I’m still thinking about consequences, bottom lines, and legacies [See: The Bottom Line from last week]…and (not surprisingly) that leads me to think about personas. What are the stories I tell about myself that have led me to a personal image that my family and friends, my colleagues and mentors would recognize as ‘Andrea’? What …
We stand on the cusp of a new year. I don’t know about you, but I am getting tired of new years that look just like the old year(s) except more so. Maybe it is time to ask some hard, life-challenging questions. For instance: Am I content to keep re-enacting past behaviors and relationship patterns? …
I saw the video in a hotel room in Council Bluffs. My husband follows news with an enthusiasm I have long since lost, so I was puttering around trying to arrange things without actually unpacking anything – not a surprise for those of you who followed my posts on sabbatical. The announcer’s voice took on …
Spoiler Alert: On Wednesday, I was feeling tender and pastoral and the blog that day reflected that. Today I am cranky and channeling one of the Hebrew prophets…so read further at your own risk. I would like to suggest in the strongest possible terms without actually resorting to profanity that any- and everyone of us …
First: A very happy birthday to my brother…who is leaning forward into a new year today. I don’t know about you, but I tend to approach thresholds with many surreptitious glances over my shoulder…sometimes walking backwards into the doorframe in the process. Over my life, as I have prepared to transition from one role to …
…and time. When emergency medical technicians or paramedics respond to the scene of an accident, one of the first things they do with the accident victims is to ask them a series of questions to ascertain whether they are still in touch with reality. The term that is used is “oriented times three.” A person …
In past years, when I was actually tending a sizable (physical) garden, I would spend weeks carefully selecting what I wanted to grow. I would place my orders and eagerly start my seed flats. I would get a jump on the season by turning over the soil, turning under the winter compost. Then I would …
In the autumn of 1986, I was given one of the most important gifts of my life. By a strange confluence of events in the lives of several other people, I was invited to serve on an international ecumenical consultation that changed the heart of ecumenical dialogue around the world…and that changed the whole structure and …
A couple of days ago, when I started writing this, if I had stepped outside, I would have been standing up to my armpits in snow with more falling by the minute (I am in Massachusetts, not Colorado)…so the idea of preparing the ground for planting literal seeds from which I expect to reap kale …
In the Myers-Briggs typology, I am an INTJ. And I am really an INTJ. With the exception of the “T – F” continuum, I am way out on the edges of the scale – sometimes clinging by my fingernails to keep from falling off. Now, if you know nothing about the Myers-Briggs self-assessment scale, this …