In Love With Their Own Ideas

I think a defining element [of a good leader] is a courageous thoughtfulness, the ability to learn fearlessly and be open to different ideas.

Leaders who fall in love with their own ideas and their own plans to the point where they can’t fall out of love with them can be dangerous… When theory collides with reality, reality always wins. Any good leader has a responsibility to go outside of his or her own brain to listen to whatever input can be solicited.

-- Admiral Eric Olson

Fundamental Illusion

The notion that God is absent is the fundamental illusion of the human condition.

-- Thomas Keating

So if I were your enemy...

The quieter the mind, the more powerful, the worthier, the deeper, the more telling and more perfect the prayer is.

-- Meister Eckhart


Technology, social media, Netflix, travel, food and wine, comfort. I would not tempt you with notably bad things, or you would get suspicious.  I would distract you with everyday comforts that slowly feed you a different story and make you forget God.  Then you would dismiss the Spirit leading you, loving you, and comforting you. Then you would start to love comfort more than surrender and obedience and souls.

If that didn’t work, I would attack your identity. I would make you believe you had to prove yourself.  Then you would focus on yourself instead of God. Friends would become enemies.  Teammates would become ...continue here.

-- Jennie Allen

SM Brunch 19: Communication, Media, Way You Treat, and Weakness

More Saturday Mornings Brunch:

The more elaborate our means of communication, the less we communicate.

-- Joseph Priestley

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The media amplifies anxiety, and then offers programming that offers relief from that anxiety.

-- Seth Godin

...seems like more than a coincidence; something insidious is going on here, especially when money is the motivation.

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The way you see people is the way you treat them, and the way you treat them is what they become.

-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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I have been increasingly aware that true healing mostly takes place through the sharing of weakness. In the sharing of my weakness with others, the real depths of my human brokenness and weakness and sinfulness started to reveal itself to me, not as a source of despair but as a source of hope.

-- Henri Nouwen

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Instagram: bobgoff

So it's searchable:

The world will know what we believe

by seeing who we love.

-- Bob Goff

Protest

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Protest".  Given these days, one might naturally think that this poem was written recently.  So, it gives another dimension of pause to learn it was actually penned in 1914:

To sin by silence, when we should protest,
Makes cowards out of men. The human race
Has climbed on protest. Had no voice been raised
Against injustice, ignorance, and lust,
The inquisition yet would serve the law,
And guillotines decide our least disputes.
The few who dare, must speak and speak again
To right the wrongs of many. Speech, thank God,
No vested power in this great day and land
Can gag or throttle. Press and voice may cry
Loud disapproval of existing ills;
May criticise oppression and condemn
The lawlessness of wealth-protecting laws
That let the children and childbearers toil
To purchase ease for idle millionaires.

Therefore I do protest against the boast
Of independence in this mighty land.
Call no chain strong, which holds one rusted link.
Call no land free, that holds one fettered slave.
Until the manacled slim wrists of babes
Are loosed to toss in childish sport and glee,
Until the mother bears no burden, save
The precious one beneath her heart, until
God’s soil is rescued from the clutch of greed
And given back to labor, let no man
Call this the land of freedom.

-- Ella Wheeler Wilcox

31

Yesterday, Tami and I celebrated 31 years of marriage.  She said some very simple, yet deeply penetrating words to me; she said she's glad she married me.  I couldn't agree more that I feel the same way towards her.

We haven't always felt this way.  Like everyone else, we've had our deep challenges.

What a wonder God can do in our lives, in spite of us.  We are so grateful for the kind of love he creates in people, the kind he has created in us.

-- Bob Goff

Meaning

Meaning is truth in context.

Not By Force

A leader leads by example, not by force.

-- Sun Tzu

...this is not as tidy and straight-forward as it might first appear; example and force have many dimensions and can take many forms.  In other words, it is worth some thought beyond just quick intellectual assent.

The Republican Fausts

Many Republican members of Congress have made a Faustian bargain with Donald Trump. They don’t particularly admire him as a man, they don’t trust him as an administrator, they don’t agree with him on major issues, but they respect the grip he has on their voters, they hope he’ll sign their legislation and they certainly don’t want to be seen siding with the inflamed progressives or the hyperventilating media.

Their position was at least comprehensible: How many times in a lifetime does your party control all levers of power? When that happens you’re willing to tolerate a little Trumpian circus behavior in order to get things done.

