Play: Great Neurologically

There’s a circuit in the emotional areas of the brain that’s involved in playfulness. It actually promotes plasticity of the brain. It engages creative combinations of things that can really benefit a worker. Too often we separate work from play. Yet incorporating more joy in our work life is a great thing to do neurologically.

For innovation to happen, you really want to have people step out of the familiar and take joy in making new combinations. That requires vulnerability. A person has to feel like she’s in an environment that respects that when she steps out of the familiar, she’s going in to territory where it may not work out. And that’s okay.

-- Daniel Siegel

Best Practices

Strategy is about folding in the future, not extrapolating the past.

I don’t believe in best practices, I believe in next practices.

-- C.K. Pralahad

True Peace - And The Weight of Ferguson, ISIS, and Boko Haram

True peace is not merely the absence of tension, it is the presence of justice.

-- Martin Luther King, Jr


Some thoughts on injustice and the peace we can bring through the suffering we share with Christ...here.

Ferguson's Real Problem is Poverty

W.E.B. Du Bois said in 1897…“The man who won’t control his finances won’t control anything else,” and, “...nothing positive will ever occur in a community that fails to circulate its dollars.”

Frederick Douglass said in 1874, "…the failure of the Freeman Bank did more to set freed slaves back than 10 more years of slavery." The Freedman's Bank, signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln on March 3rd, 1865, was chartered to teach freed slaves about money (the circa 1865 version of modern day financial literacy).

Ambassador Andrew Young said in 2005, speaking before 18 African Heads of State, “..you can make more money, honestly, from a growing economy, than you can steal from a dying economy.”

Van Jones said in 2013, “..nothing stops a bullet like a job."

I said earlier this week at the launch of Jacksonville 2020 in Jacksonville, Florida with Mayor Alvin Brown there, “if you deal with class, you get race for free.”

The real challenges of Ferguson, Mo. in November, 2014, are more about money, poverty and class, than race, police and the color line.  Continue....

-- John Hope Bryant

Magical Piano

Listening & Compassion

It is your life experiences that open up your heart to have compassion for the most difficult challenges that people face along life’s journeys. Every day we have opportunities to develop our hearts, through getting to know the life stories of those with whom we work…”

-- Bill George

By listening, leaders can see the world through another’s eyes, find solutions and build a open, transparent culture. Listening gives leaders the opportunity to connect with people on a completely new level, building stronger, more trusted relationships on the path to authenticity.

-- Carolyn Ray

Validation

We tend to look for things to validate our own experience.

It could be what we like, or the way we go about business, articles that say things that we agree with, political positions, sides of a controversy like Ferguson, the way we do church, etc.  We say things like, "I have always thought that..." to help validate something about ourselves.

It is more difficult to look for things that we don't like or that come from  a perspective we don't understand or isn't 'like us'.

Perhaps, in doing this, we are hoping that we are right, that something is true about us, that we can get that confirmed.  Perhaps this will increase our standing or get us closer to something else we are wanting even more.

Here's the thing, we must be willing to set aside our demands for validation.  Though we will always need some of it (to function as human-beings), if we are or become unwilling to see things from another person's point-of-view, we will doom ourselves to the inevitability of violence against others.  We can see this happening at nearly all levels of relationships -- inter-personally, in families, with our neighbors, within our communities and country, and between nations.

The Art of Listening

-- Bruce Kasanoff

Is there something more important we can do for people than to listen to them?

What Is Going On

Usually, when someone does something that hurts us, it has more to do with what is going on within that person than it has to do with you or me. This doesn’t excuse the behavior, but it does mean the behavior is likely misdirected and not personal, although it feels that way initially.

-- Lauren Lamarche

Where is Your Joy Hiding?

So it's searchable:

When you're looking for joy, you will always find it hiding in your gratitude.

-- Ann Voskamp

Poverty of Spirit

It seems we must know a kind of poverty, in our spirit, in order to know God.  This may be true because it is one of the key ways we learn that we really are in need of him.  We often don't know this until we have experienced the dearth of our own ability to provide what we want for ourselves, without God.

It is an unavoidable path, not because of God, but because of us.  But the secret of it is that it reveals to us our deeper desires. We discover our true hope once we have exhausted all the other things we discover we are still hoping in.

We should, therefore, deeply respect periods of this kind of poverty within us, and within others.  It is not only of no good, but also unhelpful, to rush out of our experience of poverty.  Nor is it good to to hurry this process along in others.  We must be willing to wait, to yearn.

I am watching this process in a couple of people these days...it is difficult, but I am reminded about what it is that I am actually watching.  Like leaves turning color, I am seeing a slow changing, beautiful to behold.  Poverty is delivering them...and me!

If Necessary

Preach the gospel, and if necessary, use words.

-- St. Francis of Assisi

Give Thanks - For He Is Good

Thanksgiving:

Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good;
    his love endures forever.
Cry out, “Save us, God our Savior;
    gather us and deliver us from the nations,
that we may give thanks to your holy name,
    and glory in your praise.”

