Insidious Adaptation

My body may be sick, but my soul, she is weary. It is the man inside that has been sick my entire life, My. Entire. Life. The word MY cannot be acknowledged there enough, for it is my life right? Me! The problem with sickness isn't the sickness itself, for whether it is a cold, flue, stomach bug, depression, anxiety, these reactions and ways we interpret them are neither good nor bad, but just are, yet, we submit. WE submit to the flu and gather around those who have it, comforting, loving them, "say prayers," and all rightly so, for the, "flu" as we know it to be does have the potential to hospitalize or kill a person as the media likes to give their annual account of flu-related deaths. The, "flu" or a, "cold" seem to be these underlying spirits that promote fear and hyper-cleansing. Yet, then there are "superbugs" that evolve from such hyper-sanitary areas making us sicker than ever, maybe by resistant strains of the sickne...

“and said, “I tell you the truth, unless you turn around and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven!” Matthew 18:3 NET The innocent unwrapping of pretty paper. The adults patting themselves on the back as what lay beneath a tree a bounty a plenty. We are good parents, for we provided these extras. We may secretly compare with others and what they have, we my have held on a little too tightly to the shopping this year, spent a bit much, been carried away with elation. For this too shall pass.  Tomorrow is December 26th and the reminders of what we aught to do shine as bright as the bulbs do on this Christmas morning. We are called to be consistent us adults, yet, we show children emotional doing by overdoing, and overreacting, we are at times their biggest stumbling blocks. Children’s minds are infinite in possibilities. Like Jesus, Immanuel, How numerous are his ways. The mind of a child submits eas...

Before we can celebrate the holidays a significant truth must be acknowledged:  11  Then I saw a great white throne  and him who was seated on it. The earth and the heavens fled from his presence,  and there was no place for them.   12  And I saw the dead, great and small,  standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life.  The dead were judged  according to what they had done  as recorded in the books.   13  The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades  gave up the dead  that were in them, and each person was judged according to what they had done.   14  Then death  and Hades  were thrown into the lake of fire.  The lake of fire is the second death. 15  Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life  was thrown into the lake of fire.- Revelations 20:11-15.  It gets worse, if of course you are...

With a new book in the works (for there is always a new book in the works) editing has taken over my free time. What this leaves is scraps of time, like pieces of bread, unworthy of your time, your clicks, your thumbs up. So I will make this brief. “Instead, be kind to one another, compassionate, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ also forgave you.”   Ephesians 4:32 NET This the premise, turn around now if you took a wrong turn.  Where this road goes is nowhere but within, you get to indulge a little self-idolatry here. Not the kind you want, but even an anti-hero gets to have a movie every now  and  then.   This  one is obvious, or at least should be. Yet, somehow what gets lost in translation is our part in the matter. What have we done, or not done, to allow ourselves to get stuck in  such   debacle ?  Why  are we forever caught in this limbo of things being good to not good enough, satisfied to  disc...

On the eve of a midterm election, one that my wife and I as average American citizens must admit to being of more importance than past elections, I must say, even with rising tensions, I see good things. The, "good" as I mention is not in how we traditionally, see, "good" or pleasurable, but "good" like heat to cow's milk makes the cream rise to the top. When things that are good, bad, indifferent, or effective, ineffective, or merely existing, they can sit, stagnant, never forced to grow, never encouraged to bring about strengths. As a therapist to war veterans, I find it fascinating that many of our nation's toughest struggle with daily life. They receive the diagnosis of PTSD, and take medications, or use some other method to "manage" themselves because war experiences have forever altered their mind, making them a, less-valuable commodity in the job market, if they are able to get a job at all. After all, when a business in Americ...

For one to, "lose weight," one has to place the body in what "experts" call a caloric deficit.  "Experts" are  people who has a comprehensive and authoritative knowledge of or skill in a particular area. "Knowledge" is  information, and skills acquired by a person through experience or education; the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject. "Understanding of a subject...."  The rabbit hole goes deep, for one can eventually dig to a basis they can question and therefore erode the basic foundation on which one believes. Unlike weight loss, which isn't actually understood by anyone, there are other, more prominent facts in the world that do require understanding.  Jesus for one.  For two, Halloween Candy.  Yes, Halloween Candy, has little to do with weight loss and even less to do with Jesus, right? I mean, Halloween itself, has some believe is the promotion of demons or satanic rituals. All Hallows' ev...

"Trick or Treat." "Yes, good, say that. We knock and we say that." My coaching is weak, I don't think I ever said "trick or treat" when I was a kid, probably just a "hello." But us fathers want our children to be better than us right? So, the follow through, the delivery, that is what has to happen here. Let's see if she sticks the landing. ... "Look at them run up there." A few houses in and a neighbor and new friend of our daughters are together, no longer needing an adult to guide, but convince each other this is safe, this is what we do. "Did you say thank you?" I ask my daughter, "Thank you." She says to a now-shut door. "Sweetheart, let's say thank you to them." "Ok." The walk from one house to the next started slow, apprehensive, turned into a slight jog for the children, then a run from the house almost going into the street. A few falls, a couple crash...