I’ve been feeling gutted for the last couple of days, and this morning I gave myself permission to stay gutted. I don’t want to move on quickly. There is no quick fix for deep exhaustion and concern. I want so badly to focus on other things – but I can’t, yet. The world has presented obstacles that can’t be removed …
Book Recommendations: So You Want to Talk About Race – Ijeoma Oluo Between the World and Me – Ta-Nehisi Coates I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness – Austin Channing Brown Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption – Dr. Bryan Stevenson The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness – Michelle Alexander Me …
Today I woke up and realized how I never look at Google Calendar anymore. This may not seem like a big deal, but Google Calendar used to be my guiding force, the way I knew how to go about my day. And now the day is completely different, and the focus is survival. The word survival has many different uses …
Art touches our intellect, but it mostly appeals to the heart. It’s not always about taking sides or arguing to be right, it’s creatively offering that pain is pain, disconnection is disconnection, love is love. It’s common ground.
I’m not sure how everyone else’s brain works, but I tend to think in pictures. I see things and do my best to explain what I’m seeing. This may be true for you, too, or maybe you see or feel words. There’s no right way, however you experience your brain is fine. But since I’m a visual thinker, I experience …
Our front porch is one of my favorite places. I watch the birds and people, I get quiet and usually end up deep in thought. Sometimes I laugh out loud, sometimes I cry. You’ve caught me in my teary moments. Even if I tell you I’m OK, you tend to look worried. But I am OK. I am crying, …
We were built to feel our feelings, even when feelings don’t feel very good. Anger, sadness, feeling left out – not enjoyable. But we all know these feelings intimately, they come and go throughout our lives. They are wonderful teachers, offering an appreciation for the happier moments and calmer times. They also create a sense of compassion and empathy …
In a moment it can feel really good to yell at someone, to release the anger through words. It’s like unloading heaviness onto someone else for awhile, like a momentary relief. But later we are left feeling guilty and ashamed, with the realization that we were irresponsible. We forgot to pay attention. We lost sight of what was real and most important.
Fear is human, and the acknowledgement of fear is essential. But it’s the choices we make while feeling fear that define our humanity.
When things don’t fit we need to trust that there is not one way. What is true for you can only be felt by you. What you decide to do with it can only be your choice.
Searching outside of ourselves for contentment will disappoint. It’s not a thing we can “have”. Instead, it’s a practice of paying attention, appreciating, refocusing. No one promised us contentment. It’s nobody’s job to give us contentment. Instead it’s an individual responsibility, a lifetime commitment. Sometimes it’s easy. Things flow, birds sing, life has rhythm. Sometimes it’s elusive. We feel worry, …
I told my girls about the Paris tragedy. I explained that a few very angry people chose to harm and create fear, but their actions actually led to compassionate solidarity all over the world. They thought they were spreading hate, but instead they ignited togetherness and love. In an instant people remembered what mattered most. They stopped, became silent, prayed. …
My dad fell and has been in the hospital. Actually he’s fallen several times over the last few weeks, but this big fall led to him being taken away in an ambulance. In the emergency room the attending physician walked in and said to my dad, “You look much better in person than you do on paper.” Which made me …
Over the years I’ve become geeky about neurological development and brain-wiring, and my absolute favorite wires are mirror neurons. These lovely links allow us the capacity to feel and experience what others are feeling and experiencing – we are literally wired to understand and help each other. Sometimes I feel like my brain is a house of mirrors because I …
Deep down our inner workings are good. What’s not good is all the junk piled on top of the good. The history, defensive mechanisms, trauma, judgmental thinking, biases, prejudices, and pain that blocks the good. Life is not a process of “becoming” better, we are good as we are. But we do have to commit to a consistent junk-removal process …
As long as I can remember, I’ve been at the party. As a kid, I loved the party. The new stuff, the swirling ideas, the workings of the imagination. I played with all of it, I was the center of attention. Joy and dancing, ideas and beauty. As I grew, so did the party. So many guests and conversations, conflicting …
Too often we pull back from an innovative idea, allow ourselves to be treated poorly or decide to not try something new because we find ourselves thinking, “I don’t want people to think that I’m…” What? Too successful? Too outspoken? Too self-loving? Instead of believing that it’s OK to do what feels good or right to us, we prioritize what …
The definition of love requires constant re-examination. It means one thing when we are young, one thing as we look for a partner, another when we find work that speaks to us. It especially requires re-examination when we have children. We fall in love with the idea of parenting so we decide to have a baby, and then once we …
Fear – because it’s irrational Fear wakes me up to misconceptions, untrue stories about myself or others, untrue stories about the world. Fear makes me stop and think, fear pushes me to breathe and contemplate. Fear can feel brutal, but I believe it’s meant to be a healer. The energy of fear has encouraged (pushed? forced?) me to purge old …
I have met people who make poor choices, people who act out of fear, people who demonstrate the negativity they feel. They aren’t inherently bad. They’ve just forgotten who they are. Pieces of themselves have been harmed, shamed, or forgotten. They are no longer whole, they act from brokenness. They carry unexpressed experiences and stories. They believe untrue fears that …
