feel something. In fact, it takes something to deny it and this rarely leads to good things...more often than not, it leads you away Me.

It is also important to try to recognize 'what' you are feeling. Noticing that you do, is one thing...exploring what it is, is another.

When you face these things, you then have options to acknowledge what want to do with it. Where will you turn with it? Will you turn to something that will only provide you temporary relief or escape from it or do you want to turn to someone who really cares about you in it - Me.

If you turn to Me, the One who really cares about you, will you then be willing to wait for a response from Me - an answer or the care you need? Or, will you simply turn back in your unwillingness to wait for My care and toward the relief or escape that also feels so available.

Sometimes, you know (and, yes, more than you think), the real care you need requires your ability to receive it. And the truth is, one that I am quite patient with, is that part of your readiness to receive My care comes through your willingness to wait for Me to give it to you - the real care you need and in the perfect time and way you need it. You ask Me for 'help', will you let Me to administrate giving it to you, as you really need it? What if waiting for it, in fact, is part of your ability to become ready to receive it?

It is your pause of desire, as you describe above, that allows Me to care for you. You need to acknowledge, to recognize, to explore, to pray, and then to wait...for Me.

You needed the absence of answer from Me last night, in order to recognize and receive from Me today...what you needed the most to have restored.

I'm not the first guy who has discovered this:

Psalm 27:14
Psalm 130:6
I Corinthians 1:7

He didn't want my activity last night...He wanted me to wait for Him to answer.

The Christian Meaning of Enlightenment

"You can only see what you're told to look for".
"The group you belong to was your identity".
"Religion is always looking for one absolute".
"How you see is what you see".
"Most people do not see things as they are...they see things as 'they' are".
"Religion is often observation...not participation".

-- Richard Rohr, Falling Upward

Questions

Judge a man by his questions, not by his answers.

-- Voltaire

I Deserve

Underneath the statement or belief that I deserve something is something I really want.

Conformity

The opposite of success is not failure the opposite of success is conformity.

-- Earl Nightingale

Thanks, Randy, for this one.

What Matters

It is not how much you do, but how much Love you put into the doing that matters.

-- Mother Teresa

Preparation

If I had nine hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend the first six sharpening my axe.

-- Abraham Lincoln

Satisfaction

Find satisfaction in Him who made you, and only then find satisfaction in yourself as a part of His creation.

-- St. Augustine

 

Holistic Care: Can We Handle the Truth?

Holistic care is, in fact, most important when it's hardest to do -- when there is a lot that needs fixing. I suppose there may be a holistic way to suture the finger of a healthy, young person lacerated while dicing zucchini, but I doubt it would matter much. It does, however, matter a great deal in complex cases of chronic illness, attendant despair, social isolation, and hopelessness. And at such times, it's really hard!

Here's an illustration, based on any number of patients we've treated over the years. Consider a woman of roughly 70, who comes to the clinic ostensibly to get dietary advice because she wants to lose weight. She is, indeed, obese -- with a body mass index of 32. She has high blood pressure and type 2 diabetes, and is on medication for these. Her husband passed away 4 years ago, and she lives alone. She is lonely, tends toward sadness, and is always tired. She sleeps poorly.

She eats in part because she is often hungry, in part to get gratification she doesn't get from other sources. She does not exercise because she has arthritis that makes even walking painful. Her arthritis has worsened as her weight has gone up, putting more strain on already taxed hips and knees. Medication for her joint pains irritates her stomach, and worsens her hypertension. There's more, but you get the idea.

If you can descend one degenerating spiral at a time, you can reverse engineer the process -- and ascend the same way! In my view, that is what holistic care -- in its practical details -- needs to be; both when practiced by a health care professional, and in the context of self-care- when practiced for you, by you.

For the hypothetical case in question, and innumerable real people like her, reversing a descent begins with one well prioritized move in the other direction.

...Continue Reading

-- David L. Katz, MD, MPH

How to Fix the American Skills Gap

...the idea of graduating from a four-year college in the U.S. is so firmly ingrained in our culture that many of us have trouble envisioning anything else. It seems we send some kids off to college because there is nowhere else to put them. The campus is a convenient, albeit expensive, warehouse....

Continue Reading

-- Jeff Selingo

Fine Work...and Doubt

No fine work can be done without concentration and self-sacrifice and toil and doubt.

-- Max Beerbohm

To Become

We work to become, not to acquire.

-- Elbert Hubbard

At The Core

The most successful companies of the future will be those whose leaders make sure their internal reality matches their external appearance and that put doing the right thing at the core of the business.

-- David Jones, WHO CARES WINS

Little Progress

Little progress can be made by merely attempting to repress what is evil; our great hope lies in developing what is good.

-- Calvin Coolidge

Peace of Christ

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts.

-- Colossians 3:15

How do we 'Let the Peace of Christ Rule' in our hearts?  This image on Dawn's site captures the answer perfectly - acknowledging God's Presence with us.

