We know agreement is a key to any kind of successful partnership, whether it’s in business, a marriage, or a creative partnership. Unity is a powerful thing that can weather any storm. When troubles destroy a relationship, be it a marriage or a business or what have you, it’s not the troubles that actually destroyed […]
“It’s not fair!” said every person everywhere, at some point in their lives. Some of us live in that unhappy place of constantly striving for fairness and never seeing it. Some of us sink there when bad things happen. We see it all over our political system—the constant cry for fairness, for everyone to be […]
At a recent writer’s conference (Jeff Goins’ Tribe conference), I heard a speaker, Joseph Michael, author of the online course Learn Scrivener Fast, say he was thankful for his failures. I’d always known intellectually that failures are good for you. As long as you learn something, failures are learning experiences. They’re a necessary part of […]
Recently we were at a conference and Janet ran into a friend who told her, “I’m so nervous about wearing something that looks good I brought 3 suitcases of clothes.” Now this young woman is gorgeous and would look beautiful in anything she wears. But that’s apparently not the story she tells herself. The negative […]
Pain is something we don’t understand very well, especially here in the West. We avoid it, medicate, and ignore it, none of which actually fixes it. But pain is important. It’s telling us something’s wrong that we need to address. Pain is like the idiot light on your dashboard. What if the oil light comes […]
As Americans, we don’t feel comfortable around other people’s grief. We don’t know how to act. We don’t have a healthy understanding of grief. Death is a legitimate part of life. We ignore it. We pretend it’s not there. We’ve abstracted it away, and we really don’t know how to deal with it ourselves, let alone […]
Do you ever get confused by the weather? Do you ever think the weather itself is confused? I’m looking out the window watching the rain fall on a completely sunny day! Yes, it’s dumping rain at the same time the sun is shining. Does it do that where you live? It does it here in […]
You don’t want to be the good guy in interpersonal relationships. It’s counter-intuitive, but you really don’t. What?!? Are you saying I should be the bad guy? No, of course not. In the world’s scarcity mindset we fall into so easily and often, those are the only two options. But in the Kingdom, there’s another […]
The concepts in this post come from Danny Silk’s book, Keep Your Love On: Connection, Communication, and Boundaries. This book has really rocked my world. I wish I’d read it 20 years ago. A short, easy read, it’s one of those books that you want to read every year. I cannot recommend it highly enough. […]
Judith MacNutt, wife of Francis MacNutt, tells a great story about a circus elephant she saw back-stage. The massive animal stayed in its circle, held by a chain around its foot staked at the center of the circle. The huge creature easily could have ripped that chain right out of the ground and taken off. But […]