Saturday Mornings

  Progress is not possible without deviation. -- Frank Zappa

I've noticed ...I tend to struggle with people who seem pre-occupied with their legacy or their need to be admired, especially those who...

The mystery of poverty is that by sharing in it, making ourselves poor in giving to others, we increase our knowledge of and belief in lov...

How beautifully they go to their graves! How gently lay themselves down and turn to mould!  —  painted of a thousand hues, and fit to make ...

' Poem for the week' -- "Thanks": Listen with the night falling we are saying thank you we are stopping on the bridges to...

Not what we have, but what we enjoy constitutes our abundance . -- Jean Antoine Petit-Senn A while back, this thought captured my imaginatio...

The practice of gratitude teaches us, as the theologian Christine D. Pohl put it, “the giftedness of our total existence .” This posture of...

In the US, Thanksgiving is right around the corner. Despite what you might see around you, it’s not a holiday that exists to mark the begin...

Ever noticed ...that  gratitude is a kind of energy — both tapping into it and creating it?

All that we are looking for in life—all the happiness , contentment, and peace of mind—is right here in the present moment . Our very own aw...

Self-righteous people, in general, don’t seem very happy…or enjoyable. We spend so much time trying to be what we think we need to be, in ...

AXIOS The Morning

Visual - "Mirror" Winona Lake, IN

Once upon a time, there was a young girl named Ars whose family fell on hard times. Desperate, Ars' parents betrothed her to a wealthy b...

Instagram:  aaronieq Many of my regrets are from jumping to certainty about that which I was only beginning to understand.  Curiosity ...

Being positive in a negative situation is not naive, it is leadership . -- Ralph Marston

I’m wondering ...how religion, faith, and spirituality are unique, even as they also overlap or inter-relate.   I probably used to assume th...

In Christ, we see an image of a God who is not armed with lightning bolts but with basin and towel, who spewed not threats but good news for...

Sometimes it looks like nearly everything about life involves negotiation. There's nothing quite like threat to create... attention , fo...

AXIOS But, at some cost:  Teacher burnout leaves schools scrambling

Poetry , like nothing else, can grasp the spirit of something we all resonate with before it gets away. ' Poem for the week' -- ...

Our Veterans Day falls on what used to be called Armistice Day. On that day in 1918, the major fighting of World War I ended. My grandfather...

Another lingering reflection , from a recent Randoms ...: When people don’t pay attention to us, why is it so easy to believe that they don’...

The only ones who fear failure are those who have never tasted it. -- Simon Sinek

I've noticed ...recently, how short-term my sense of vision is — in other words how quickly I tend to lose it...often in just a matter o...

Compassion changes everything. Compassion heals . Compassion mends the broken and restores what has been lost. Compassion draws together th...

AXIOS

We cannot be empathetic only to our allies. We cannot allow fear of law enforcement excess to deprive fellow citizens of the protection th...

Visual - "Fire of Fall"  Pierceton, IN From a  photo essay  of sorts I ended up with one recent Saturday morning.

Comparison is a thief of creativity . Somehow we judge ourselves by the best in others and the worst in us when, in fact, people are waitin...

How does information impact us? How has that changed? It seems to me that information, in the end, has to be digestible; otherwise, it is mo...

Avoid having your ego so close to your position that when your position falls, your ego goes with it. Don’t take counsel of your fears or ...

Most major Christian holidays focus on an event in the life of Jesus, but All Saints’ Day , which falls on Nov. 1, is fixed on stories of hi...

An annual series:   Fall Tree Of The Day : Winona Lake, IN   More Fall 2021 pics here ....

Roughly a half decade or so ago, I started noticing that everyone began to believe that their political opinions were the most interesting ...

Liberty and responsibility are two sides of one thing. For most people, it’s hard to care about things (or people) they’re not close to. Th...

Morning Brew

' Poem for the week' -- "The Power of Hope Today": Today’s hope is a flickering candle that dwells in a snow-dusted windo...

I couldn't help but think of yesterday's post when I saw this:  

Another lingering reflection , from a recent Randoms ...: Chiding (oneself or others) is rarely an effective long-term strategy for change ....

Early adopters change the world. While one person choosing not to eat meat will have a small impact on our climate, it will have a much bigg...

Ever noticed …where you tend to be most able to help someone else — is it not often related to things you have gone through ?

I keep meeting fellow church leaders, artists, and other stakeholders who share a feeling of estrangement from some of the dominant express...

Sustained dysfunction often leads to authoritarianism .  In love , while words have power, presence has more. Curiosity is like muscle — i...

  We each have a sacred responsibility to the people of the United States. It is not about me. It is about my ability to serve the people. ...

I cannot even begin to describe how resonant I am with the spirit of this (it is like describing the soul of my ‘ Poem for the Week ’ series...

The heart is wiser than the intellect. -- Josiah Gilbert Hollan

Below all the chatter, noise, and bluster of our time; I hear a persistent question — it seems like people are essentially asking, will ther...

Tweeted by William Shatner during his flight last week into space: I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to hav...