Just By Watching

You can observe a lot by just watching.

-- Yogi Berra

Radiance Of All Powerful Things Combined

There is a significant power in 'presence' - in being with another, in being together.

There is significant power in a lot of things...

We tend to want to name one of them and measure it, in order to elevate it...to 'the most important thing'.  But nothing powerful will completely submit to that effort of ours.  And, that is because we need to discover that many things are powerful, for different purposes and at different times.  Our efforts to summarize eclipse the undeniable radiance of all powerful things combined -- that is, the thing that holds all of them together -- the source of all powerful things, the Source of power.

What To Do

Millions long for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

-- Susan Ertz

Mindfulness

Alexander Graham Bell, noting how the sun’s rays ignite paper only when focused in one place, advised, “Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand." Yet ordinarily our attention wanders, a sitting duck for whatever distraction comes our way – especially when our email inbox alone offers constant distractions that seem urgent, but are just not that important.

Then there’s multi-tasking, which really means switching from one narrow focus to another – the mind cannot hold more than one at a time in what’s called “working memory.” So interrupting one task with another can mean taking many minutes to get your original focus back to speed.

The opposite of multitasking is single-tasking, the ability to bring our focus to bear fully on just what we are doing. It comes to us naturally in those do-or-die times when a deadline forces us to focus fully. But how can we have that full concentration during the rest of our work life – or our life in general?  ...Continue Reading

-- Daniel Goleman

Focus - Well You Don't Say

Finally, someone says something again about the importance of focus:

...it appears that the ability to multitask is more of an illusion, than a bona fide skill. Have you ever wondered who might really be approaching work in the most effective manner? Well, it appears that "paying attention" is still required.

In reality, we should be on a mission to break our multitasking obsession. (I believe that many of us feel obligated to multitask.) While we have the ability to switch between tasks — we do not have the ability to attend to all of them effectively. Recent studies have documented that performance can drop significantly when attempting more than one task, and this becomes more of a challenge as we age.

Research at Stanford has shown that heavy multitaskers have trouble mastering even the simplest of tasks. (In fact, multitaskers didn't do much of anything well.) ...Continue Reading.

-- Dr. Marla Gottschalk

...I've wondered about the impact of focus (or, lack of it) in 'our times', particularly as it relates to habits developed through neural pathways.  It's a challenge not to put a moral judgment on something like this, as us older folks are 'want to do'.  But, either way, it seems we lose something important when we lose our ability to ability to focus...whether that be because of our age, our habits, or our times.

Talking A Good Game About Being Open-Minded

Lots of people talk a good game about being open-minded. But how many of us are truly open to ideas that challenge our most closely-held beliefs?

...we are limited by our beliefs, attitudes and - most importantly - restricted access to information.  Many of us are surrounded by people who share our views. If you are religious, you congregate regularly with people of the same religion. Americans are surrounded by Americans; the same is true in Russia, India, China and Portugal.

...few of us have the courage to SEEK OUT our blind spots. Doing so requires challenging many of our most cherished beliefs. It makes us feel foolish. Why would we deliberately do something our brains are telling us is nonsense?  

-- Bruce Kasanoff

I think Kasanoff nailed this one; worth continued reading...and consideration!

Girded You

Take your burdens, and troubles, and losses, and wrongs, if come they must and will, as your opportunities, knowing that God has girded you for greater things than these.

-- Horace Bushnell

UM vs Minnesota 2013

 

More pics here....

Any Intelligent Fool

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex and more violent. It takes a genius — and a lot of courage — to move in the opposite direction.

-- E E Schumacher

This Possibility

We love this possibility (see yesterday's post) - that someone, who doesn't have to, actually loves us.  We love this possibility, in part, because it off-sets another possibility.  One that we most dread.  The possibility that no one really loves us for who we actually are.  We live with a presiding fear that the only ones who do, kind of have to.   In other words, they should.  They're supposed to.  But, below it all is still the unrelenting question; would they, if they didn't have to?

Where does this notion come from?  Why is it so deeply entrenched within us?

Isn't it because somewhere along the line, we have ended up with a conclusion that love is something that needs to be deserved?  At one level, we know this can't be the basis of things, but yet we still largely operate out of this most of the time - that I need to be lovable, in order to be loved.  And, we know that there is much about us that is not...lovable.

But love has a completely different premise, does it not?  Love, in its purest form, is independent of the deserving nature of its object.  It is complete...from the source of the love, not based on the recipient of it.  ...at all.

This is strange.  Unfamiliar.  And yet, in the deepest places of us, it resonates as true.  I am not loved because I am lovable.  I am not loved because of I am deserving of love.  I am loved because another chooses to love me.

This is the impossible realization of love, one that often takes a lifetime to discover.  One that, once realized, perpetuates the truth of love itself - from us, to others.  A mystery.  A marvel.  A sure and true thing.