When our joy becomes a toxin to a friend, their sorrow can become toxic to us. A good friend will then walk away for a time.

When our joy becomes a toxin to a friend, their sorrow can become toxic to us. A good friend will then walk away for a time.

Social activities are important, but not if they are simply filler for an empty life.
Caution is great but if you are always looking at your feet you will miss the beauty of the world around you.
Self-improvement is not always about making ourselves better.
Rather, it can be about making ourselves feel better.
I am learning how to not be okay all the time.
Others do not get to dictate how long or how much a person feels sad, lonely, hurt, or frail. They do not get to silence one’s feelings.
Learning to shed the criticisms and the expectations of others is not easy. Learning that feeling and expressing life’s sadness as well as life’s joys does not make one weak.
It is okay to be something other than okay.
Life is tough, even a good life, even a blessed life. It not weakness to feel frail, tired, and hurt. It is not weakness to get frustrated and angry. It is only weakness when those emotions dominate one’s life.
Our testimony is like the wheat that is the essence of out bread, it need to be replenished every season.

An empty nest is only the beginning of grand new adventures, even if the mother bird stays close to home.

It requires more than just voting in order to practice informed citizenship. You cannot only tune-in every 2-4 years and hope that you’ll have more than a narrow understanding of the issues.
The world is complex and deferring your civic responsibility to others isn’t going to make you satisfied with the actions of the government.
You might not be a bad citizen if this is what you choose to do, but you won’t be an informed citizen.

The human story that shreds the heart of so many, also seems to bring out the vile ugliness of others.
When people feel a burning need to promote and protect themselves at the expense of another, we see the ugly nature of humanity in its fullness. Turning away from this ugly sight does not absolve one from its contaminants. Like an insidious disease, you either fight it or succumb to it, you do not simply ignore it hoping it will go away.
In a politically charged environment, remaining silent can be just as politically volatile as voicing an opinion. Therefore, it is better to stand and be counted rather than hide behind silence.