-- 1 Chronicles 16:34

I am grateful today for the wealth of the Lord...I have been given much.  Cherished family, good friends, community, more comfort than I need or deserve, health, meaningful work...and much more, like these kinds of things, identified here by Linford Detweiler:

- Our accumulated memories and stories
- Our sometimes loneliness
- The gift of learning to be astonished
- The gift of learning that through our imperfect world runs a deep current of love that refuses to be contained or extinguished

Even more, I am thankful for the endless goodness of God. He was making a way for me and for those I love, even before I knew what I needed from him.  The glory of his ways is without measure...not only for salvation, but also for the beauty and joy of relationship with Him.

Thank you!

Move

Familiarity creates comfort. But comfort is often the enemy of improvement.

When the fear of moving is the only thing holding you back, move.

-- Jeff Haden

Doubt's Opportunity

Turn your doubt into curiosity.

It's not that doubt is a problem, though it certainly can be inconvenient (but, so can the things that create it!).  It's what we do with doubt that is important.

Youthful Sacrifice

Add to this that he was partly a young man of our time -- that is, honest by nature, demanding the truth, seeking it and believing in it, and in that belief demanding immediate participation in it with all the strength of his soul; demanding an immediate deed, with an unfailing desire to sacrifice everything for this deed, even life.  Although, unfortunately, these young men do not understand that the sacrifice of life is, perhaps, the easiest of all sacrifices in many cases, while to sacrifice, for example, five or six years of their ebulliently youthful life to hard, difficult studies, to learning, in order to increase tenfold their strength to serve the very truth and the very deed that they loved and set out to accomplish -- such sacrifice is quite often almost beyond the strength of many of them.

-- Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brother Karamazov

Free Forgiveness

The gospel is a doctrine that teaches a far higher matter than the wisdom, righteousness, and religion of the world; it teaches free forgiveness of sins through Christ.

-- Martin Luther

Pleasing God Is Not

Pleasing God is not a means to our godliness, it is the fruit of our godliness.  For it is the fruit of trust.

-- The Cure

Snowman!

Wow, Frosty is already here and well fed...and before Thanksgiving!

Only Constant

The only constant in life is change.

-- Heraclitus

Feedback

Customer feedback is great for telling you what you did wrong. It's terrible at telling you what you should do next.

-- Phil Libin, CEO of Evernote

Starts to Pay Attention

Research seems to show it takes seven to twelve points of contact before the receiver of your message starts to pay attention.

No One Really Cares

In reality no one really cares how we look...except us. 

So do this. Undress and stand in front of the mirror. (And don’t do the hip-turn shoulder-twist move to make your waist look slimmer and your shoulders broader.)

Take a good look. That’s who you are. Chances are you won't like what you see, but you'll probably also be surprised you don’t look as bad as you suspected.

Then, if you don’t like how you look, decide what you’re willing to do about it and start doing it. (Just don't ever compare yourself to other people; your only goal is to be a better version of the current you.)

Or, if you aren’t willing to do anything about how you look, that’s fine too. Move on. Let it go. Stop worrying about how you look. Stop wasting energy on something you don't care enough about to fix.

Either way, remember that while the only person who really cares how you look is you, many people care about the things you do.

Looking good is fun. Doing good makes you happy.

-- Jeff Haden

I Pray

I this pray for someone I love:

God, before all is said and done, I pray that you would find him.  I pray that he would find you.  I know the road won't be easy; it hasn't been for me.  But, I pray that in your great mercy, in his own way, and in your own time, that he would come to love you deeply.  Whenever that happens, I will be most grateful.  Between now and then, whether sooner or later, help me to represent what I can of you...for his sake.  Help me to realize that the work is really yours, not mine.  That the choice is really his, not mine.  Help me to be patient, willing to love over the period of time this will take...a lifetime even, just as it has been for me.

First Date

I Am Proud Of YOU

I am proud of YOU.

What goes through you head when you hear that?  If it is offered to someone else, is it something like, "Why doesn't anyone say that to me?"  And, if it is offered to me, is it something like, "Really?  Why, what did I do?"

We want it and don't expect it, at the same time.  And, we tie it to something that has been or should be done...in order to deserve it.  What happens when we think about it without attaching whether we deserve it or not?  Why is it that when we offer such a statement to someone else, we don't necessarily want to add the reason for it.  We express it, because it is true, like a parent to a child, not based on whether or not it was earned.  But, when we receive it, we feel the need to know...why?

I am proud of you communicates that I accept you, that I enjoy you...no strings attached.  And, I want you to know it, especially in a world that only offers it with the condition of continued performance.  That's not what I want.  Perhaps, that is why I am curious about the reason when it is offered to me.

It is both disorienting and relieving to hear such words of acceptance and pleasure from someone else.  Perhaps, God said it best when He said about His Son, "This is my Son, in whom I am well pleased." ...because he was doing a good job?  No, because He loved him so.

Like the beauty of this morning, with its snow flurries dancing in between me and the sun behind them, I want to offer my "I am proud of YOU" to someone I love today.

