Well, I hope you have already gotten some helpful insight into some places to bring more peace into your life this week. Today I want to share one of my very favorites. As with all the other practices on my list, this one adds up slowly to a wonderful cumulative Read more…
It’s time for installment number three in this 10 part series of proven ways to increase your peace. Let me just be really open with you right here. Today’s path to peace is hands-down the most difficult one for me to consistently implement. And yet, it is one of the Read more…
Yesterday, I began a series of 10 proven ways to increase your peace. As promised, here is a second clear way to nurture a life of greater serenity and calm. 2. Take time to calm down before trying to “correct” anyone. This includes your children, your spouse (use caution correcting Read more…
If you are anything like me, you want peace in your life. You probably want as much of it as you can get a hold of. Let’s face it. Life has a way of throwing a lot of potentially stressful stuff at us. Like you need me to tell you Read more…
I haven’t stepped on the scale for a while, probably a couple months or so. No big deal. Surely I’m just holding at the same weight. Maybe even slowly shedding a pound or two along the way. After all, I really want to lose about 30 pounds, so surely that Read more…
My thanks to a client who shared this article link with me today. It is a Newsweek interview with Dr. Rachel Remen, who talks about the power of asking “What matters?” and seeking renewal through purposeful living, rather than seeking comfort through distraction and numbing. The brief article is well Read more…
This will be a very short post, but will serve as a prelude to much more to follow in the coming months. At the recommendation of a dear friend and trusted spiritual director, I am currently reading a phenomenally insightful book that has me feeling like Neo reeling in the Read more…
In the spirit of Mardi Gras, I’m reposting my thoughts from the St. Patrick’s Day parade from last year. People seemed to enjoy reading this one, and I’ve got quite a few newcomers to the site since then. To update the following post to Mardi Gras ’08, simply delete the “Emerald City” comment, change “Cajun/Irish” to “Cajun/French/Catholic,” and picture me and my family skipping the parades altogether to simply stay home and enjoy the good times without the beads, beer, and rowdiness. OK, there is still plenty of rowdiness at our house, but it isn’t nearly so loud or drunken. Laissez les bon temp roulet! (That’s “Let the good times roll” for all you folks outside Cajun Country.)
“Plastic and Beer”
I write this post on St. Patrick’s Day, after having spent the morning with my family at my first ever parade in Baton Rouge. While I had never really heard much about the St. Patty’s Day parade, I’ve heard about the legendary Mardi Gras parades of South Louisiana for years. From what I could tell, this was pretty much the same thing – but with cheaper floats and the crowd looking like they just stepped out of the Emerald City. As I stood there on Perkins Road with my family, taking it all in, I tried to figure out what was really the point of it all. And I think the main point was this:
People were looking to have a good time. In South Louisiana, good times are never far away as long as there is plenty of beer and beads. And both were in abundance in Baton Rouge today. In the midst of this Cajun/Irish festival, I realized several things:
Our hearts are so easily captured. Put a few guys and gals on a trailer with some loud music and cheap plastic beads and other assorted junk, and our hearts suddenly become convinced that catching this stuff is the most important thing in the world. I wish I could say I did not give in to this bead-snagging impulse. But the truth is, (more…)
It has been almost a full three weeks since my last post. As I was reflecting on why this is, it occurred to me. My life has been really full. Not in a frantic, can’t slow down, can’t catch up, I’m running ragged and feeling frazzled kind of way. Full, Read more…
My post on this Friday is a short one. I am preparing to take what has become a semi-annual trip with my wife to the Parish Hermitage in St. Amant, LA. Sometimes we have “issues” to work on. This one was planned around our 11 year wedding anniversary – no Read more…