Nourish and Strengthen.
‘Rote’ is defined as a routine, mechanical way of doing something. I would wager that a lot of folks who pray regularly have some rote phrases that show up in their prayers, passed down from family to family. In my family of origin, this was especially true in prayers over the food. A […]
Risk Management.
Early in the morning in early January of this year, my mom and all my siblings received a text from one of my older sisters telling us her oldest son had crash landed a small airplane he was piloting. Realizing some of us are worriers (ok, one of us) she started the text with “J.R. […]
Sally can’t open the door.
50 years ago I was a little 5-year-old all set to go to kindergarten in my suburban Minneapolis neighborhood. My mom told me recently she was surprised by how brave I was about going to school. She did not know back then how much school would be a part of my life, but she […]
Envy and the deep blue sea.
We’ve all heard the statement attributed to Teddy Roosevelt that says “Comparison is the thief of joy.” And I agree. Kind of. There are a ton of reasons why comparing ourselves to others is unfair to us – especially because we tend to compare the worst in ourselves and our lives to what we […]
Incongruity Theory.
Right after we got home from our honeymoon, my husband had to go out of town on business. The first morning he was gone I texted him and said “Good morning Husband!” (probably with a heart emoji). I was so excited to FINALLY be able to say the word husband – about him!! Imagine my […]
Due Diligence.
DUE DILIGENCE. I remember exactly where we were standing when I handed my dad my hand-written list of calculations. I was asking him for financial assistance – something that was uncomfortable for me. I needed his help to get into my first condo and I remember my timing for such an ask was not ideal. […]
Starting Over.
I’m going to guess that all of us have had an experience in our lives where something was ruined. The tent fell down, the lego castle was crushed by our brother, the hairdresser chopped our bangs too short, the cake came out of the oven underbaked, the application got denied, the internship didn’t turn into […]
Misdirected Anger.
I was recently working with a client about a relationship he was ending. In dissecting the unraveling of it all, we ended up discussing how interesting it is to watch where people direct their anger and frustration. I related it to a situation I witnessed recently. Darren and I were in the lobby of […]
The Curse of the Excess.
My dad had some strong OCD tendencies and was an expert sort-er. He sorted socks by color, pens by color, m&m’s by color. He sorted containers by size, flower pots by size, and chocolates by size. The trouble was, once he started sorting, things got complicated. If he found a container he liked, he needed […]
The Thing about Influence.
There’s something about pink frosted sugar cookies that make people smile. It’s kind of a proven fact. In my baking life, those cookies are the ones I get the most comments on. Period. They’re also some of the most time consuming to make. The dough usually has to be chilled. Then rolled. Then cut. Then […]