But if the last 10 days have made anything clear, it’s this: The Republican Fausts are in an untenable position. The deal they’ve struck with the devil comes at too high a price. It really will cost them their soul...continue here.

-- David Brooks

Cast Yourself

​Cast yourself in the arms of God and be very sure that if He wants anything of you, He will fit you for the work and give you strength.

-- St. Philip Neri


God, with your help, let me courageously face whatever I'm afraid of.

-- Linda Neukrug

SM Brunch 18: Life Mistakes, Ideology, Changed Rules, Habits, Discipline, and Forgiveness

More Saturday Mornings Brunch:

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In the 1970s, the rules changed: the self-denial ethic morphed into the self-fulfillment ethic.

-- Philip Yancey

This makes me wonder what version of self- we are now in -- past self-actualization, now to...self-promotion?

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​People seem as attracted to ideology as ever and our capacity to change or adapt our ideologies seem to lessen with age, unless they are disrupted. The problem is that as we age we tend to insulate ourselves more and more from things that could disrupt us. But...

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​The great thing about habits is that they are changeable. 

-- Bernard Marr

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Without self-discipline, success is impossible, period.

-- Lou Holtz

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Heart to Heart

'Poem selection' for this Valentine week -- "Heart to Heart":

It’s neither red
nor sweet.
It doesn’t melt
or turn over,
break or harden,
so it can’t feel
pain,
yearning,
regret.

It doesn’t have 
a tip to spin on,
it isn’t even
shapely—
just a thick clutch
of muscle,
lopsided,
mute. Still,
I feel it inside
its cage sounding
a dull tattoo:
I want, I want—

but I can’t open it:
there’s no key.
I can’t wear it
on my sleeve,
or tell you from
the bottom of it
how I feel. Here,
it’s all yours, now—
but you’ll have
to take me,
too.

-- Rita Dove

Action & Thought

Think like a man of action; act like a man of thought.

-- Henri Bergson

More than juxtaposed concepts, consider how each of these informs the other.

Forgotten

How much do we no longer know, as human beings, simply because of all that we have forgotten over time...generation after generation?

So stark is this possibility that some seem to think things like silence or contemplation are actually new ways of knowing.

Shared Goal

As an emotional intelligence competency, teamwork means being able to work toward a shared goal with others, actively participating and sharing responsibility. Leaders with this competency draw on their skills in empathy and cultivate an atmosphere of cooperation and respect. They are able to build commitment to the team’s goal from everyone. This competency is about more than just work in team situations; it is core to all forms of collaboration.

-- Daniel Goleman

Dear Mr. President:

Dear Mr. President:

I am not a Republican or a Democrat. I do not belong to an organized religion. I do not represent or belong to any special interest groups. I am not an advocate for any specific political view albeit I respect those with one. I am an American. An ordinary immigrant who came to the United States (legally) back in 1980. Today, I am the owner of a small business here in Washington D.C. living in the Maryland suburbs with my wife and kids appreciating the blessings daily.

Today, by coincidence, I watched in shock and disgust some of the ugly social media commentary against you and your family members following your final press conference. I read commentary no American could read without horror. Commentary no American can or should shrug off and move on from. It was another infuriating reminder of how we have become boundary-blind. We may not...continue here.

Like?

If these are the creatures, what must the Creator be like?

-- St. Francis of Assisi


If man is man and God is God, to live without prayer is not merely an awful thing: it is an infinitely foolish thing.

-- Phillips Brooks

SM Brunch 17: Can See, Ground & Dies, Justice, and You've Got A Friend

More Saturday Mornings Brunch:

Most people can only respond to what they can see.

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​“Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”

‭‭-- John‬ ‭12:24‬

I must believe this more and more...even as it relates to some of my own vision for things.  This is simply how life works; it works right through death.  There is something about this that I can get more comfortable with and, as many of the wisdom traditions have pointed out, there is a wonderful beauty to this kind of understanding of seeds (perhaps this is part of why I love flowers so much).

...so, because of this, I really enjoyed a line from this particular rendition of the idea from this week's Michiana Chronicles:

“They tried to bury us, but then they discovered we are seeds.”

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​Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.

-- Benjamin Franklin

While it may be true that he really wasn't the one who said this, there is a tidiness to it that makes a rather searing point.

