Tag Archives: pain

Including Lost Loved Ones In Your Holiday Celebration

Losing a loved one hurts a lot. It’s a pain that never really goes away, it just becomes a little more bearable as time goes on. And while I am grateful that my religious beliefs are that we will see our loved ones again someday in the eternities, there is still the hurts of missing […]

Hard Times Lead Us To Question

When good people pass away it can cause those left behind to start questioning things – Why did this good person with so much to live for have to be taken too soon?  Why would a loving God take them from us when they are so needed by so many here?  What good purpose does […]

To Fathers, Grandfathers, And All Those Men Who’ve Influenced Our Lives For The Better

This Sunday is Father’s Day and the subject of fathers is one that is incredibly near and dear to my heart today for several reasons.  One of those reasons is that my father-in-law is struggling still. He had his surgery last week but the nerve and muscle pain down his leg still hasn’t let up […]

There Can Be Miracles When You Believe

Some days we really need to hear this particular song…today would be one of those days…  Its worth your time to have a listen: Or at a minimum read the lyrics:   Many nights we prayedWith no proof anyone could hearIn our hearts a hope for a songWe barely understood Now we are not afraidAlthough […]

Watching Someone You Love Suffer

“Watching someone you love suffer can teach you even more than suffering yourself can.” -Dodie Smith It is so difficult to watch someone you love suffer. You would give anything to help take their pain away, yet there is only so much you can do. First you focus on the logistical things you can do…drive […]

Trials Are Empowering

“Have you ever gone through something difficult and that experience allowed you to empathize with friends or even strangers who were facing a similar challenge? Or have you seen others experience sorrow from difficult circumstances and turn their pain into a moving, empowering cause? The trials we face allow us to develop compassion for others […]

Challenges Change Us

“You cannot stay on the summit forever; you have to come down again… So why bother in the first place? Just this: what is above knows what is below, but what is below does not know what is above… One climbs, one sees. One descends, one sees no longer, but one has seen. There is […]

Ten Rules For The Good

Starting off any new week,  it’s always good to have a really good motivational poem or quote that can help put things into perspective and motivate you to want to be better.  A perfect example of one that works well for any given week is these ten rules written by Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson’s Ten […]

When We’ll Know That We Knew What Love Was

My daughter Ashley wrote a great guest blog for me last week about how her definition of love is growing as she comes to understand more about what love and marriage are all about. Reading her post I couldn’t help but thing about how my own definition of love has grown tremendously over the years […]

Learning From Others Mistakes Is A Great Way To Save Yourself A Whole Lot Of Time, Money, And Pain

“Don’t touch that hot stove – you’ll burn yourself.” We’ve all heard that advice before. Some of us headed the advice and some of us didn’t. Those who did were able to avoid a painful burn and its subsequent scarring, and those who didn’t…well, we all know what happened to them. They learned the hard way. […]

Have you cheated the man in the glass?

When you get what you want in your struggle for self And the world makes you king for a day, Just go to the mirror and look at yourself  And see what “the man” has to say. For it isn’t your father or mother or wife Whose judgment upon you must pass. The fellow whose […]

Creating A Day Worth Living

Life can sometimes seem ridiculously complicated. And trying to find peace amidst the chaos day to day often feels a bit impossible. So what makes for a peaceful day? If the only way to have a peaceful day is to have a day where everything goes perfectly then the chance of us ever having a […]

The safest road to Hell is the gradual one

“Indeed, the safest road to Hell is the gradual one—the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.” – C. S. Lewis There are so many ways to off-track in life, and so many of them happen through a series of poor smaller choices that end up leading to big mistakes, but […]

Strength comes from overcoming obstacles

There are a lot of times in life we question why we have to go through really hard times. Years ago someone shared this story with me. I have probably shared this before with all of you but it just seemed like it was worth sharing it again today: Parable of the Butterfly A man […]

“Growing from our past is productive…attempting to live there isn’t.”

When we lose something in life, such as losing a job or losing a relationship, we run the real risk of getting stuck. Stuck looking back at what we had, stuck overanalyzing why we lost it, and stuck feeling sad about it being gone. If we allow ourselves to get stuck spending all of our […]

If you want a thing bad enough

If you want a thing bad enough To go out and fight for it, Work day and night for it, Give up your time and your peace and your sleep for it; If only desire of it Makes your aim strong enough Never to tire of it, If life seems all empty and useless without […]

Some days you gotta just push through it

Yesterday morning when I woke up I could tell I was starting to feel a little sick but I had so much going on yesterday that I tried to ignore it and I was able to get through hosting my son’s big event at our house Sunday night. Then I woke up this morning and […]

Life Is Life A Roller Coaster.

“Life is like a roller coaster. It has its ups and downs. But it’s your choice to scream or enjoy the ride.” That quote is great because it makes it so easy to visualize what it is saying. Yes life is indeed like being on a roller coaster. We can’t control the ups and downs […]

Don’t Forget To Laugh!

“Laughter is one of the most amazing things in life. It is more contagious that any disease and it brings people together very quickly. Not only does it spread like wildfire, it is proven that laughter can have a positive effect on your body as well as your mind.“ It is really easy to get […]

Someday We’ll All Have Perfect Wings

I would guess most of us have either heard of or seen the bumper stickers which read, “Mean People Suck”. I happen to agree with that sentiment. When someone treats another person mean I really struggle with it. When I hear stories of bullying in our young people, or see people taking pot shots, or […]

A Laugh A Day Keeps the Doctor Away

We’ve all heard the saying that Laughter is the Best Medicine, so when I came home from work tonight feeling a cold starting to come on I decided I needed to do two things: 1. Drink some Nyquil, and 2. find some funny quotes to make me laugh. I don’t think anyone who has ever […]

Accepting That You’re Perfectly Imperfect (Forbes Article)

I’ve learned many lessons through my years of leading a company, but without question, the most surprising thing I learned was this: The thing you can do that will make you the strongest, is the thing that is most counter-intuitive to do: Be openly vulnerable. I am sure many of you are scratching your head […]

Do It In Memory Of

For many people the holiday season is the happiest time of year, but for many people who have lost someone they love to death it can also be an incredibly difficult time of year. I was reminded of this over the last several days as a dear friend of mine lost his father and then […]

“A place for everything and everything in its place” -Ben Franklin

Today’s advice:  Organize your life BEFORE you move!  Oh my goodness how I wish I would have done just that!  I wish I would have had the time to organize my life before I had to move into a new home.  I have lived in my current home for around 15 years and it is […]

Being kind is a scientifically proven way to improve your spirits

Being kind is a scientifically proven way to improve your spirits – kindness is a natural antidepressant. So if you want to feel instantly better about yourself and change any negative feelings to positive ones, all you need to do is be kind to another human being. In a scientific study they found that when […]

Things Work Out

Things Work Out                                                   -By Edgar A. Guest  Because it rains when we wish it wouldn’t, Because men do what they often shouldn’t, Because crops fail, and plans go wrong Some of us grumble all day long. But somehow, in spite of the care and doubt, It seems at last that things work out.   […]

Why?

This past week my cousin returned from a 20 month stint working in Afghanistan to come home to his beautiful family that lives on the east coast.  His wife and their nine children had been anticipating his return with such excitement.  I noticed his wife posted a darling message on her Facebook page last week […]

Make The Best Of The Way Things Turn Out

As I sit here at the hospital tonight, following my daughters second ACL surgery that took place earlier today, I am trying to reflect on what lessons I have learned in my life today so I can share those thoughts with all of you.  It’s funny how just sitting around in a hospital waiting room […]