We Need Them

“They said this would be easy. But it’s not. Unexpected things happen that change everything. This is too hard for me.”

Sometimes our people look different than we imagine.
Sometimes they are only in our life for a train ride.
But we need them to get us through the unexpected.

Just before exiting the train, a businessman sensitive to her embarrassment gave her a wink:

“I didn’t see a thing, Beautiful.”

Continue...

What We Do Have

We tend to forget that happiness doesn’t come as a result of getting something we don’t have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.

-- Frederick Keonig

Great Oxymoron

No one matures in bitterness.
No one gets free in isolation.
No one heals rehashing the testimonies of bad religion.
No one gets to love or be loved well in self protection.

Self-protection is one of the great oxymorons. We're the only person in the world we don't have the potential to protect. And once we hide from trusting God and others, we may become more enflamed, more self-justified, more calloused in repeating our blame.

-- The Cure

Reminds me of this passage:

“Your eyes are windows into your body. If you open your eyes wide in wonder and belief, your body fills up with light. If you live squinty-eyed in greed and distrust, your body is a dank cellar. If you pull the blinds on your windows, what a dark life you will have!"

-- Jesus, Matthew 6: 22-23 (MSG)

Continue here with some further thoughts on trust from Donald Miller.

False Absolutes

Science can purify religion from error and superstition. Religion can purify science from idolatry and false absolutes.

-- Pope John Paul II

CT: God Is Not A Candy Machine

At the end of the day this is a mystery, and God is not a candy machine. We have to live with that.  If people are insisting on a system, they are misunderstanding God.

If God really invented the universe and created it out of nothing, my goodness, it’s like an ant arguing with a human. It reflects our inability to grasp the greatness of God. We demand a kind of pint-sized logic of him.


We demand a user-friendly God, and that’s simply not who he is. He created the galaxies. If he deigns to talk to you, ever, or do anything for you, ever, you should just be grateful and shut up. Don’t demand that he now has to do whatever you demand him to do. It really boils down to humility.

To certain questions the first thing we have to say is, I don’t know. It’s a profound mystery.

The Bible tells us we are supposed to pray, and it’s God’s business what he does with the prayer.  Continue....

-- Eric Metaxas, fron a CT interview about his new book, Miracles

Funk of Fear

So I'm up unusually early this Saturday morning.  I couldn't go back to sleep after a bit of an all-to-vivid dream.  It was about a combination natural-disaster in our area and the resulting chaos of failed law-and-order.  ...somehow I ended up fleeing Warsaw to Columbia City and everyone had knives or swords and was just running around stabbing people, as if to establish some kind of order to protect what they thought they would need to survive in a post-apocalyptic world.  Strange stuff...to be dreaming about.  But also, I suspect, a reality that lurks beneath the surface of our collective psyche.

The news from around the world does sink into us somewhere, despite our efforts to turn it off.  Our state-of-things is shockingly tenuous.  It wouldn't take much for us, here, to be in a similar state.  It wouldn't take much to send us all into a funk of fear.

I write this for 2 reasons.  One, it reminds me that there are a lot of dependencies in life, and not nearly as many independencies as I would like.  And two, ironically, it is in our dependencies that we have opportunity to find real life.  Such deep-rooted fears inside of us can break way for us to acknowledge that we are truly needy and humble people.  Life is mystery and we must learn to trust in our dependencies, rather than in the things we stay so busy at trying to protect ourselves.  This, actually, brings us to an unexpected kind of relief.  We have to trust something anyway.

The good news is that we have Someone who is trustworthy...even in a fearful world where we can't really trust much of anything or anyone.

Ordinary Love

We can't reach any higher
if we can't deal with ordinary love...

-- U2

...click image for video.

Attracts More

Feeling grateful or appreciative of someone or something in your life actually attracts more of the things that you appreciate and value into your life.

-- Christiane Northrup

Soul Quake

Sometimes you need a soul quake to find the fault lines in your life.

-- Ann Voskamp, A Holy Experience

Imagination

To our brains, safety is largely based on familiarity.

This works against us in many ways now. Most people fear or resist change, even when they aren’t aware of why. Even people who embrace change have a hard time in the midst of it. Imagination is a tool that lets us hack reality and reshape it to our vision. Imagination is often viewed as a solitary activity, but it is most powerful when a group of people can stand together behind a shared mission and make it real.  Continue...

-- Rita King

Cold Fall Morning

It was a beautiful start to an even better Fall day in Winona Lake yesterday!

Unchastity

If anyone thinks that Christians regard unchastity as the supreme vice, he is quite wrong. The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins…. According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil. Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.

-- C.S. Lewis

Blood Oranges In The Snow

It could be the colder weather...or the fireplace fire last night...or all the shoes by our back-door from all the kids being home again with their friends.  Or, it could be that tender time of year we now embark on, where some of the things that matter most are more clearly in view.  Whatever it is, I'm ready for the new music above, from Over the Rhine; hoping it sinks into the deeper places and rests there like it usually does, awakening me again to myself and the goodness around me.