For those interested in true sources, some think the idea above is really a modification of this...in response to a question about how wrong-doing can be avoided by a State.:

If those who are not wronged feel the same indignation at it as those who are.

-- Iohannis Stobaei Florilegium

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Otherwise

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Otherwise":

I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise. I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach. It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birch wood.
All morning I did
the work I love.

At noon I lay down
with my mate. It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks. It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.

-- by Jane Kenyon

Starving

People are starving...and for food isn't the half of it.

Gracefulness

​I've noticed...looking back over my life, that I have tried to have an element of gracefulness to what I do. And, I felt a kind of contradiction in myself when this doesn't happen.

I don't think I've tried to plan for this; it more just seems to happen, like just a 'way' I'm wired or prefer to do things.  In other words, it isn't just what gets done, but how it gets done that is important to me.

But Not

The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not a bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly.

-- Jim Rohn

Either, Or

​Be wise regarding either / or dilemmas or propositions. Often there are other forces involved, trying to keep things positioned this way.

For example, why must things be described only as either 'left' or 'right'?  Aren't there different features of both, which are appealing?

Inner Experience

Historically, most people naturally presumed that they would come to God by finding unique spiritual locations, precise rituals, special priests or shamans, or unique sacred words. Our correct behavior or morality around these manifestations would bring us to God or God to us. The majority of us began by looking for the right maps or laws, hoping to pass some cosmic test. The assumption was that if you got the right answers, God would like you. God’s love was highly contingent, and the clever were assumed to be the winners.

But the Bible does not make transformation dependent on cleverness at all; rather, transformation is found in one of God’s favorite and most effective hiding places: humility. Read the opening eight Beatitudes in this light (Matthew 5:1-12). Such “poverty of spirit,” Jesus says, is something we seem to lose as we grow into supposed adulthood.

We all need what Jesus described as the mind of a curious child (see Matthew 18:1-5). A “beginner’s mind,” which is truly open and living in the now or in what some call “constantly renewed immediacy,” is the most natural and simple path for all spiritual wisdom.

The genius of the biblical revelation is that we come to God through “the actual,” the here and now, or quite simply what is. The Bible moves us from sacred place (why the temple had to go), sacred actions (why the law had to be relativized), and mental belief systems (why Jesus has no check list in this regard)—to all space and time as sacred. At the close of Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus says: “And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20).

Space, time, and patience reveal the patterns of grace. This is why it takes most of us a long time to be converted. As Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955) prayed, “Above all, trust in the slow work of God.” Our focus eventually moves from preoccupation with perfect actions of any type, to naked presence itself. The historical word for presence is simply “prayer.” Jesus often called it “vigilance,” “seeing,” or “being awake.” When you are fully present, you will know what you need to know in that moment. Really!

As Eckhart Tolle points out in The Power of Now, you don’t have to be a perfect person or in a certain place to experience the fullness of God. God is always given, incarnate in every moment, and present to those who know how to be present themselves. Strangely enough, it is often imperfect people and people in quite secular settings who encounter “The Presence” (Parousia, “fullness”), more than overtly religious people preoccupied with doing their rituals correctly. That pattern is rather clear throughout the entire Bible where, except for Isaiah, Ezekiel, and Zechariah, God-experiences are in “secular,” domestic, and nature settings.

The biblical text moves us toward transformation of both the self and all of history. Deep understanding of Scripture cannot happen until you have somehow first experienced God actively and lovingly working in your own life! Then it all makes sense. Without inner experience of God and grace, Scripture interpretation is often lethal and egocentric. As Paul courageously says, “The written letters alone bring death, but the Spirit gives life” (2 Corinthians 3:6).

-- Richard Rohr

SM Brunch 16: Out / Into, Romanticize, Lose?, Fear Clothed, and Abandoned

Another Saturday Mornings Brunch:



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​Seems true; what you get out of it, depends on what you put into it.

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I can truly love another person only if I don’t romanticize him or her.

-- Parker Palmer

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​What if the things we're afraid we will lose by not being more courageous, we will lose anyway?

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Remember that anger is fear clothed, so when you feel anger always ask what you are afraid of – and if someone is angry at you, feel compassion because it only means they are afraid of something.

