The Bridge Builder

‘Poem for the week’ — “The Bridge Builder”:

An old man going a lone highway,

Came, at the evening cold and gray,

To a chasm vast and deep and wide.

Through which was flowing a sullen tide

The old man crossed in the twilight dim,

The sullen stream had no fear for him;

But he turned when safe on the other side

And built a bridge to span the tide.

“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near,

“You are wasting your strength with building here;

Your journey will end with the ending day,

You never again will pass this way;

You’ve crossed the chasm, deep and wide,

Why build this bridge at evening tide?”

The builder lifted his old gray head;

“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,

“There followed after me to-day

A youth whose feet must pass this way.

This chasm that has been as naught to me

To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be;

He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;

Good friend, I am building this bridge for him!”

-- Will Allen Dromgoole

From Fear or From Love

All the ill that is in us comes from fear, and all the good from love.

-- Eleanor Farjeon

I Had A (Bad) Dream

...and, I can still remember many of the details (unusual for me), not to mention the overall feeling of something deeply foreboding.

It involved Donald Trump.

He had (apparently) won the election and was, at least on the surface of things, solidifying support (or coercing it, as he had promised to do while campaigning).  And, for some reason, he was in our (relatively) small town.  

As he walked through a surrounding crowd, It almost seemed like he was working a list of some kind.  He called out a friend of mine (lucky you, Tim), who is also a relatively well-known member of our community, by name.  He leaned in, with his fat arm wrapping around my friend’s neck like a python, saying, "I've got some things I want you to do for me...".

With no other way to know my friend, it was as if someone had supplied Trump the names of key individuals in our area. I couldn't help but feel a cold-draft on the back of my neck as the big-brother effect descended on the scene.  It was a litmus test; a test of loyalty.  And, it came from those who had already pledged their allegiance, not to the flag (mind you), but to the power of this man.  A man eager to use it.

I thought he probably wouldn't notice me, though (pretty vivid dream, no? …I can't believe all the details I recall)...until I remembered a couple of things that were causing what felt like a growing pit in my stomach.

I was now President of a local company (a small one, but nonetheless...I could be on the list) — so, it was possible I wouldn't be exempt from the experience I was watching my friend now in.

And, then, there were my blog posts about...Donald Trump.  I didn't think many people even knew about my blog, but...what if more did than I thought?

I tried to wake myself up, but fell right back into what was now becoming a bit of a…nightmare.

Sometimes we collectively make a deal with the devil; and, sometimes, he makes a deal with us (whether we solicited it or agreed to it, or not).   

In my dream, I had a profound sense of dread of where this was all going, which likely parallels some of the inner fears I’ve had all the way along regarding the whole Trump debacle. Such things, often times, become the substance of our dream-life — what we’re actually quite fearful of (even if we try to master it cognitively while we’re awake).

And, perhaps, this is what many are feeling these days (even while others seem to be actually cheering it on).  Because, as nightmarish as it sounds, it's not like we don't have a record of what he has done.  We also know what he intends to do.  He and his henchmen aren't even trying to hide it — it’s widely published in sources like those referenced here: 

Steve Bannon Vows Purge if Donald Trump Wins Election

Thickening Webs on the Christian Right

Project 2025

…like a (bad) dream.

LT: You'll Have To Decide

Leadership is about fighting through the most intractable problems. It’s about challenging anger, frustration, and heartbreak to find a solution. It’s about doing what you believe is right, even when it’s hard and lonely. You’re all future leaders, every one of you graduating today…. You’ll face complicated, tough moments. In these moments, you’ll listen to others, but you’ll have to decide, guided by knowledge, conviction, principle, and your own moral compass.

-- Joe Biden, commencement address at Morehouse College

Memorial Day

Yesterday's post...might make the case for some national remembering — what do we know about what got us here (good and bad), what are we thankful for, what do we believe in?  

We should dedicate a day sometime for some collective-reflection (wait...we have one, so I guess the question is more like, do we use it for such?):

[Serving aboard the U.S.S. Essex] was a teamwork operation, certainly. We had very few occasions when we would do anything on a solo basis. Almost everything we did as teams, and in our case we usually liked flights of four at least, to help each other out.