...click image to stream.

Judger-ing

The key problem with making judgments is that they imply universality. Since a judgment is universal, it exists independently of who is saying it, and this is one of the great attractions of judgment. Someone who judges doesn't have to take responsibility for the judgment or defend it; it simply exists. “It’s bad.” “It’s God’s will.” This makes it very difficult for the judger to even consider reviewing the situation being judged, or considering alternative understandings.  They assume that everyone else should have the same identical response, thus imposing the judge’s values on everyone else.

Judging sets in motion a recursive circular process that typically builds upon itself, and “snowballs,” becoming more and more widespread and intense as time goes on. The more I judge, the more I delete the details of my own experiencing. The less I am aware of my own experiencing, the more defensive and threatened I am likely to feel, so I will tend to rely on judgment even more.

This does not allow the generative listening, questioning and debate to occur required for creative and inventive problem solving. This reactive response keeps people in inert and restrictive ‘either/or’ ‘good/bad’ or ‘right/wrong’ paradigms that focus on making others conform to their point of view in ways that delete possibilities and options for creating a different perspective or alternate point of view.  Continue...

-- Janet Sernack

Habits Are Often Very Fragile

When an action is easy to do, you are more likely to do it regularly. Since new habits are often very fragile, the most meaningful changes you can make are not to your attitude, but to your environment.

Examine where the habit starts to break down. These are your “ah-screw-it” moments – specific sources of friction and the reasons why you tend to fail at committing to the behavior (where you say “Screw this, it’s not worth the effort!”).

A commonly found piece of advice on building habits is to start small.  ...continue.

-- Gregory Ciotti 

Don't Waste

Don't waste life in doubts and fears; spend yourself on the work before you, well assured that the right performance of this hour's duties will be the best preparation for the hours and ages that will follow it.

I'm not sure who said this, but it seems helpful as an approach to the mysteries of life and work.  It seems to reflect a kind of trust that is needed to move, in spite of uncertainties that we often feel.  Something is gained (learning, etc.) in the doing of things, especially when under-girded with at sense of faith.  And, the things gained are not necessarily tied to success.

Not To Be Easy

So it's searchable:

My job is to not be easy on people.  My job is to make them better.

-- Steve Jobs

Everyone

Everyone has their own way of leading...and it needs to grow.

The Garden of the Saints

The Church is a very human organization but also the garden of God's grace. It is a place where great sanctity keeps blooming.  Saints are people who make the living Christ visible to us in a special way.  Some saints have given their lives in the service of Christ and his Church; others have spoken and written words that keep nurturing us; some have lived heroically in difficult situations; others have remained hidden in quiet lives of prayer and meditation; some were prophetic voices calling for renewal; others were spiritual strategists setting up large organizations or networks of people; some were healthy and strong; others were quite sick, and often anxious and insecure.

But all of them in their own ways lived in the Church as in a garden where they heard the voice calling them the Beloved and where they found the courage to make Jesus the center of their lives.'

-- Henri Nouwen

Thanks for sharing, Sue.

SL: What You’ll Find When You Stop Running

I was a member of a counter terrorist group. I wore dark camo, a helmet, night vision goggles, a bulletproof vest, and black face paint – the whole deal.

Running furiously through the woods, we eventually fanned out, finding separate paths– a strategy we’d obviously learned in training. As I was charging through the underbrush, I heard footsteps behind me. I had been singled out for pursuit. I could hear him running behind me; the leaves and sticks under his feet crunching as he followed.

Nearing exhaustion, I kept running as fast as I could, but he followed me relentlessly. With limited visibility, I tripped over a root, sprawling on the forest floor, my face in the dirt. In a moment, his footsteps stopped, and I realized that he had caught up with me.

I turned to look at the face of the person who I thought would surely kill me...continue.

-- Al Andrews

Dynastic Wealth

Melinda and I are strong believers that dynastic wealth is bad for both society and the children involved. We want our children to make their own way in the world. They’ll have all sorts of advantages, but it will be up to them to create their lives and careers.

-- Bill Gates

An interesting essay on wealth...continue here.

Meaning

Life is about meaning – the meaning that comes from authentic relationships with those we love, and from worthwhile work that we believe in.

-- Jennifer Dulski

Lasting Morale

Lasting morale comes from being part of an organization that succeeds by providing people the responsibility needed to contribute in meaningful ways.

-- John Routa

Phoney Separation

Managers who don’t lead are quite discouraging, but leaders who don’t manage don’t know what’s going on. It’s a phoney separation that people are making between the two.

-- Henry Mintzberg

Something Beyond Yourself

Stories are keys that release you out of yourself and into the wide freedom of caring about something beyond yourself.

-- Ann Voskamp

Happy Birthday, Tami!

We love you...and what you love.  More pics here.

What Can I Do?

What can I do?  Sometimes am I blinded by a lot of what I feel like I can't do, what I can't get to.  To maintain or discover a renewed vision, I can still ask myself to see what I can do.

