So I was visiting by chiropractor getting a much needed crack when she asked me a question: What do you remember about your dad? With Father’s Day coming up (today actually) I’d heard conversations about fathers more than usual the past couple of days.

I was laying on my stomach, my head in the headrest of the table I was on, a big smile on my face and eyes getting misty. My fathers is much loved (I say “is” because I don’t think you stop loving someone even when they’re dead) by many people, especially his three sons.

As the eldest of three sons my experience with my father was quite different than my brother three years younger and dramatically different that my brother seven years younger.

First, I’m named after my dad, which carries with it a responsibility that most kids never experience. It’s not easy. You’re inextricably linked forever, no matter what.

Second, my father was parochial school principal and elementary school teacher in small rural communities in the upper Midwest and Northern California. That meant that he was my principal for eight years and my teacher for six of those eight years. I could write a whole essay on how tough this experience was, but I could also add a lot of great things too. My father played a HUGE part in my childhood as a result. For that I’ll be eternally grateful.

My father also introduced me to history. I’ve always enjoyed reading and by the third grade I’d run out of books to read in my age group. I went to my father asking for something new. He had me follow him to his small library of books, many of them were his history books from college. The first book he handed me was his World History textbook, probably about 700 pages or so and weighing a lot. I imagine that he thought this would keep me occupied for a long time. It did, until I came across a word that I didn’t understand. I carried the big book back to him, pointed to the word I didn’t understand and said, “Dad, what does this word mean.” He smiled, walked over to the same small library, pulled a Webster’s Dictionary off the shelf, handed it to me and said “here’s a book with words that tells you what they mean. Look up every word you don’t understand in this dictionary.” As I lugged these two big books back to my room I wondered why he didn’t just tell me what the word meant. I soon learned the expanse of the English language and my vocabulary grew.

I have millions of memories of my father over the years. During my 44th year he passed away, roughly three weeks after his final Father’s Day while alive. During that day we spent a lot of time together. He was in a rehab hospital following surgery on his spine to remove tumors that were causing tremendous pain. His cancer was spreading through his body at a ferocious pace, leaving no doubt, that short of a miracle, this would his last holiday commemorating him.

We shared a lot of memories that day. We laughed and cried together. I held his hand as he was racked with pain. Because he was too weak to help himself, I fed him. The roles had reversed and I was proud to be there for him like he was for me when I was a baby/toddler/child.

Three weeks later he was gone.

It’s been thirteen years since that last Father’s Day with my dad. He was a great father. Deeply flawed, a romantic, loved history, wonderful teacher, filled with grace, slow to anger (but when his anger was triggered, watch out!), constantly curious, loved reading aloud to his sons, enabled by mother, resourceful, insane work ethic, loved God deeply, and was kind.

I could go on and on.

He profoundly shaped who I am today, but was profoundly impacted by how he was raised. His parenting style was very hard and professorial and less a coach or mentor. His style was deeply influenced by his wife, my mother, a deeply narcissistic person. Knowing all of this I give him a lot of grace and empathy for him as he navigated his circumstances. I used to be quite judgmental about his choices, but as I get older I understand that judgement comes from arrogance and not love.

Was my dad the greatest?

Yes!

Happy Father’s Day dad!

As a Gen X’er music was an important part of my life. For me memories are tied to different songs. I will hear the opening of DON’T STOP BELIEVIN’ today and reach to crank the volume to the annoyance of my Gen Z child.

I genuinely appreciate most types of music genres: country, blues, jazz, classical, hard rock, metal, movie scores, and even alternative rock. But my favorite band overall is JOURNEY.

Music played a big part in early relationships too. In the 80’s San Francisco was a magical city to visit. The LIGHTS on the city by the bay twinkled off the water. When eating some Boudine’s sourdough bread on fisherman’s wharf you might pass a hippie tripping on acid mumbling about a ufo that looked like a WHEEL IN THE SKY.

There were always the sea lions lounging around and on top of each other, very much LOVIN’ TOUCHIN’ SQUEEZIN’ one minute and then loudly yelping the next. Inevitably I’d reply WHO’S CRYING NOW?

When I was younger I’d visit the city with my MOTHER, FATHER and two brothers. Other times I would visit with my girlfriend at the time. Like many early relationships we went our SEPARATE WAYS, our dreams were WORLDS APART. Before saying goodbye she said “BE GOOD TO YOURSELF.” At the time that didn’t hit like it would today.