-- Neil Armstrong

It didn’t have to be the military, but I just thought service of some kind is important … for citizenship. I just think it’s important to give back, whether it’s locally in your own community or statewide or national.

-- Rob Riggle

True patriotism springs from a belief in the dignity of the individual, freedom and equality not only for Americans but for all people on earth, universal brotherhood and good will, and a constant and earnest striving toward the principles and ideals on which this country was founded.

-- Eleanor Roosevelt

I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.

-- James Baldwin

One man's reflection of his time of military service and the impacts it had on his life...here.

Jarring generation gap

AXIOS

From values to voting to happiness to economics, America has more than a red-blue divide: It has a massive generational divide.

In his Six-Chart Sunday newsletter, Washington strategist Bruce Mehlman spells out startling differences that have emerged between older and younger generations across a striking array of topics...continue here.

-- Mike Allen

3 Observations & A Question

Curiosity is the path to enlightenment — certainty is the path to ignorance.

Entitlement is believing the rules don’t apply to me — that I am superior to the requirements of self-control, that I have more power than I really do.

Whatever you're thinking people think about you, you can likely toss at least 50% of it immediately — they don't really have that much time left, after they're done being preoccupied with themselves.

How often do we give to others what we wish was given to us?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question….

How even the smallest acts of kindness make us happier and healthier

When a windy arctic blast raged through the Northeast U.S. this past winter, more than 600,000 people lost power for days. I was one of them. Because we don’t own a generator, our family toughed it out in the freezing cold without power. It tested everyone’s mettle. But when I stepped back from my extreme discomfort for a few moments, I discovered some extraordinary goings on: random acts of kindness.

The owner of a new takeout kiosk around the corner filled my thermos with boiling water several times a day. For free. The proprietor of a café I visit every morning, for my ritual coffee and croissant hot out of the oven, wanted to help. A man I know from frequent walks with my dog rushed toward me on the snowy path to warn that a tree I was about to pass could fall at any moment. (It fell later that day.)

There was no mandate for any of these behaviors. People acted out of genuine kindness and compassion. The exceptional acts of kindness took me out of my stressed-out, shivering-cold pity party by elevating my mood and boosting my overall well-being...continue here.

-- Marjorie Radlo-Zandi

Day-To-Day Basis

It's only possible to live happily ever after on a day-to-day basis.

-- Margaret Bonnano

Life’s Messaging

Life is speaking to us all the time.

But, much of the time, we’re not listening. 

Too often, we keep ourselves surrounded by so much noise (usually the noise of all our activity). And, because of this, the pulsation of life (communication) doesn't register with us.

Until it does.

At some point, the meaninglessness of our noise pushes us to recognize our craving for silence — enough silence that we can actually hear something else.  Something that we desperately want — something life is communicating…something meaningful. But, until we hear what it is telling us, we are largely just restless, bouncing around in all our busyness. Perhaps this is why, in a time of nearly unlimited entertainments, we can still actually end up feeling more bored than anything else.

Deep down, though, we want to hear what life is telling us. 

As compelling as what we really want is, though, we still seem to have to make a daily choice to distance ourselves from our self-created noise (media of one kind or another) in order to hear the messaging going on...to our hearts, all the time.  If we don't, we just float on in our trance of noise and activity, missing most of what makes everything real and meaningful

So my question becomes, how do I organize my time and attention to get (and stay) in tune to what life is communicating?  For me, I have found that I have to carve out dedicated time to do this.  If I don't, the demands I've created for myself just grab and pull me away to more and more activity and I become less and less able to understand what is happening.  As with many other things, listening is something I must consciously choose to do.

This includes quiet — choose quiet.

It also includes what inputs you allow in your life. Pick good ones (God knows there so many that don't amount to much more than just a waste of time) — choose good people, good information, good sources energy...and, yes, good food.

And, it includes choosing to listen to yourself, especially (ironically) your body.  Life speaks to us as much from within us as it does outside us — choose to pay attention...to yourself.

...so you can listen to what life is speaking.