I can recognize.

I can seek to understand.

I can offer compassion.

I can invite.

I can love...both by being firm, and by not keeping score.

And, I can remind myself of this; all that I hope for, and all that I want is given, not achieved.  That takes a lot of the pressure off, that often attends our fears.

It really helps to know, too, that the Master of all the things above is way ahead of me.  He's way better at it than me, He's very cognizant of what is needed, and He is actively pursuing His plan of goodness for us.

I can rest.  I can wait patiently.  I can be free.  ...that's what I can do.

Shorten It

Never Grow

Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.

-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Don't Coexist

Growth and comfort don’t coexist.

-- Ginni Rometty

You Do Not Teach By Teaching

You do not teach by teaching — you teach by loving. Be humble and courageous.

-- Glennon Doyle Melton

Pizza Delivery Driver Surprised by IWU Tip

Makenzie forwarded this article here....

CT: success has little to do with you

Imagine asking two successful people how they managed to accomplish what they have. The first says, “I’m just very gifted.” The second says, “I’ve just worked very hard.” Who sounds more smug?

Our meritocracy—in which people are valued based on ability alone—has conditioned us to consider it arrogant to attribute our accomplishments to God’s gracious gift. For some reason, gift talk sounds elitist. Conversely, we think we’re being humble when we say we worked hard for our success. The gospel polarity of grace versus works, though correctly understood in theory, is capsized in practice: “You succeeded? You must have worked harder than others,” we think. “You didn’t succeed? Try again.”

For it is by works you have succeeded, not by gifts, so that no one can boast. Logical as it may seem, it’s far from the gospel.  ...continue.

-- Andrew Wilson

The Ridge

Absolute Certainty

Nothing would remain stable in human society if we determined to believe only what can be held with absolute certainty.

-- St. Augustine

FMSC: 351 454 98000+ 268

Thanks to our friend Vicky who drew us all in to a great evening of work together at a local FMSC mobile-pack. We, and others (351 people), packed 454 boxes of food (containing over 98,000 meals)...enough to feed 268 people, like Nelson, for a year.

It was joy!

Like A Moron

...begins where we dare to enter into foreign, scary places. ...happens when we're willing to dare looking stupid; or, in the words of Wendell Berry in Citizenship Papers, to "take the risks of amateurism." Witness goes hand-in-hand with entering into foreign discussions that don't happen in the church. Otherwise, the church will die talking to itself.

When we are interested solely in winning the dialogue, we will stop entering into them because we don't feel we can win them. As my friend Dr. Dan Brunner has said: Christians don't know what to talk about when we aren't talking about conversion or theology. This is indicative of a church culture that deals with its ignorance by silence when it should deal with its ignorance through dialogue.

There is something profoundly scary about throwing yourself into a foreign field where you know nothing because you risk looking like a moron. We prefer safe conversations about faith because they make us look smart. But it is only in the process of looking like a moron that one can receive new wisdom and insight.  ...continue this helpful reading here.

-- A.J. Swoboda

Doesn't Mean

Just because the clouds are there doesn't mean that the stars aren't....

Many mornings lately I have walked to my work-out a bit awestruck by the stars.  When I return, they often are fading in their brilliance because of the light of the rising sun.  I often feel inspired by both phenomenon.

Some days, there are too many clouds to see the stars and I miss the inspiration I often now look forward to.

What I see and feel doesn't really change what is actually true.  It is good to know what is true, even when my feelings don't reinforce it...like knowing the stars are still there, even on a cloudy morning.

(thanks, Mark, for your seed-thought on this for me)

Deepest Gifts

Often out of our deepest pain, come our deepest gifts...

...both the ones we receive and the ones we have to give.

CT: Reconciliation

The net worth of the average black household in the United States is $6,314, compared with $110,500 for the average white household, according to 2011 census data...The black-white income gap is roughly 40 percent greater today than it was in 1967...Black men in their 20s without a high school diploma are more likely to be incarcerated today than employed...

All these constitute not a black problem or a white problem, but an American problem. When so much talent is underemployed and over-incarcerated, the entire country suffers.

...

Our Father in heaven, in you all people of the earth find their true identity. You made us all equally in your image, as your children, and therefore as each other’s brother and sisters.

Holy be your name and the honor you have bestowed on your united church, above our pride, allegiances, and all other identities and affiliations that tempt us to value ourselves above others and put you second.

-- Nicholas Kristoff

Continue reading about why we can still believe in reconciliation and pray here....

Miss Me Yet?

I’m not one to jump on anybody right now because I understand the problems there are, especially the problems when you’re dealing with 17- to 22-year-olds. If you’re losing, your tie is wrong, your socks are wrong, your world is wrong. If you’re winning, you can dress in a pair of boxers and a t-shirt and you’re probably right.

-- Tom Izzo

Legacy of Honesty

No legacy is so rich as honesty.

-- Shakespeare

Don't Promote Self-Esteem?

In my counseling office, parents like to tell me that their child is so smart. I rarely hear how compassionate or loving that child is to others. I read so many articles on self-esteem and how important it is for everyone. Is it really that important to think highly of ourselves?

