It’s a fine line trying to live as a light in a world with substantial growing darkness. I can’t run around like a happy-clappy dope ignoring anything that doesn’t immediately affect me, but at the same time, I can’t live so alarmed that I just collapse into a sheet cake. So what do I do?
Turns out one answer is to sing some 70’s classic rock with a guy and his guitar outside your favorite breakfast joint.
Yes. Really.
Read MoreYour identity is and always will be an inside job. Stop waiting for the world to validate you because it won’t. Imposter Syndrome and its attendant behaviors happen when we abdicate our responsibility for creating powerful identities and let someone else do it instead.
Popular culture will teach you you’re only as good as your last achievement or your body weight and if you believe it, you’ll run yourself to death.
Read MoreForest Bathing is a Japanese practice of wandering through the forest just to be there, oxygenating, slowing the heart and mind, noticing and remembering things like:
You are not your job.
You can’t control everything.
The world will do what it does.
Your mind and happiness are your responsibility.
Why even bother with New Year’s resolutions anyway? Change is hard and people kind of suck at it. Why does hope spring eternal on this particular human behavior?
The reason is simple and profound.
But first, a story.
“Be the change you want to see in the world,” is one of Mahatma Gandhi’s most famous quotes. Unfortunately according to this guy, as meaningful as the quote is, it’s not what he said. The actual quote is even better.
Read MoreIt’s time to start thinking about words like clothing.
Some of you are wearing clothing someone else gave you and you’ve never considered if you even want to wear it. Some of you have completely forgotten who gave you those clothes and you think you bought them yourself. Some of you don’t know you can take ugly clothes off and run around naked for a while until you find something better.
The words you speak and those spoken over you should be as thoughtfully considered as the outfit you put on this morning. Just as the clothes we wear signal something about our identity so do the words we speak and those that have been spoken over us.
Read MoreBecause there are some hard hard things going on in our world and in our lives, and it can sound like I’m minimizing it or pulling some “Good Vibes Only” stunt.
Nope.
Jesus said in this world you will have trouble, but the word in Greek was actually “pressure.” The biggest problem some of us have is we believe we can’t be joyful until our circumstances improve. So we walk around focused on the hard, the heavy, the pressure and wait for relief, which predictably makes things much worse.
But the second part of what Jesus said is important: “Cheer up, I’ve overcome the world.”
Read MoreJesus and I had a long talk by the river. Afterward, as I walked back to my car, I realized the whole time I was there, my mind was still, having been wrestled to the ground by the enormity of God’s creation. For the one-millionth time, I realized that I’m better, healthier, less anxious about life when I’m in nature and still.
So why do I insist on running around unconscious, rattled and harried, or worse, dead still staring at my phone?
Read MoreI’m not a binge-watcher or big fan of tv and even I know that typically, in an ensemble cast, only one or two characters evolve in a season, but all of Ted Lasso’s characters, who’ve become such personal friends that I find myself shouting “Go Richmond” at the top of my lungs over a fictional match in a sport I don’t even care about, EVOLVE IN GORGEOUS AND UNPREDICTABLE WAYS under Ted and Beard’s canny leadership.
Read MoreTed spends the whole show spotting potential in people and inviting them into it, saying things like "I have a real tricky time hearing folks that don't believe in themselves," which sounds ridiculous and it is, but you can't help but trust the guy because it feels good to be around someone who believes so firmly in himself for no reason other than he decided to.
Do you see where I'm going with this?
Mary Baker Eddy who founded the Christian Science movement and died in 1910 said this:
“If you wish to be happy, argue with yourself on the side of happiness; take the side you wish to carry, and be careful not to talk on both sides, or to argue stronger for sorrow than for joy. You are the attorney for the case, and will win or lose according to your plea."
About two weeks ago, I decided to believe Mary Baker Eddy and simply choose which side I would argue for: All the incredible things that were afoot in the world (aka: a gratitude practice) or all the wickedness in the world.
Read More