Work You Love

Whichever route you take, expect a struggle. Finding work you love is very difficult. Most people fail. Even if you succeed, it's rare to be free to work on what you want till your thirties or forties. But if you have the destination in sight you'll be more likely to arrive at it. If you know you can love work, you're in the home stretch, and if you know what work you love, you're practically there.

-- Paul Graham

Juggling

I’ve noticed…that a lot of what I'm doing these days feels like juggling....

Change-Averse Institution

For centuries, Christianity has presented itself as an “organized religion” — a change-averse institution that protects and promotes a timeless system of beliefs that were handed down fully formed in the past. Yet Christianity’s actual history is a story of change and adaptation.

-- Brian McLaren

3 Observations & A Question

Spirituality is not knowledge, though it includes it — it's engagement.

It’s not your competence that connects you to others after all — it’s your vulnerability.

 

It is to be understood that nearly all close relationships will hurt you AND that they will bring you great laughter and joy, not to mention…love.

Some people are selling fear — why do we keep buying it?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question….

Why We Believe the Myth of High Crime Rates

Americans are convinced that they are living in a world ravaged by crime. In major cities, we fear riding public transportation or going out after dark. We buy weapons for self-defense and skip our nightly jogs. Next to the weather, the explosion of crime is a favorite topic of conversation. The overwhelming consensus is that crime is only getting worse. According to a Gallup poll, in late 2022, 78 percent of Americans contended that there was more crime than there used to be.

These perceptions would make sense if they were accurate, but they aren’t. Crime, in fact, is down in the U.S., rivaling low levels that haven’t been seen since the 1960s. According to FBI data, violent crime rates dropped by 8 percent and property crime dropped by about 6 percent by the third quarter of last year, compared with the same period in 2022. Still, the reality of these optimistic statistics doesn’t quell people’s fears.  Continue here...

-- Sara Novak

Fear

‘Poem for the week’ — “Fear”:

What is it about fear,

this thing passed down

generation to generation

like a well-tended

but never talked about

Curse?

How have we managed

to give it so much life,

to allow it to grow and inflame

every corner of our tired

souls?

Fear of the other

Fear of ourselves

Fear of loss

Fear of wanting

Fear of change

Fear of fear itself

Is there an antidote,

a way to stop this,

to name and remove

the poison that plagues

even the best of us?

Give me your hand

place your own hand on your heart

put your pen to the journal page

grab onto something, someone,

and ask what might happen

if we let go.

And then, let go.

Fear can only hold on if we are.

-- Kaitlin Curtice

Never The Situation

The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation, but your thoughts about it.

-- Eckhart Tolle

“What's It All Mean?”

I recently saw a reference to a new book by Luke Norsworthy called, How to Love the Life You Already Have.

While routinely I see such things, the title of this one stuck around with me. Perhaps the title intimates that too often we don't...love the life we already have. That we are often living in a twilight zone of a life we'd like to have, but don't.

I don't know a lot of details about where this book goes.  But, what is it about our lives that creates a tension between the life we have and the life we'd like to have. Is it a healthy tension? I'm guessing it could be, if we really engage the question.

How about you, are you living the life you want to live?

I overheard this 'Yoga with Adriene' admonition this morning: "Trust you have everything you need — don’t decide where it ends."

Obviously, put together, there are lots of directions to potentially unpack here.

And then, on my way to work, I heard the NRP Tiny Desk rendition of Philharmonik's "What's It All Mean?" which, among other things, at least got me moving:

One version of the question above is about the age old grass-is-always-greener-on-the-other-side trope.  It tends to reflect a pattern of thinking or feeling that we can often fall into.  The common lesson there is that, often, whatever is better about the greener grass isn't always better.  In fact, it can often be the case that it really isn't better over there than it is right here.  It just looks better, for some reason.

But, can I really trust that Adriene's assertion is true, that I have everything I need?  Maybe not everything I want, but everything I need.  For some reason, we don't really like the effort involved with distinguishing between the two, do we?  We too often just don't want to think about it.  We just want what we want and live in that zone, not really addressing what all is going on.

Maybe we're just too lazy.  Or, perhaps, we're in an effect of trauma.  Most of the time, it's something in between that keeps us to asleep to the kind of work that is needed.  To asking questions like, how fulfilling is the everything I want, relative to what I really need or…what's it all mean?

