2025 is more than halfway over and what a great time to pause and savor that we do have time to reflect what has passed, and the gift of time still to come ahead for us. This is one reason why I love to stop and share my Four Somethings occasionally – things I have read, seen, experienced that made me stop and savor life. Spiritual practices enrich our lives and help us keep us aligned with God. One practice I frequently promote is reflection – pausing and pondering where you are, where you have come from and where is God inviting you into next.  I share bits of wisdom in four categories. Gathering Four Somethings makes me aware of all the blessings often hidden under busyness, worries, and distractions. These “somethings” become markers in our spiritual journey. With so much pivoting and uncertainty in our lives right now, being grounded in a simple practice like this guides my way.  Something Wise Once an unhappy young apprentice came to an old master and told … [Read more...]

“It takes a long time to grow an old friend.” John Leonard We just returned from a delightful few days’ vacation with two lifelong friends who I first met in sixth grade. They can still remember what I wore the first day as a chubby, frightened student in a new school. We were Beatlemaniacs together. During high school we ate homemade pizza together on Friday night pajama parties and watch silly spooky movies. We were in each other’s weddings. And shared so many joys and sorrows over the years. It is the type of friendship where we don’t see or talk with each other for a bit, then take up right where we left off.  Our poor hubbies didn’t get a word in the entire trip! Developing and maintaining friendships does take time, but the result is priceless. My prayer of gratitude this week is thankfulness for friends.  All sorts of friends.  I feel blessed. Friends from college that even after these many years we can still laugh and when we get together, … [Read more...]

I slowly walked the labyrinth at the retreat center circling inward both physically and emotionally. I felt as if the Holy Spirit walked with me that bright June day listening to my heart, helping me unwind my emotions and untangle what was stirring within my soul. I felt drenched with sadness. I finally named what I felt: grief. All the losses of that past year: friendships, aging, disappointments, health setbacks. The final loss took a while to surface, but I slowly articulated it: I grieved over things that were no longer the same in my life and were never again going to be like they used to be. I learned quite a bit about grief that day. This is one reason why I took a course on grief this year. This course increased my awareness of all the different kinds of grief and loss we experience and how we as a culture we never really talk much about this topic. My inner work and spiritual journey has been lately on a path of learning to name my emotions and to hear and … [Read more...]

"Be strong, and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the Lord." Psalm 31: 24 "Each one helps the other, saying to one another, 'Take courage!' "Isaiah 41: 6 "I have said this to you so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution, but take courage: I have conquered the world!” Matthew 14: 27 "I have said this to you so that in me you may have peace. In the world you face persecution, but take courage: I have conquered the world!” John 16: 33 Courage is my word of the year and the Bible has lots to say about having courage and as you can read above for us to “take courage.” This got me to wondering: how do we go about taking courage in the first place? What does that even look like? Taking courage sounds like courage is something right in front of us, readily available. All this time I thought courage was a characteristic I had to muster up from some place deep inside of me and man, most days I couldn’t find it. Often, I felt courage … [Read more...]

I love wandering through my garden, meandering, taking in the colors, the scents, the wonders of nature. As I gather and savor and take in, my imagination is stirred. My mind is refreshed and renewed with expanding ideas, and I reenter the house with new energy to tackle even the simplest of chores with a kind heart and appreciation of life. Sometimes I wander through my books this same way. I scan my bookshelf for one of my treasures of wisdom and chose a chapter, finding a page or two where I highlighted words that struck my heart long ago. Perhaps those sentences still ring true today - maybe they sing a familiar tune. Often they teach an entirely new lesson. Let’s pause midyear. We ARE halfway through 2025 already, a wonderful midpoint to catch our breath, to wait for our soul to skip and play awhile in the garden and savor the season. To take time to listen to our inner voice and seek what may be missing or hungering to be heard. Here are some recent gatherings, savorings, … [Read more...]

Every hear of the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon? To be honest I had to look up what this event was called, but we have all experienced this. In short, Baader-Meinhof phenomenon is a frequency bias. You notice something new or adopt a new word like a word of a year. Maybe you have a conversation about a red car or just found out you were pregnant. Maybe you and your neighbor talk about a breed of dog, a particular style of house, or just about anything. Suddenly, you’re aware of that thing all over the place. Every place you look you see that item. There are red cars on every street! In reality, there’s no increase in occurrence. It’s just that you’ve started to notice it. My word of the year is courage and this word sure has been cropping up in all my readings and in podcasts and quotes and sermons and Bible passages… all over the place. I can’t get away from its lessons!!! That is the power in choosing a word of the year and being intentional on exploring and going deeper into … [Read more...]