The more kids, the harder it is to keep the house clean. When you live in areas with Western levels of prosperity, there’s a lot of crap for kids to make a mess with! So to have more than a couple of kids, either you have to be a super organizer or you have a very high tolerance for mess. Or I suppose you could … Continue reading The real reason prosperous humans have fewer kids
– Paul to the Phillipians Life is stressful. Remembering to pray is hard. So, some years ago, I read this verse and decided to kill 2 birds with one stone. From that point on, I decided, being anxious or worried would be the universe’s cue for me to check in with the divine (you know – pray). Sometimes the prayer was just a “hey – … Continue reading Anxiety -> Prayer -> Peace
Being forgiven = Freedom Forgiving = Freedom Pick a day this week to deliberately forgive anything and everything that bugs you. Traffic? “I forgive you idiots for being in my way. I forgive the morons who designed the road system while under the influence of socialist drug addicts during their brutalist period. I forgive my brakes for screetching.” (FYI – Name calling is tolerated, but … Continue reading Practice Forgiveness Day!
It’s hard to enjoy your life if you are not really there for it. “I am.” -God “Be Present” is one of those great spiritual truths like Love, Peace an Compassion. I’m sure books have been written on why this is so, but so far the teaching of it has been lax at best. And no matter how much people on TV swear by it, … Continue reading Pay your body a visit!
Want to drive yourself crazy? Do what I do: have a set of kids, wait 5 or 6 years and have another set. Try to figure out if you screwed up the first set so you can better parent the second set. It’s a terrible pastime, really; going back and revisiting every parenting decision you made along the way to try to judge the outcomes. … Continue reading Mom’s Going Crazy Recipe
Here’s a question for you parents: your kid does something boneheaded. It wasn’t necessarily intentional, but it was entirely preventable. You discuss with him what went wrong and what needs to be done about it. At the end of the conversation the kid asks, “are you angry with me?” What’s your answer? Is there a place in parenting for holding anger over our kid’s head? … Continue reading Question for Parents: “Are you angry?”
I would quit I have tried to quit But it seems that I don’t know how There is no window to submit your paperwork to Or voicemail to leave a message on late at night. You cannot march into God’s office To announce your departure face-to-face He will not reply, “I hate to see you go.” No matter how hard I try to quit The … Continue reading The Quitter
Once there was a climber who set out to climb a mountain. The word from those who had gone before was that the guru at the top of the mountain was God himself and that the closer you got to the summit, the more spectacular the views and the more satisfied your soul became. At the bottom of the mountain, there were many paths to … Continue reading Mountain Climbing
It’s a very long story how it all came to be this way, but I am having the odd experience of raising a 16 year old and a 1 year old at the same time. I say odd not so much because it’s that unusual. But often I feel like I’m starting to get a sense of what sort of person my oldest son is turning out to be and … Continue reading Is it my fault he smells like cumin? Thoughts on parenthood
It has long been a practice among those who want to learn how to pray to pray a psalm each day – preferably by starting at the front and working through them in order. When you do this, you find that some days the psalm speaks to you and some days you are praying someone else’s prayer. Which is as it should be. The point … Continue reading I asked God to hit my husband with a bus
The Upside Down World 