-- James Altucher

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Music

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Music":

When I was a child
I once sat sobbing on the floor
Beside my mother’s piano
As she played and sang
For there was in her singing
A shy yet solemn glory
My smallness could not hold

And when I was asked
Why I was crying
I had no words for it
I only shook my head
And went on crying

Why is it that music
At its most beautiful
Opens a wound in us
An ache a desolation
Deep as a homesickness
For some far-off
And half-forgotten country

I’ve never understood
Why this is so

But there’s an ancient legend
From the other side of the world
That gives away the secret
Of this mysterious sorrow

For centuries on centuries
We have been wandering
But we were made for Paradise
As deer for the forest

And when music comes to us
With its heavenly beauty
It brings us desolation
For when we hear it
We half remember
That lost native country

We dimly remember the fields
Their fragrant windswept clover
The birdsongs in the orchards
The wild white violets in the moss
By the transparent streams

And shining at the heart of it
Is the longed-for beauty
Of the One who waits for us
Who will always wait for us
In those radiant meadows

Yet also came to live with us
And wanders where we wander.

-- Anne Porter

Slow Work

​Above all, trust in the slow work of God.

-- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

In vs Out

I used to think...in terms of getting moved out of something (by me...or God...and usually because of something wrong with me).  Now I know that understanding is probably mistaken, as it​ is more likely, in such situations, that I am being moved into something, than out of something.

Creating Leaders

To successfully create more leaders you must have an open mind, a small ego, a humble heart....

-- John Eades

Maintenance

​A lot of life is maintenance. There is wisdom in recognizing that life shouldn't primarily be about the reduction of work. Taking care of, caring for things, is a kind of goodness.

Not Only

​The truth of the one God—as opposed to all the divinities invented by men—is seen in Jesus Christ in the fact that he is free not only to be exalted but also to be lowly, not only to be remote but also to be near, not only to be God in himself in his majesty but also to be God outside himself as this One who is infinitely less than God....

The error of man concerning God is that the God he wants to be like is obviously only a self-sufficient, self-affirming, self-desiring supreme being, self-centered and rotating about himself. Such a being is not God.

-- Karl Barth,  Church Dogmatics IV I, pp. 417 and 422

SM Brunch 15: Punished, Racial Bias, Show, Spiritual Dimensions, and 21

Another Saturday Mornings Brunch:

In the end, we aren't punished as much for our sins as we are by our sins.

-- Nadia Bolz-Weber

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We are biased.  And, we can change.

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​We must show people how.

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Faith is resurgent, while dogma is dying. The spiritual, communal, and justice-seeking dimensions of Christianity are now its leading edge. . . A religion based on subscribing to mandatory beliefs is no longer viable.

-- Harvey Cox

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It was a joy this week to celebrate our youngest's (Makenzie) 21st birthday!  She has wonderful friends, who helped us throw her a party!

Winter Trees

Time has developed an affection in me for both the existence and idea of trees.  There are, perhaps, many 'roots' to this interest as it strikes me that they exhibit many characteristics that are among the best of things human beings can be as well.  Sometime soon, I will itemize those; among those being their resilience, pace, and brilliance.  But, for now, simply following the link to my posts on 'trees' over the years will suffice.

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Winter Trees":

All the complicated details
of the attiring and
the disattiring are completed!
A liquid moon
moves gently among
the long branches.
Thus having prepared their buds
against a sure winter
the wise trees
stand sleeping in the cold.

-- William Carlos Williams

Foundational Key

​Action is the foundational key to all success.

-- Pablo Picasso

Completely Happy

I've noticed...there is a part of me that is not completely happy until everyone is. Or, putting it this way, I do not seem to fully enjoy, knowing that others are not able to enjoy what I get to enjoy.

It is almost like there is something about goodness we must all share.

Sacrifice

​The best leaders are those that understand the meaning of service, those who are willing to sacrifice for their own people.

-- Simon Sinek

Shaping

​We often presume that things are primarily about their affect on us, and then about what or who is doing that 'affecting'. I wonder if the reality is that things are more about how they shape us, than simply how they affect us.

When we enter or persist in times of discomfort, what if we could carry this likelihood with us?  Perhaps we can ask, who are we becoming through this?  It could very well be that most of the time, we cannot know the answer to this kind of thing until well down the road.  But, I do wonder what could be different if I lived with an awareness of it along the way.

Funerals

I told my wife yesterday that I love a good funeral; a bit of a strange thing to say, I'm sure. But, a healthy sense of my own mortality relieves something in me.

