Cre-ate• verb: to produce something new by using your talents and imagination. Today I invite you to look at the other half of the A in MAPS—an acronym to help us remember how to nurture ourselves. Have you ever noticed how the letter A has two sides? We’ll call those two sides Academic and Artistic. Notice how both sides start at the same point and have a bridge in between them? Just like the letter A, we each have two…
Sto-ry • noun: an account of incidents or events We can nurture ourselves through story—both by sharing our story and listening to other people’s stories. Find Your Pod, Tell Your Story The captain of the whale-watching tour ship called out over the loudspeakers, “Look to nine o’clock and you’ll see a bottlenose dolphin!” The passengers rushed to the port side and crowded eagerly around the railing. “Do you see it?” I asked one of my students. “Over dere,” he said,…
A Must-Have Book if You Want to Understand If you’ve never read The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie, go buy a copy and read it. You’ll understand the word support if you do. You’ll understand a hugely underrepresented and misunderstood slice of the population by the time you reach the last page. I read the book (along with Navajos Wear Nikes: A Reservation Story by Jim Kristofic) before I interviewed for my current job. I…
Work and Junk for Jesus I work at a mission school—in the United States. Three-fourths of our budget comes from generous donors who believe in what we do to bring hope and healing to Native American young people. Occasionally, though, we have to deal with Junk for Jesus. A friend of mine who worked at a hospital in Haiti for two years shared the term with me a few years ago as we compared mission stories. “When we arrived, they…
To Guide or to Raise, that is the Question I used to think that my husband and I would ‘raise’ our children. As if they had tender shoots and fragile roots and would produce a crop one day. We took a parenting class. I read books and prayed a lot. I learned to mean what I said, and not make threats I didn’t want to carry out. Parenting did not come easy for me. Raising kids required much more than…
Finding My Place at the Five-Minute Friday Retreat I sniffed my pits before closing my car door and heading towards the place where we would register. I shrugged. Without facing the registration process, I wouldn’t receive a room key for the retreat. And until I had that room key in my hot and sweaty hand, I couldn’t shower. I’d have to go in smelling slightly ripe, covered in grime (birding is dirty business), and wild-haired. Once again, I found myself…
A Journey to Inspire Me The boat rocked back and forth as it rose and fell with the swells of the ocean. The deep blue of the water vied with the sky for my attention. On the horizon, thunderheads piled up between us and the receding shore line. I couldn’t wait to discover the secrets of the open ocean and let them inspire me in some creative way. The hot wind whipped my curls into my eyes. I didn’t bother…
Comfort, the Verb I step around the counter into my daughter’s kitchen and start fixing breakfast. A minute or two later, I hear an inquisitive “Bah?” from the living room. “Bah!” I answer. “Ahw!” The thunks of hands and knees on the wood floor increase in pace as Abel uses ‘echolocation’ to find me. I glance over and see his strawberry-blonde curls. His head bends down in concentration as he crawls into the kitchen, sits up, and turns in a…
How to Play with a Baby “What happened to your knee?” my daughter Laura asked. I glanced down and noticed a red, raw spot on my left knee. “Carpet burn, I guess,” I answered with a shrug. “Abel and I have been racing up and down the hallway.” “Oh, you poor thing!” “Naw,” I replied, “anything to hear his cackle!” Therein lies the truth. I’ll do anything to get a two-toothed grin, a chortle, or a cackle out of my…
Confession Time In the effort to practice full disclosure, you should know that I think of myself as a rather selfish person. I get single-minded in my plans and goals. Often, I only want to do something if I can see how it will benefit me in some way. I worry more about the blessing I might receive than blessing other people by showing up. I don’t enjoy visiting extended family members because I can only see the negative: The…