We can smile and relax.  Everything we want is right here in the present moment.

-- Thich Nhat Hanh

LT: Lead Yourself

Lead yourself, and then you can lead others. And if you're going to lead yourself, you better know yourself. If you're going to know yourself, you better know your strengths and weaknesses.

-- Arthur C. Brooks

A Way That You Live

I’m wondering…if humility is as much a way that you live, as it is a state of mind and spirit.

Wisdom Begins in Wonder

In Honor of Good Mothers

Our moms are troves of wisdom — and we can all learn from them:

"My mother taught me that it is never too late to change your opinion and always to be thoughtful about the world around me." 

-- Amy P., Eaton Rapids, Michigan

"Don't judge others. Never consider yourself better than anyone else, and don't assume you know what they've been through — you don't." 

-- Mary Ann T., Santa Monica, California

"Respect everyone's independence and intelligence — even children." 

-- Mitchell T., Winston-Salem, North Carolina

Continue here.... 

Among other things, I often see mothers (including my wife, kids and their spouses) wonderfully desiring and creating opportunities for a sense of being home.  The practice in this meditation well describes the power of doing so here....

And then, there's this beautifully poetic version of the intersection of motherhood and the wisdom and beauty of its earthiness.

Immigration Concerns & Housing Inventory Shifts

 GALLUP - Front Page

FASTCOMPANY

3 Observations & A Question

There are things that we simply need to learn over and over — perhaps this is not so much indictment as wisdom.

Sometimes we really have to consider (if not address) what things keep us asleep to a lot of life.

We have to set aside the time to identify the sacred around and within us.

When is the last time you actively considered that there is more than one perspective (yours or mine) that is legitimate?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question….

On the Lighter Side: Body by Brisket

On the Lighter Side:

Wits

The universe is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.

-- Eden Phillpotts

Baking Bread & Tending Flowers

How much more wisdom is there than that gained from baking bread and tending flowers?

Just throwing that out there....

Of course, there is probably a little more involved.  Wisdom, after all, often seems a little more targeted at how to navigate things — what to do, dealing with people, meaning of life...to name a few.

But, what is needed even for those things might likely be addressed by the hands-on learning we gain from rather simple things...like learning how to bake bread and fostering beauty.

After all, at a most basic level, what beyond daily sustenance and enjoyment really is there (besides tragedy, suffering, existential threat, etc.)?

The baking of bread is a simple and mysterious example of such things. Comprised of the most basic elements of life (water, flour, heat), it is a rather smirking example of non-complexity, at least in terms of ingredients. And, yet, something else is involved that is often nothing short of confounding, until you've understand the dynamics (beyond the ingredients) involved. In a rather fascinating way, they even require a kind of submission to effectively cooperate with them.

Which then leads to a kind of enjoyment that seems to nearly touch the most basic elements of our existence — our need for daily sustenance and our ability to relish something like flavor and texture so deeply that groans are about the only means of adequately expressing our enjoyment of it. Fresh baked bread is pretty close to the top of nearly everyone's best-thing-ever list.

And, then, there's flowers.

Even though there are some pretty basic scientific explanations involved for their effective contribution to a variety of eco-systems, there is also something about flowers that seems extravagant — bordering on wastefully so. Whether it be color, shape, aroma (though some actually can be pretty stinky...or so it seems to us), the way they collect themselves, the seasonality of their unveiling...their list of wonders is also breathtakingly endless. They are a marvel, not only individually, but also collectively. They co-exist with many things almost as if they don't care. Delicate, vulnerable, and resilient all at the same time — they also seem to respond to care, either from that of their environment or the gentleness of human touch. Few can withstand blunt-force trauma (at least in the moment) and they also can merely cease to exist in an environment that no longer supports them.

And, yet, they seem at times larger than life itself. We can almost worship them (or use them to worship something — or someone — else). We have much to learn from the combination of forces surrounding the beauty of flowers — both from a how-to-cultivate perspective to a how-to-let-them-be perspective. They, too, require something from us...for us to truly enjoy them for what they are. In other words, it takes a wisdom to work with and relate to them. And their reciprocity is, at times, more than we could ever have imagined.