...having high self-esteem didn't improve grades or career achievement. It didn't even reduce alcohol usage. And it especially did not lower violence of any sort (Highly aggressive, violent people happen to think very highly of themselves, debunking the theory that people are aggressive to make up for lower self esteem).

I can't control my brain and how smart I am. Let's not tell our children how smart they are. Let's compliment how hard they have worked on something or how loving they are towards another person. These are all things they can control. Their brain power is not something they can control.

I don't care how highly you think of yourself. I like to focus on your integrity and compassion towards others. Now that will really make this world a better place. Your brain may assist you in that goal. Your liver will help you too. God is love and how much love and compassion you can give to another is what I like to promote.  More here....

-- Pamela Chambers

Strength vs Muscle

I am more interested in strength than I am in muscle.

DM: Why You Can’t Seem to Find Your Willpower

Citing study after study (perhaps too many for an otherwise enjoyable read) Baumeister and Tierney argue willpower actually comes from the muscle of the mind and that it can be strengthened.

Just like any muscle, the brain is strengthened with rest and sleep. After you work your brain, it needs rest in order to grow. Getting enough sleep is key, and taking breaks at regular intervals will help. Ever notice how you have more willpower in the morning than in the evenings, and after a meal as opposed to when you’re hungry?  More here....

-- Donald Miller

As Donald ends up noting, realizing that the brain is a muscle has helped me, too.

Your Yes

Whenever you say yes to something, there is less of you for something else. Make sure your yes is worth the less.

-- Louie Giglio

VSF Church Camping 2014

It's that time of year again!

Click here for more pics....

Stop Drinking The Stuff

To the inevitable backdrop of John Philip Souza marches and Presidential photo-ops, Big Soda has announced that it will do some vague kind of something about the excesses they contribute to our intake of calories and sugars over something like ten years.  Big Soda might have said: “we know you are getting fat and sick, and feel we are implicated; but frankly, we don’t give a damn as long as you are foolish enough to keep buying what we sell.” Actually, that would have been refreshingly honest. But I guess we can be grateful just the same that they didn’t say that. I don’t think it would have earned a hug from Bill Clinton.

Do we really need soda companies to cut calories for us? The aphorism is: the best way to predict the future is to create it. It is NOT: the best way to predict the future is to hope that those currently profiting at the expense of your health will come around and create it for you.  After all, they not only concoct these potentially addictive formulas, but spend lavishly on highly influential marketing.

Why do we need Big Soda to reduce calories for us? It’s a bit brutal folks, I admit, but here goes: the fault is not in our sodas, but in ourselves -- that we allow ourselves to be underlings to the bullying of marketing aiming for profits at the expense of our health.  Continue here....

Stop drinking the stuff.

-- David L. Katz

The Fattest Country On Earth

A recent report cited that the single biggest reason families go bankrupt in the United States is because they get wiped out by medical bills. What a nightmare. God bless those families that have to spend all of their household savings, and more, to help a loved one.

But here’s something that few American citizens know: Just like those families, the U.S. could also go broke, because the country is being wiped out by medical costs. The nation’s healthcare costs have grown to $2.8 trillion, or nearly $9,000 per person, which is more than double what comparable countries pay per person. The U.S. ranks 25 globally in physical well-being, with 57% of our citizens struggling, 11% suffering, and only 32% thriving in this element. But here’s a truly alarming -- and revealing -- fact: The U.S. is the most obese country in the world.

Bluntly, our citizens are too fat, and the country’s economy and future are being smothered by our obesity.

We have to change what and how much we put in our mouths. We have to commit our entire country -- government, businesses, nonprofits, media, families, everyone -- to getting each and every one of our citizens to eat better.

-- Jim Clifton

Why You Should Listen, Even If Others Don't

The odds are very good that the last person to whom you spoke barely heard anything you said. Don't take it personally -- most people just don't listen.

Most of us know it's bad to be so stuck in our own biases and beliefs that we block out half of what other people say... because we label their thoughts as "wrong" even before they stop talking.

When you actually listen to another, you quiet that voice in your head that almost never shuts up. Plus, you actually stop talking... and most of us would do well to talk a bit less, especially when we are trying to learn.  More here....

-- Bruce Kasanoff

Cedarwood Road

A HEART THAT IS BROKEN
IS A HEART THAT IS OPEN

-- U2, "Cedarwood Road", from Songs of Innocence

Fatal Flaw

We all seem to have a fatal flaw.  Or, perhaps better said, we all are fatally flawed.  One way or another, we are all in the same place; incapable of sustaining our lives, much less our success.

This is actually good news, if not only for the relief of it, then for the truth of it.  It should free us.  We can stop trying to overcome it by fixing it or compensating for it in ourselves, not to mention the way we often so easily settle for trying to keep track of the 'flaw' in others in order to simply make ourselves feel better.