Some stand out to me, like such services for Harriet Decker, Elsie Eisenbraun, Kathy Abbitt, Clint Bolton.  I tend to enjoy summary reflections of things, especially lives.

The Lord is good,
  a refuge in times of trouble.
He cares for those who trust in him,

-- Nahum 1:7

​This verse was shared at a memorial service I attended yesterday.  It was presented, in part, as a summary of what the life of the deceased, Barbara Manahan, valued in her life.  It is interesting how death creates such opportunities to reflect on life.  I wonder if such things are the way the dead speak to the living, about what is important in life.

Funerals (honest ones anyway) can connect the realities of life and death, to life and death, in good ways.  They remind us that the two are not as fitted to either / or, and good / bad, as they are to both / and.  We need a deeper understanding that life and death are not competing with each other, they are working together, as parts of reality ((Jn 12:24)  They show us the connection between our humanity and the divine.  In other words, neither one of these cannot be fully experienced without the other.

Funerals are often like a 'reset' of these truths for me.  They whisper a kind of peace to me about the hope we have in the goodness of God that extends beyond our physical lives.

SM Brunch 14: Conspiracies, Unfamiliar Territory, Travel, Knowing, and U2

Another Saturday Mornings Brunch:

I am generally a skeptic when it comes to conspiracies, except when they apply to me (grin).

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​I must be willing to live, at times, in unfamiliar territory (perhaps even willing to choose it). Otherwise, I risk becoming unhealthy, even sick, from a diet of the familiar I can so naturally maintain.

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Perhaps 'the road less traveled' is not really the one others don't take. Perhaps it is really the one I don't take, the less familiar one...the one less traveled by me.

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​The first step to any goal is to know what you want.

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My son announced to me this week that he bought tickets for he and I to attend U2's concert, as part of their 'Joshua Tree Anniversary' tour, this June.  Though certainly grateful for the opportunity itself, I am even more overwhelmed by his heart towards me -- his generosity, his sensitivity, his expression of love.  Love is a humbling thing, isn't it?

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An Accounting

If you can't talk about something, you can't think about something.

-- Eula Biss

So, here's my 'Poem selection' for the week -- "An Accounting":

In this room, hours pass, a slight
corruption of each previous
allotted time block—and probably
confirm failure and humiliation,
which though not ideal, I accept
as historically accurate. I’m sick
of lifestyle music, the thing between
awe and detachment which Hazlitt
defines as adrift. I clear my throat
remind myself, doors are locked,
the ashtray half-full. Unless otherwise
noted, light falls from the television—
accompanies night, any available
other-worldly knowledge. What else?
I’m unhappy even at the edge of rivers,
conversations regarding weather,
any manner of appointment. All comfort
requires another voice. Ditto delusion.
For instance, these shadows imposed
from trees bent by wind and other forms
of predictive behavior, may or may
not contain consciousness. I’m still
working it out. A glass of water grows
warm. I have done terrible and middle
class things for money. This is not
necessarily an acceptable conversation.
Things are good. The serotonin
reuptake inhibitor fades another winter.
If there are things we need, there are
things we need less. I face the mirror
to say it again with feeling. Understand
this is me applying myself.

-- Brett Fletcher Lauer

Looking Back With Gratitude On Obama

Getty Images

This reflection on the the significance of Obama Presidency is worth listening to.  It reminds me of the importance of how what is going on around us makes us feel about life, especially for those whose starting-points in life are different than mine.  We need to see and hear others, from their point-of-view, because it helps us more accurately understand our own.

We All Deserve Styrofoam Cups

​Entitlement is so easy to spot...in others, and, not so much in ourselves. Perhaps it is a grace when our sense of it is 'forced' on us, often through circumstances that don't work for us as we would have hoped -- simple every-day circumstances like getting a certain kind of job, getting married, having a baby, etc.  When one of these is prevented, our sense of entitlement  -- whatever we believe we deserve -- is not too slowly revealed.

This may not be as much a criticism, as just a simple reality.  And, the beauty is that we can learn to let it go -- a good reminder, from Smon Sinek:

Why

​Being an effective leader starts with knowing how to inspire people — to transform individual self-interest to shared collective interest. This happens most often by clearly defining the “why” of the organization – it's the common purpose.