And, so, the dynamics involved with both baking bread and tending flowers enable our tangible participation and wider understanding. Sure we can just hastily grab a loaf at the store or mow everything down (flowers included) with our lawn mowers as we rush to get the yardwork done. Or (should we choose to truly engage them), these can be the very teachers we learn from about the depth and range of the goodness that surrounds our lives as they provide us opportunities for wisdom about the whats, hows, and whys of much of life itself.

Being Human

Being human takes practice and hard work. Being inhuman, unfortunately, comes all too easy.

-- Simon Sinek

How You Feel Changes

Ever noticed...how much how you feel about yourself (and life) can change over the course of just one day (not to mention, how variable it is from day to day)?

Walking Away From Christianity

The vast majority of people walking away from Christianity in America are not rejecting the person and work of Jesus.  They are rejecting faulty biblical interpretations that lead to bigoty, oppression, and marginalization.  This rejection isn't unchristian.  It is Christlike.

-- Zach Lambert

4 Observations (from Others)

Long-term thinking eliminates a lot of poor behavior.

-- Shane Parrish

When my ego recedes, there’s more room for God.

-- Tony Jones

One’s destination is never a place, but rather a new way of looking at things.

-- Henry Miller

We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise we harden.

-- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Prior 4 Observations (from Others).

Let's make a toast to the ways you keep calm and carry on

Your breakfast toast is not just a carb. It can be an inspiration.

The impetus for this callout came from an article we published earlier this month. We asked some of the attendees at the Skoll World Forum, dedicated to "accelerat[ing] innovative solutions," what they do to "keep calm and carry on" when things get tough.  

A grandmother's advice: 'Listen more, talk less'

Karen Lembo of Morristown, New Jersey, writes: "I try, very hard, to stay curious about people. It is not easy, and it is coming to me much too late in life, but I 'listen more, talk less.' My beloved grandmother, Nana Rete, would quote 'God gave you two ears but only one mouth for a good reason, Karen.' It took me years, but gosh I see how much more I learn daily by asking questions and then listening, REALLY listening."

Lembo adds, "I keep calm by staying close to my grandchildren — their wisdom, joy, humor, love and kindness knows no bounds."

Continue here....

-- Marc Silver

We Suffer More

We suffer more often in imagination than in reality.

-- Seneca

Joy - Where Do You Find It?

Where do you find joy?

One aspect of joy often seems to be that it includes an element of surprise.  We weren't expecting it and...it happened.  Perhaps, this is common when we have given up hope about something and then it happens and what we feel is a sudden kind of...joy.  What we had hoped for did happen after all.  Or, maybe it is a reflection of what we feel when something even better than we hoped for...happens.

But, while this seems like a fairly accurate description of how we often experience joy, I'm not sure it is the only way we do...or could.

What if joy is something we need to seek out?  Like, perhaps, we don't have to leave it exclusively to surprise.

Like with many things, it seems that how we have arranged and live our lives significantly impacts the quality of our existence.  If we do things that are harmful (to ourselves or whoever or whatever is around us), we reduce our capacity to experience what is good.  Likewise, when put or keep ourselves in a position to experience what is good, we often do so.  There seems to be a spiral-effect involved, in either direction.

Joy, it would seem to me, operates consistently with this dynamic.  If I put myself in contexts where good things can happen, the opportunity for me to experience joy goes up.  The opposite also seems true.

We often think that things like joy should be constant and over-the-top.  But, few things are really like either of those.  More often, it seems, the best things live among the smallest and (seemingly) most insignificant things in life.  And, perhaps, they are found most by the way we dwell with those kinds of things.

And, so, I'm thinking that joy is among the wonderfully inconspicuous things that we find when we're most in a position to notice them.  Not (at least too often) when we're in a hurry, rushing everywhere, or when we're trying to manage our stress with the many harmful things our society offers us to avoid them.  Perhaps, it is when we commit ourselves to simple ways of living, making enough room to discover something already around us that is good for us, that we find valuable things...like joy.

Where do you find joy?