WHEN YOU LOVE A WOMAN it’s hard to forget and I found myself looking into THE EYES OF A WOMAN that I missed terribly. When we met again with OPEN ARMS, ready for that body-melding hug, I felt like I was the EDGE OF THE BLADE. This was great at the moment, but I was always waiting for the next shoe to drop.

Life happens. That relationship crashed again, mostly my fault this time. I was immature, arrogant, and scared. Not the type of boyfriend that lasts long term. She deserved better.

A few years later I missed an opportunity to make amends and SEND HER MY LOVE as a friend and former romantic partner. Life has a way of grinding you down to dust, allowing you to “the joy of rediscovering” myself in some ways and creating a new self.

About four years ago I crossed the RUBICON and committed to myself to FAITHFULLY stay the course and finish this journey after my final DEPARTURE.

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A few years ago I attended a dinner party hosted by a friend named Charlie at their home. My friend is wealthy after many years as a lawyer advising Mergers and Acquisitions. The setting was beautiful. Stunning home. Landscaping was immaculate.

Valet attendant met me when I drove onto his property. That made me wonder how many guests my friend had invited. Charlie had a chef come into his home to prepare the meal. His finest china and crystal used on the dining room table.

This was my first time attending one of these parties. I’d been invited many times before, but because of travel researching for a new book or on a book tour in bookstores and podcasts. It’s not a busy life as an author of ancient history books and I’m not a NYT best seller by any means, but I’m happy. This will come up a little bit later.

As I enter the house through was resembled a medieval door (Charlie is a history buff) I was greeted by Jessica, Charlie’s wife. I hadn’t met her before, in fact this was the first time I’d met any of his wives. Jessica was bubbly, all smiles and loud words as if she was trying to fill the large foyer with energetic presence, greeting me with a distant hug and kiss.

I was nearly the last to arrive. The other guests who arrived earlier were already gathered in a room with a huge fireplace and a ceiling stretching at least 30 feet high. Scanning the room I estimated maybe ten other guests, all of them complete strangers. “Likely clients or prospective clients of Charlie’s,” I thought.

I man in his 60’s, dressed in a three piece suit noticed my arrival and walked over. “Sir, my name is Michael. Would you like your usual beverage?” My usual beverage? He could see I was confused since we’d only just met and this was my first time at Charlie’s home. “The host mentioned that you prefer sparkling water with a lime. Would you also like ice?” he replied with a bigger grin. I smiled back, nodded and said “thanks Michael.” I didn’t remember ever telling Charlie what I like to drink, but shrugged it off as maybe a good memory from the last time I was in his office getting legal advice.

Before long there was a shall bell ringing getting everyone’s attention. “Ladies and gentlemen,” Jessica said loudly. “Dinner is ready. Please follow me to the dining room.”

In an adjacent room was a table large enough to seat twenty people. It was a scene fit for royalty, each place with a name card on each plate. I was seated in the middle of the table facing toward windows that looked out on an English-styled garden. On either side of me were two strangers, Martha to my right and Gerald to my left. Across from me was a man in his 40’s, I assumed, named Chad. He was dressed expensively, a custom tailored suit, what looked to be a Swiss watch, quick smile which produced not a wrinkle anywhere on his face, and perfect teeth. To his right sat a near clone of himself and to his left sat a woman who appeared to be a female version of Chad and about 10-15 years younger. Both oddly had their seats slightly angled toward him.

I smiled to myself thinking this would be an interesting evening.

Our host sat at one end of the table and stood up, tapping his wine glass to get everyone’s attention.

“Friends, Jessica and I are thrilled all of you could attend our dinner party tonight. Some of you already know others around the table, but most don’t. So as we’re served the various courses, let’s take some time to introduce ourselves and share a short bio about who we are.”

This was going to be interesting indeed. One of the things I love about my work are the stories I read or hear.

Throughout the next hour the various guest gave everyone their name, where they live, what they do, maybe a hobby of some kind, favorite food, best travel experience, and maybe even how they know Charlie.

Almost every guest had spoken by the time we received our entrée course. “Chad, you go next,” quipped Charlie. It was clear that Chad wanted to go last, but nodded in agreement, cleared his throat and launched into his bio.

“Good evening everyone, my name is Chadwick Pembroke, I own the Private Equity fund Pembroke Sovereign Capital where we manage only generational wealth of the world’s billionaires and royal families. I founded the firm 20 years ago after some time with Goldman Sachs. I matriculated through Yale undergrad and Harvard for my MBA. I own a home on Wexford Square here in town and homes in Canne, St. Barts, and Zurich. I just took delivery of my Gulfstream 750ER that can fly nonstop nearly anywhere in the world. My passion is collecting Ferraris and frequently talk with the CEO of Ferrari on the next car. For travel I spend the winter ski season in Zermatt and the summer season I go to Big Sky Montana and rent a chalet.”