...people are motivated when they are contributing to something bigger than themselves — something with purpose and meaning. They derive more satisfaction when they know they belong, that they matter.

-- Gary Burnison

MLK Day: Towards Justice

The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.

-- Martin Luther King Jr.

By What We Are

How we receive him must be determined not by what he is but by what we are.

-- Father John, The Hardest Thing To Do

SM Brunch 13: Wonder, Separation, Inaccurate, Real?

More Saturday Mornings Brunch:

We often wonder, in whatever context we're in, whether what we are doing is making any real difference.  And, if what we are doing is hard, we wonder even more.  Besides, what if I am just making things worse?  This leads to another question, is it worth it? I think of the story of a friend this week, or of what it was like for the ladies in the story Hidden Figures (a movie really worth seeing, by the way), or of work I am doing with one of my employees.

One thing seems true, we should learn to not only use the current time as a means of evaluating these things.  Time has a way of deceiving us.

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As social psychologists Richard Nisbett and Timothy Wilson argued now almost 40 years ago in a widely cited paper, people have limited and often inaccurate introspective access to their own (let alone others’) mental processes. This means that people are often unaware of the existence of the stimulus that caused a response and frequently even unaware of the response. Instead, people use widely available and plausible causal theories to infer the causes of their own behavior. The implication: when stimuli are either not salient or are not plausible causes of the response those stimuli produce, people will be quite inaccurate in their reporting about why they behaved as they did.  Continue here....

-- Jeffrey Pfeffer

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There is something about separation that can enlighten and clarify.

What we get connected to shapes our identity, particularly our sense of ourselves. This can certainly be good. But, it also can become something else...something along the lines of my identity being distorted or lost, without that connection.

Separation can, often painfully, clarify this for us.

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Photo by Tiina Tormanen

This doesn't even seem real until you see other images from this artist.

Good Taste

When you appeal to the better nature of a specific group, you're doing something with good taste. Just barely ahead of the status quo, in sync but leaning forward.

The key understandings are:

• It is never universal. Good taste is tribal, not widespread.

• It's momentary. The definition changes over time.

• And it's aspirational. When we encounter good taste, it makes us feel as though we can and will be better.

Because it's not universal, being seen as having good taste is not up to you. It's up to the recipient. You can't insist you're right.

Good taste is an incredibly valuable skill, and you can acquire it with practice.

-- Seth Godin

Growing vs Surviving

​He who is not busy growing is merely surviving.

-- Cameron Sepah

Someone else we know, put it this way:

He who is not busy living is busy dying.

-- Bob Dylan

From the Side

I've noticed...​that it seems more and more like I have to come at things from the side.  That is, when I try to grab something straight-on...some kind of flow in me slows down or freezes up. I am wondering about what all is at work here.

Team Sport

Good leadership is a team-sport.

Divine Overdose

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Divine Overdose":

We are even more modern
we are free
not to know
pining pining
til the trees are in
their autumn beauty
who knows why
we are free
an LP of poetry
left on in the apartment
while I walk my love
to the subway
she turns to gold
in the light banking off
the ball-fields
and to have to think
of that small
pale body asleep
I return I take the stairs
3 at a time
and now my heart is sore

-- Matthew Rohrer

Speaks To God

Who one believes God to be is the most accurately revealed not in any credo but in the way one speaks to God when no one else is listening.

-- Nancy Mairs

SM Brunch 12: Bitter, From Cage Fighting to a Hut, Complacency, and Growth

More Saturday Mornings Brunch:

The sweetest things become the most bitter by excess.

-- Democritus

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Growing up, I faced pretty severe bullying. Maybe it’s because I was chubbier and had pimples on my face. Maybe I was too nice and let other kids walk over me. At 13, I was diagnosed with clinical depression, and I battled suicidal thoughts.

Luckily, I had a loving home and my parents did everything they could to help me improve my self-esteem. They encouraged me to get involved in athletics. And that’s what started me on the trajectory to professional cage fighting.  I’ve loved the sport of wrestling since the moment I stepped onto the mat. It took my focus off my struggles. I didn’t start off as a great wrestler. In fact, I was terrible. But a coach saw something in me and he never gave up. Eventually I became one of the best and won multiple state and national championships.

