The Art of Being Human

        Some times it’s just painful to watch someone going through growing pains especially when they don’t want to grow or worse, don’t think they have to.    I’m watching two people really struggle along those lines. They’re both going through the same thing even though they don’t know it and neither of them are going through it very gracefully. The rest of us can see it even if they can’t. They are their own worst enemy.    Their fears keep  them from the very thing they most want and which causes them the most torment.  Unfortunately there’s not a lot any of us can do for them except stay connected and try not to get caught in the crossfire.                 A lot of the drama we create in our lives and the lives of others happens when our spirits are being held hostage by our fears. We feel helpless without knowing it, so we complain, blame, and criticize. What complai...

    I've got a cold so I’m going to make this short and cut to the chase. We need everyone to be great, folks. By great I mean your best self, your most holy self, your most loving self.  Be great, do whatever you need to do to make it happen. It shouldn’t be that hard but let’s face it, there’s not a whole lot of support for being great these days. There’s a lot of support for being everything else but not great.              My friend Melinda calls it the know your place and stay in it syndrome.  Other  people think they have the right to determine our reality and we let them.  We believe them when tell us that we can’t or shouldn’t or wouldn’t dare.  We believe them when they tell us they're better than us and that we are who they say we are.  We believe them when they tell us the world is flat and man can’t fly.  Yeah, you know what I’m taking about. We believe the self serving deceptions...

        I finally surrendered to the technology gods and bought a new television. I hustled down to the local electronics store on a whim after school and bought the first set that caught my eye and was in my price range. Yes, that’s right it was a mostly impulse purchase. Since I was there and in a what-the-hell mood I picked up the Roku thingy that Revel has and it required a router. I should have bought shoes. Do you want to experience the real difference between men and women?  Do something together involving electronics, manuals, and little black boxes with yellow cords.         I know my strengths and weaknesses and I mostly focus on my strengths. I’m not going to get my panties in a twist about something I know I don’t do well. I’m going to get help if I need it or I’m going to let it go. Listen, everyone is really good at some things and not so good at others. It’s the way we’re wired.  Me, I’m pretty good at...

   Cheryl was too busy to listen to another litany of complaints about a woman I’d decided had power over me. She laid aside the stack of wood she was sanding, put her hands on her hips and said, “Listen, I’m going to tell you something you won’t think is true but it’s the cause of all your problems. You’re a people pleaser.” She ignored my smirk in favor of the task at hand and I left mumbling to myself. She was right I didn’t think it was true.    People pleaser conjured up all sorts of images none of which fit the one I claimed for myself. I ran her observation by a couple of friends on the off chance she might, maybe have a point. They dismissed it the idea as absurd and I tried to. The more I tried to shake it loose though the more it stuck with me like a burr on the back of a favorite sweater. I finally decided to consider it and over the course of a weekend realized she was right. I was in my brash outspoken way a people pleaser. I was like a mangy d...

      Paddlers have an expression, “You never paddle the same river twice.”  Change is constant on the river and off.  There are changes we grab hold of, a wedding of a child, a new baby, the first house, a new job and  changes that grab hold of us, a spouse dies, a child leaves home, a job ends. The only sure thing is that there will be change of one kind and another rather you like it or not. Resistance is futile, born from fear. I mean, it’s either fear or love, right?   We fear losing control, fear failing, fear success, fear the unknown. Fearful souls who have forgotten who they are clutch at an illusion of what is like a drowning man clinging to straw.       I’m not immune to the siren call of fear no matter how often I salute happy endings and new beginnings.  I like change… most of the time.   Although I am loath to admit it there are moments when change and what I think it may or may not bring ...

     Melinda stopped me on the way out of a meeting with a consultant and asked me what I thought about the changes headed our way.   “This is a good time to be a face in the crowd.”   She laughed because I’m not exactly a shrinking violet. Being a face in the crowd seems like it goes against my nature and let’s be honest it does.  I was born standing on a soapbox.  A guy who didn’t know me well gave me a bullhorn once. He took it back just as quickly. And yet every instinct I know and trust is telling me to be a face in the crowd and I'm paying attention.        We are living in fascinating times.  We need the changes that are headed our way and I’m excited for all of us.  Like many of you there are moments when I teeter on the brink of freaking out at the magnitude of what’s happening.  It’s big by anyone’s definition and we are lucky to be part of it.  Yeah, that’s right I said lucky. ...

    A short stack of books sit on my bedside table that I can read bits and pieces of before I let the rack monsters have their way with me. A book of Rumi’s poetry and the latest addition of Oxford American keep company with The Bible, a book of short stories and A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson.  I bought A Return to Love years ago without knowing anything about it other than title appealed to me. It sat on a shelf for months until the shelf crashed to the floor. I spent a very nice rainy afternoon sorting through the books and finding them new homes and added A Return to Love to the stack in my bedroom. I’ve picked it up several times since and am always encouraged by what I find.   In the first chapter she says that her negativity was as toxic to her as alcohol is to an alcoholic. We’ve become addicted to pain fueled by negativity and are experts at finding our jugular, the special place where we can do the most damage, create the m...