There was a smattering of applause from around the table. Chad was clearly impressed with his life and so were others who gave him their admiration.

Then all eyes turned toward me. I glanced at Charlie, his eyes twinkling wrinkled slightly with a grin. “Larry?”

“Hello everyone. My name is Laurence Temojin. I teach history at the local university here in town. I write history books on ancient history and often travel various places to research for those books. Every once in a while I lead a group of students on a historical trip overseas. My wife and I raised two children, now adults with their own families. Thankfully they live close by so I can see my grandchildren as often as I want. This has been a great blessing since my wife of 40 years recently passed. Well, I guess that’s all there is to know about me that’s important.”

“Thank you Larry,” Charlie said. “Don’t let Larry fool you. His books are amazing and we could be here all night listening to his stories.” I nodded my thanks and smiled at Charlie.

“But I want to know more Larry!”, Chad blurted out.

“Such as?”

“Where to you live?”

“Not far from campus”

“But those homes are old, built like 50 years ago.”

“I enjoy my home. It’s just me now and I don’t need much.”

“Larry’s got one of the best libraries I’ve ever seen in a house,” Charlie said coming to my defense.

“What kind of car to do drive?”, Chad continued, ignoring Charlie.

“A simple car. I’m within 2 miles of everything I need.”

For 10 minutes this line of questioning kept up. Every possession, every title, every trip, everything that Chad valued he queried me, seeing me shrink in his eyes as not worthy to be in his presence, let alone at the dinner party as Charlie’s guest.

His last question came out with all of the ego, resentment, arrogance, and entitlement he could muster. “So you must not be doing very well as a professor and author!”

The room was quiet. Everyone around the table was looking at me to see how I would respond. I calmly looked him in the eye. Over the years I’d had many students like Chad, some of them children from men like Chad, so I knew exactly how to handle people like Chad. Not defensively. Not with a loud voice to match is decibel level. Not mirroring his body language.

In a steady and quiet voice I replied, “Chadwick, I have something you will never have.”

He grinned widely, arrogantly thinking this could never be the case. “What the fuck is that?”, he said crudely.

“Enough.”

Over the next few seconds I could see in his eyes he was wrestling with this idea of “enough.” His whole life was built up in the constant pursuit of status.

Not know what to say he leaned back in his chair, pulled out his phone wrapped in a Louis Vuitton case from his custom suit, looked at it briefly to see if anything warranted his attention and put it on the table for all to see.

It was an awkward couple of minutes afterwards, but slowly the chatter around the table picked back up. The catering staff brought in dessert and coffee. Across the table the man and woman on either side of Chad had turned their chairs slightly away from him, speaking to the guests next to him. The folks other either side of me wanted to know more about my family and history. The conversations changed to topics of family and things that really mattered, which is interesting since just a little while before they were captured by the aura of each other’s status measurements. The only person not speaking was Chad.

At the end of the evening as the guests were leaving, Charlie pulled me aside, “Thank you Larry for coming tonight. I apologize for Chad’s behavior and will have a word with him about it.”

“It’s okay, Charlie. No need to apologize. I know who I am. I know what I have. All of that is enough for me to be happy. My family is the only that matters. My identity isn’t tied to status or material wealth. I am happy with my life and have no regrets. In my mind, that’s the true measure of wealth.”

As I spoke I wondered if he thought I was speaking to him as well. I wasn’t, but gave him a reassuring pat on his chest, ending with, “I’ll see you next week. I have a new book idea I want to bounce off of you.”

With that Charlie smiled, shook my hand, waited with me as the valet brought my car, and said “Goodnight my friend.”

This story was written to encapsulate a hard learned lesson that I’ve learned over the past four years. It is pure fiction, but based on a true story and something I’ve been contemplating for a while. I hope you like my very first piece like this.

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As I faced my own inflection point in my life nearly four years ago, where I face-planted again and again and again (let’s just say it was a lot), one of the many things I grappled with is remembering events that drastically shaped who I am.

But through all of my face-planting I met a good man to help me navigate this journey that I’m on. During a session where EMDR therapy was used I unpacked an old memory that had remained hidden for 50 years.

Here is that memory.