Acknowledging this (continually) is pretty critical to what we are left with.  We are either done, dead, gone or we can give way to something miraculous that can rise from the ashes of this truth.  What preempts the futility of such eminent death?  Is it not...mercy?

Because we know the depth of our flawedness, we recognize the power of mercy to redeem the scene.  Because of our personal experience with this mercy, we have unique and powerful opportunity to extend it to others.  This is the beauty of the notion - we can offer mercy, because we have experienced mercy.  Our flaw has revealed in very personal terms the nature of this mercy.

We can actually rejoice in our flaw...because of the opportunity it creates for others, the opportunity it creates to help other people stop wasting their efforts to fix or compensate for their flaw.

Mercy triumphs...!

Teenagers -- Move From Telling to Asking

What I want for my teenagers is for them to have respect, take responsibility and be resilient.

The difficulty is how to teach teenagers resilience in the age of instant gratification. The answer is to let them fail; they need to learn to pick themselves up. Life is not perfect and too often as parents we try to keep our kids in a perfect world, like driving them to school just because it is raining. This can be so hard as a parent: we want everything to be just perfect for our precious progeny, but for them to be happy they need to know what it is to struggle and achieve.

We no longer would tell them what to do. We would ask them what they were doing. 

The shift to asking also helped us listen, and respect the choices they made. This was a massive step in how we parented, and we did not get it right all the time. 


The other thing we do is help our kids have downtime. Dinner time is about sharing food and sharing conversation...continue here.

-- Naomi Simson

God is Better

I like the thoughts here, as they describe the fickleness of our relationship with God much of the time and, even more, what God  is offering us.

I'm not as excited about the notion of 'God is Better'. Perhaps it is because it feels too...market-based. Like, I like this product better than that one. That doesn't seem to work too well with something like God. Just follow Him, because He's your better option...for now (until another option emerges).

I do think God is better, but not in a marketing sense per se.

So how could one describe the spirit of what Chan is trying to say?

The Time Has Come to Give Them...To Life

I wish I knew more about what is going on.  I just do...it's probably a parental instinct.

But life has organized it that, without a volunteering from them, I am not to know as much right now.  It is new.  It is difficult.  But, something also seems right about it.

When your kids are off to college and you wish you knew more details about their lives, but can't, it leaves you off at a door in a new neighborhood of something....  You have to walk through the door of a deeper kind of trust.  When you can't find the normal ways to know or control something, you have to give up trying the old ways and wait for something new.  And, you have to acknowledge that there is something purposeful about the not-knowing.

In this case, I have to give my kids...to life.  To give them in a new way to God...to take care of them...to lead them...to wait for them to learn to trust Him in deeper ways.  I can't know or nudge the way I want to any more; I can only entrust.  I have to entrust myself to Him, as much as I entrust them.

As I recently prayed for them early one morning about this, I believe God answered me this way, "The time has come...to believe in a new way that they are in my good hands.  It's now more about me and them, than you and them.  Trust me."

I felt kind of sad for the comfort of the familiarity of the old doors.  But, also relieved by the fresh paint on the doors of the new neighborhood -- they are even more deeply in the hands of a good God...less of me, more of Him.  They need to grow now in another yard, than my own.  It is good for them to see and grow in the sun out from under the shade of my branches.  They need to learn what they need to learn...and with some distance now, away from me.

I wonder what they will do without my presence, without my promptings.  I wonder how they will feel their way, how they will recognize that they are feeling for God.  I wonder how God will continue His saving work in them.

I want to know.  I will know, but probably more through the lens of the future than right now.  The time has come to give my kids...to life, both to what they pursue in it and to what it does to them.  And, though unsettling without direct knowledge of their well-being, it seems right.  Trusting God always is.

Resilience

Resilience is the ability of people, communities, and systems to maintain their core purpose and integrity among unforeseen shocks and surprises.

-- Andrew Zolli

Courage Muscle

Courage is like a muscle; it has to be exercised daily. If you do, it will grow; ignored, it will atrophy.  Courage helps fuel grit; the two are symbiotic, feeding into and off of each other...read more.

-- Margaret Perlis

Scares You Everyday

Do something that scares you everyday.

-- Eleanor Roosevelt

Your Own Biases

If you want to bring out the talent in other people, you have to look past your own biases, otherwise you will only be helpful to people who are clones of yourself.

-- Bruce Kasanoff

Sure. Sure, no problem. I can do that.

But, wait, it isn't that easy...or, it wouldn't be that necessary to note something like the above.  We are biased, often deeply so.  We believe in the way we go about things or in the reactions out of which we often live.  We don't think others are right (or, as right), rather we believe that we are (largely) right.

To some extent, this is not all that surprising.  We have come to know, what we know, through the grid of our experiences; the grid that has taught us and shaped us...the grid that we, somewhat helplessly, have become invested in.

The problem is when we enforce (something that biases can easily do) what we have come to know upon others -- when we don't have interest in or respect for the grid that others have or are using.  Biases, to some degree, are amoral.  They just are what they are.  But, too often, we use our biases against others and, sadly, too often without knowing it.