After graduation, I moved to the Olympic Training Center to pursue my dream of wrestling in the Olympics. In a match with a world champion, I ended up in a bad position. Rather than give him the point, I let him gut-wrench me against the mat, twisting my arm the wrong way. In a freak accident, my arm snapped like a twig...continue here.

-- Justin Wren

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It’s biologically and psychologically proven. I remember learning about it in animal behavior in college: we scan and surround ourselves with what we grew up with and know. We all do it.

You can’t change anything unless you become aware of it, accept it, and then you can take action. One of the biggest gifts of this film for me is that it made me so aware of my own unconscious biases. It was really uncomfortable, but things that make you grow tend not to happen in cozy complacency.

-- Alysia Reiner

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​Discomfort is growth. To constantly improve, and to be more resilient and adaptable, whenever there is a fork in the road, choose discomfort over comfort and you will grow.

We're used to choosing comfort. We're used to choosing the easy way. Yet all our success and growth comes from choosing the hardest and least comfortable way.

Choose the hard path. Choose something that makes you uncomfortable. If you do that every single day, you will grow every single day.

We never grow when we're comfortable.  Continue here...

-- Tyler Grey

For or Against

It seems to me that, before it's all said and done, you have to decide what you are for, rather than simply what you're against.

Inferiors

If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.

-- J.K. Rowling

Never Know

You never know who your boss may be...or whose boss you will be.

What You Become

​What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals. 
​
-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Absence

It’s in absence, most especially, I find poems.

-- Layli Long Soldier

New Year or Another Year?

I've been thinking about a new year and the significance of such mile-markers.  I wonder about periods of time when, presumably, people did not have the benefit of a sense of time, at least the way we do now.  How was their life different because of it?  How is mine different because of my sense of time?  Last year, at this time, I had a sense of something coming.  I didn't know what it was, but I felt mindful of it.  Looking back, things did come.  Some were expected; some weren't -- but, 2016 was fulfilling...and a year of letting go.

So what about this year? How will it be marked -- as a new year or just another year?  What will it bring?

For some reason, my mind has gone to the story of David and Goliath.  There are many facets to it, to be sure.  But, one that has been sitting with me has to do with the notion of what faithfulness with the many small things of life, the things that take up a lot of time, has to do with what happens when the big things come.  I think it is likely that David moved in his big moment with Goliath the way he did because of what he learned through the much longer periods of time in his life.  The times where much smaller things were going on, where he learned to believe what he did, probably significantly shaped who he was and what he did in the big one.

When we were in Colorado over Christmas, I was struck by the passion of Tami's Dad for some of the people in the family who are really struggling with life.  He prayed for them, in a deep and groaning way.  It seemed like he thought it mattered that he did so.

What about me?  Why do I pray when I do?  Truth be told, it is often over similar things.  I wonder about the significance of being willing to pray for some of these people this year.  Would it be like the many small things that David learned to do over a long period of time?  Would it matter for who I am praying for?  Would it matter for me?  Would it matter at the moment of an unforeseen big event...because I had been choosing to regularly pray for them?

Perhaps, this year, the significance of 2017 is not because it is new.  Perhaps, the significance of it is that it is just another year...where it really matters how I do the smallest of things of life faithfully.  I think it does matter, somehow.  And, if it does, I want to do it.

2016

The last few years, I have enjoyed reviewing Saturday Mornings entries from throughout the year. Did what we wanted in the year happen?  I'm surprised at the affection I have for so many of the ideas and events that shaped the year and us.  Here is a short list of some of my 2016 favorites:

December: Living It Two Goals of Religion	June: How Big Deepest Agony
November: Leonard Cohen Dead at 82 Chicago Cubs...World Series Title	May: Enneagram, Con't Value of Vulnerability
October: Bearings The Power of A Dinner Table	April: 2nd College Graduate Tend To Flowers
September: Process of Subtraction SM Brunch 7: Damage, Getting Even...	March: Grand Canyon Hike More
August: Wholeness vs Perfection  Compassion	February: The Gates of Hope Silence
July: Saturday Mornings Brunch Compare & Compete	January: Choices Reflect Winter

It Must Ensue

Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself.

-- Viktor E. Frankl

Colorado: Skiing

Another great Colorado day -- what beauty!  More pics here....

Colorado: Hiking

Clear air and blue skies at Mt. Herman, Colorado, with family:

No Matter How Familiar

No matter how familiar, initially space is so often like an unmet friend-to-be.  You have to get used to it all over again.