When I was a toddler, before the age of three, I lived with my parents in Fullerton, California. It was a small home, common to Southern California, packed close to other small houses. I would describe it as a nice working class home.

One day, while my mom was working in the kitchen, I wandered outside the front door to see what adventures could be had. Our neighbor was outside, a man, cleaning something on his front porch. There was one of those green cardboard can of Comet cleaner just sitting there. Right next to a big glass bowl, filled halfway with water, with a small turtle inside.

I didn’t know what Comet was used for. How could I as a toddler? To me it looked like something the turtle would enjoy. So with my fat fingers I picked the can of Comet up and shook some into the water, thinking it was food for the turtle and not poisonous.

I don’t think too much time elapsed before our neighbor started yelling and screaming at me one minute, and to my mother the next minute, carrying on about his turtle and me killing it. My mother burst out of the house, ran over to where I was, snatched me up by the arm, adding to the cacophony in my head.

My mother is a stern person, raised by midwestern farmers in Illinois, where spankings and abandonment were common forms of punishment and rarely used in isolation. As soon as we get inside the house, the front door slammed shut, I’m drug into the kitchen, and she pulls out this wooden spoon that seemed to go with a witches cauldron. Huge, imposing, and clearly meant for my two year old butt.

After she throws the instrument of punishment in the trash, apparently my fiery buns of steel broke it while receiving the spanking, I was taken to my room, and left there to cry and “think about what I had done.” It seemed like hours that I was shut in solidarity confinement.

That’s my very first memory.

I wish I could say that it was the last time I was punished like this. Both spankings, bordering on beatings, and abandonment were commonly used. Both of my parents used these tactics, while the largest amount of the abuse came from my mother. Shame was a particular vicious weapon used frequently. Perfection was the only standard. I wasn’t the only victim of the apex predator in my life. My two siblings, father, and everyone that crossed our paths found themselves in her field of fire.

Everyone in the family developed coping mechanisms to survive. Over time I became hyper-independent and left home as soon as possible. I made choices as a result of my coping skills as a child that did not translate well into adulthood.

What I’ve learned in my EMDR sessions is I’ve gone through life without connections I felt were safe. Everyone around me who you’d think would be a strong bond or connection, I kept at a distance and eventually destroyed. I didn’t know what a healthy attachment to someone in my core family looked like.

The resulting loneliness has been the latest version of solidarity confinement.

There is a silver lining at the end of this piece I promise.

Through regular sessions with my guy, I’ve come a long way. There are still bad days, but the scales are tilting toward good days more than bad. I’ve worked really hard to repair some relationships and accepted that others will always have scar tissue that can’t be repaired. Each day is met with the gratitude for the chance given to unpack all my memories, feelings, traumas, and dreams that I’d shoved into the darkest recesses of my mind. I refer to who I was as 1.0. That operating system crashed and was nearly unrecoverable. The latest version is 2.0, with I expect will be many more updates to come.

There are many unteachable lessons learn over the past four years. One that I’ll share with you dear reader today is as follows: have grace for yourself, give yourself some compassion, forgive yourself instead of beating yourself up, but most of all, love who you are in this moment. If you can do these things for yourself, eventually they will be traits you’ll show those around you.

God bless!!

I’ve been golfing since I was a teenager and have an okay game, probably more aggressive than most golfers my age, but that is also my personality. Over the past few years, I felt like I was falling into the old trap of swing habits that were making my shots shorter and more erratic and my scoring was reflecting this inconsistency.

Today I have my second lesson out of a package of seven that I purchased from a local pro. After hitting balls on the driving range next him and another struggling golfer I decided to ask him about some lessons. I liked his teaching method and knew he was the guy to help scrape the rust off my game.

Like a lot of new things in life, the tweaks to my golf swing were very uncomfortable. My stance at address was too bent down, not as much on the balls of my feet, my takeaway way too far in, and my downward swing is too far out.

And all of that is before I hit the ball.

As I was thinking about my swing, my thoughts turned to the amount of work required to make these tweaks feel natural. A golf ball, depending on the brand, has 336 dimples. Will I need to swing at least that many times?

My sense is that it will be at least 10 times that amount before it becomes natural. Yep, 3360 swings. That’s a ton! But if you ask a professional golfer how many balls they hit to get to their level, you’d likely get millions as your answer. At roughly a minute per ball that comes to 16,666 hours per 1 million balls hit. Of course a pro golfer doesn’t hit balls 24/7/365, but this shows the level of dedication required to reach and stay at the highest levels of professional golf.