We have to learn to see, to train ourselves to see, how others are made, how they have been shaped.  If we don't, we neglect something significant in them, if not worse.

Master Users

The best leaders...almost without exception and at every level, are master users of stories.

-- Tom Peters

Incurably Agnostic

We should all be incurably agnostic if God had not revealed himself.

-- David Watson

This is not as tidy as it might sound, at first glance.  It is, in fact, both brutal and undoingly a basis for all gratitude.

Elephant Hula

Relieves Responsibility

A little known saying goes: “The worst thing you can do for someone carrying a burden is to take that burden away.” That is a management sin: it makes things easier for the one carrying the burden for a short while, but it also relieves him of his responsibility for the burden. And that’s not a good thing in the long run.

-- Klaus Schuster

Context is important, isn't it?  Things like 'statements' aren't universally true.  Words are simply limited in their application.

For example, the above statement strikes me as quite untrue, in certain contexts (like this one).  But, in others, I would say the above has a lot of truth in it.

Nothing Converts

Nothing converts cynics like success.

-- Stephen Covey

Caffeine: The Silent Killer of Success

90% of top performers are high in emotional intelligence. These individuals are skilled at managing their emotions (even in times of high stress) in order to remain calm and in control.

Caffeine disrupts the quality of your sleep by reducing rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, the deep sleep when your body recuperates and processes emotions. When caffeine disrupts your sleep, you wake up the next day with an emotional handicap. You’re naturally going to be inclined to grab a cup of coffee or an energy drink to try to make yourself feel better.

When you sleep, your brain literally recharges, shuffling through the day’s memories and storing or discarding them (which causes dreams), so that you wake up alert and clear-headed. Your self-control, focus, memory, and information processing speed are all reduced when you don’t get enough—or the right kind—of sleep.

Irritability and anxiety are the most commonly seen emotional effects of caffeine, but caffeine enables all of your emotions to take charge. Coming off caffeine reduces your cognitive performance and has a negative impact on your mood.  Continue reading here....

-- Travis Bradberry

Problems So Interesting

Management is the art of making problems so interesting that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them.

-- Paul Hawken

Exposure to Challenge

Becoming a capable leader is an evolution — a co-mingling of training, coaching, and exposure to the types of challenge that bring both insight and growth.

-- Marla Gottschalk

Any one of these alone, is not enough. My sense is that exposure to challenge is critical, especially at the right time and in the right context.  Nothing else provides the opportunity to solidify and grow quite like challenge.

Wake People Up

Many do not recognize the fact as they ought, that Satan has got men fast asleep in sin and that it is his great device to keep them so. He does not care what we do if he can do that. We may sing songs about the sweet by and by, preach sermons and say prayers until doomsday, and he will never concern himself about us, if we don't wake anybody up. But if we awake the sleeping sinner he will gnash on us with his teeth. This is our work - to wake people up.

-- Catherine Booth

And, perhaps, we should start by asking where we, ourselves, are fast asleep...for it is where we have been awakened that we are likely most sensitive and, therefore, most able to extend the mercy needed to awaken others.

Why Wait Until Marriage? -- What No One Tells You & What I Wish Someone Had Told Me

Your skin is the outer layer of your soul.

The union of two bodies is nothing less than the union of two souls.  Physical oneness is a holy God-created ceremony to express nothing less than a soul oneness.

When someone isn’t willing or ready for spiritual oneness, emotional oneness, legal oneness, financial oneness — why let them steal physical and soul oneness from you?

Your naked body deserves the honor of being shared only with someone who is covenanted to never stop loving your naked soul.

-- Ann Voskamp

A very good read...continue here.

The Questions We Ask

I like this line, near the end:

"Adventure is curiosity, the willingness to embrace uncertainty."

Is Conspiring

Nearly everything around you is conspiring to make you go faster; our culture is shifting towards always-on, always-connected. This is okay if you remain accurate, calm and focused. But if you go faster simply for the sake of going faster, you won't end up as successful as my friend. Instead, you'll someday regret that you never learned to slow down.  

-- Bruce Kasanoff

Continue reading here....

Come To Me

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

-- Matthew 11:28

Emotionally Exhausted

A day off work yesterday hardly seemed like rest.  I had been wrestling internally most of the day trying to identify the root of something growing on and into me over the last few months.  The word I would use to describe what I am feeling is...exhaustion.  Exhaustion of an emotional kind.

Over the last few years, physical exhaustion has been a way of re-energizing me emotionally.  But a sequence of things recently has left me unable to recover in either way.

New challenges at work, stretching in relationships, dealing with more adult matters of the heart with my kids; all have climbed up over me in a way that has ended feeling...suffocating.  And, I am seeing something of a related pattern in my thinking -- that it feels like a lot is riding on me, what I do, how I respond, how I lead.  Yesterday helped me realize again that I am not responsible for all of these outcomes.  I have a growing sense that I need to rediscover what it means to cast my cares upon the Lord and to shun my tendency to end up with too much dependence on myself.

Job Satisfaction