Evergreen

'Poem selection' for the week -- "Evergreen":

I whisper to the tree, the tree,
the murmuring Tree
“I might take action”

Is romantic
Snow sun melts into streams increasing in volume
I control with my lips

Around History. Our eyes meet. White ancient
Roar I hear stream-
Side, my invisible dress threatening

A slow death. The rest I want to carry
So I listen
For the tree, and its never quite obsolete magic.

-- Rob Schlegel

From the Author:

“‘Evergreen’ raises a lot of questions for me, in me. With an ambivalent nod to Emerson, the poem reflects my uneasy relationship with Romanticism. But the poem is also about how the imagination is like magic; it can get you into trouble, but also get you out.”

Living It

The birth of Jesus made possible not just a new way of understanding life but a new way of living it.

-- Frederick Buechner, Listening to Your Life

But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is the Messiah, the Lord.”

-- Luke 2:10-11

Angels, from the realms of glory,
Wing your flight o'er all the earth;
Ye, who sang creation's story,
Now proclaim Messiah's birth:
Come and worship,
Come and worship
Worship Christ, the new-born King.

Shepherds in the field abiding,
Watching o'er your flocks by night,
God with man is now residing;
Yonder shines the infant Light:

Sages, leave your contemplations,
Brighter visions beam afar:
Seek the great Desire of nations;
Ye have seen his natal star:

Saints before the altar bending,
Watching long in hope and fear,
Suddenly the Lord, descending,
In his temple shall appear.

Lord Himself

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.

-- Isaiah 7:14

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel

Moving up my Christmas favorites list:

O come, O come, Emmanuel
And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear

O come, O come, Thou Lord of might
Who to Thy tribes, on Sinai's height
In ancient times didst give the law
In cloud, and majesty and awe

Thine own from Satan's tyranny
From depths of hell Thy people save
And give them victory o'er the grave

O come, Thou Dayspring, come and cheer
Our spirits by Thine advent here
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night
And death's dark shadows put to flight

O come, Thou Key of David, come
And open wide our heavenly home
Make safe the way that leads on high
And close the path to misery

O come, Thou Wisdom from on high
And order all things, far and nigh
To us the path of knowledge show
And cause us in her ways to go

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to thee, O Israel

Why Hope?

Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.

-- Romans 12:12


It doesn’t take long to look around the world, into the present darkness and evil that surrounds us, and conclude that we have little reason to hope. We all experience pain and suffering. Peace and safety are hard to come by. Injustice, sorrow, sickness, poverty and violence are all alive and well.

But The Word became flesh and dwelt among us (John 1:14). When Jesus stepped onto the scene, hope was made possible. The advent of Christ ushers in hope.

When we trust the work of Christ on the Cross for salvation, we are saved by faith (Ephesians 2:8). Given that hope is faith in the future tense, we, as believers, have hope, we possess it and it is ours for the taking. It is at the root of our saving knowledge, understanding and belief in Christ. And if we believe that Christ bore the weight of our sin on the cross and defeated death in His resurrection, Peter says that we are born into a living hope, a hope in Jesus’ victory on our behalf, no matter the trials and tribulations of this world.

Having been justified, we rejoice in the hope of God’s glory, even in the midst of suffering. In fact, as believers, suffering produces hope, because we know that despite our present troubles, God’s love has been poured out on our behalf in Christ. As His followers, life will be difficult, but our hope is not at the mercy of our circumstances and our perspective is not limited to what is seen, but is wrapped up in the truth of the Gospel for all eternity. We have hope and can hope because it has been given to us in Christ.

-- www.121cc.com

Emptied Himself

When ultimate glory is involved, one can do anything for its sake:

Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, 

who, existing in the form of God, 

did not consider equality with God 

as something to be exploited. 

Instead he emptied himself 

by assuming the form of a servant, 

taking on the likeness of humanity. 

And when he had come as a man, 

he humbled himself by becoming obedient 

to the point of death — even to death on a cross. 

For this reason God highly exalted him 

and gave him the name that is above every name, 

so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow 

— in heaven and on earth and under the earth — 

and every tongue will confess 

that Jesus Christ is Lord, 

to the glory of God the Father. 

-- Phil. 2:5-11

...the most beautiful hymn in Scripture?  Continue here....