How many tee-shirts do you own? I wonder how many tee-shirts are really essential. This was the discussion my hubby and I held last week as we looked at our overstuffed closet, packed with too many tops and tee-shirts. Now most of our tee-shirts are fun memories. Many still bring smiles to our hearts. But to be honest quite a few are faded and a bit past their prime. Some are one size too small. Time to declutter the closet. We went to work! The closet now looks much better and didn’t take as long as we thought. We were tired, but we felt peace and joy and quite a bit lighter once the job was done, But the process made me consider this: What about my internal closet? What needed to be weeded out? What was I keeping that was past its prime and time to release? As I was pondering this, writer Emily Freeman asked this deep question that struck my heart: What’s something you’re craving that has nothing to do with food? Two distinct questions invited me inward: one asking … [Read more...]

What do we get wrong about courage? I have been exploring the concept of courage all this year as it is my word of the year. Recently I listened to the wonderful podcast, Hidden Brain, and its host Shankar Vedantam spoke the phrase “what we get wrong about courage” on the episode about radical kindness. Of course, my curiosity perked up! What we get wrong about courage is this: We think people who demonstrate courage have little or no fear. Somehow they have learned to overcome fear or manage that emotion. They are superheroes, selfless, extreme and beyond our imagination. But that is not true. When “heroes” are interviewed after an event, often they say they acted without thinking. They just did what anyone else would have done for another human being or how they were trained. Externally, acts of courage don’t show us how the person is feeling on the inside and most of the time, internally fear is a very much part of the picture. On the Hidden Brain episode, the researcher … [Read more...]

I love meteors, especially the Perseid meteor showers that arrive late July through mid-August. I wake up in the middle of the night and can go outside into the warm night. I get comfy in one of the lawn chairs on the backyard deck and gaze into God’s wonderful creation. Then I wait, wait, wait. Hope. Hope. Hope. And there one is!! Yippee! A meteor streaks across the sky. My night is complete. A summer surprise. God’s amazing work. But this summer was different. Finally, we had a clear weather and a delightful warm night. It was about 1:00 am and I slipped out of bed anticipating my usual routine of staring at the stars and contemplating the heavens. The weather was perfect as I settled onto the lounge chair and looked up. Was that fog? No, I don’t think so. Clouds? Mmm, not sure. Mist? Why are the stars so dim? I could see stars, but not as many as usual. Some constellations came into view, but many of my old summer friends were faded and not entirely there. Odd. … [Read more...]

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...]