Now I know there is no way that I’d have an interest to devote that kind of time to hitting a little white ball with that level of dedication over my lifetime. But what if I applied that to other facets of my life? What else requires more practice? What kind of precision is required? Is it just about showing up to the driving range of life and go through an examination, with a therapist instead of a golf teacher?

Unlike my pro who videos my swing and slows it down so I can see my swing faults, seeing a therapist is actually a lot more work. But your honesty is required. Truth is like the video of heart and mind, sometimes it comes out it slowmo because being honest hurts. A great therapist is really good at asking just the right question that drags 5-10 minutes out of you. They validate your thoughts and feelings, ask questions to see if that elicits new thoughts, and suggest an idea to help work through a problem.

I think many people hear the suggestion, but never put it to practice, even after role play, which means they fall back into the same habits or responses as before, angry with themselves for not quite getting the suggestion right on the first couple of tries.

But without practice and repetition, new behaviors just don’t stick, no matter how much we want to improve. They get rusty just like a golf swing if not practiced.

So, if there’s a behavior or communication method you’re trying to change and you chunk the shot, don’t give up. Keep practicing what your therapist suggests. Be honest with yourself about your performance. The other person is keeping score too.

Thank you!

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For the past three years, I’ve been working on a research project in preparation for writing a book. Since childhood, I’ve been fascinated with Bible prophecy and its intersection with history. Every Christian faith has its own peculiar interpretation of prophecies throughout the Bible and all of them are centered around a doctrine that makes up the DNA of that faith.

Many of the interpretations were created in the 1800s with anchors and two books of the Bible: Daniel and Revelation. In the mid 2000s I joined a Bible study group and which one of the topics we discussed was Bible prophecy. After several in our group moved away, we disbanded, but kept in touch, always sharing with each other, our latest epiphanies or discoveries. Since that time, I always felt like we were missing something, that there was a mystery in the prophecies that we somehow were missing. It’s almost as if we didn’t know our ancient history as well as we thought. So, I decided three years ago to embark on a journey to read as much history as I could have ancient Syria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. So, I decided three years ago to embark on a journey to read as much history as I could on ancient Syria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome.

As I read, I highlight write notes in the margins and use tiny sticky notes to Mark pages to help me come back to particular passages that are relevant to my research.Yesterday I was reading at work by Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus called The Later Roman Empire. It is written during the period of time following the reign of Constantine and focuses much of the work on the life of Julian, the only self-professed pagan Emperor after 325 A.D.

In a section describing 361 A.D. Marcellinus writes the following about Julian’s open profession to paganism:

Experience had taught him that no wild beast are such dangerous enemies to men as Christians are to one another.1

Marcellinus himself was not a Christian, but had great tolerance for Christians and their faith. This comment about Julian was striking, but in the end, hardly surprising. There are countless stories of Christians mercilessly killing, pillaging, torturing, destroying, and committing atrocities that go the opposite direction of how we’re taught in the Bible.

As I’ve contemplated this quote, I turned to the book of acts in the Bible, reminded of the trial of Steven before the Council in Jerusalem. An Acts 6:13 Luke wrote about the elders and scribes bringing “false witnesses” against Stephen. Stephen’s rebuke of his accusers in Acts 7:51-53 landed hard against the “uncircumcised minds” of his opponents.

As I look at the institutions and leaders today I fail to see a huge difference in the last 2000 years.

Since I read these passages yesterday, I ruminated on my own life. Who am I to judge? The line that separates good from evil in my own heart is both thin and very flexible if I’m being perfectly honest. We are all susceptible to influence, just look at Hamlet and who influence him to murder the king. Often it is the people we are closest to that influence that line in our hearts to move and make more room for evil or for good. Social media, TV, music, video games, hobbies, politics, friends, family, and work are all examples of an endless list of influences tugging on that line.

I don’t have all the answers. This piece, like the small handful that I’ve published already, and the many more that I’ll publish in the future is about exploration of human nature, and the part we all play at earth’s history with the fragility of that line that separates good and evil in every person‘s heart.

Thank you for reading!

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“The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either, but right through every human heart…”

When Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn wrote this in his book Gulag Archipelago he was writing about human nature. This quote came to mind when I was describing the movie Nuremberg to a family member last night. And as I was reflecting on this famous quote today I remembered in my own life how paper then that line is in my own life.

Over the decades that I’ve been reading history books the one prominent theme throughout is the line that separates good and evil in human nature. It’s usually one event that tips the balance, turning a meek and mild mannered gentleman or lady into a raging lunatic. Charles Dickens’ Christmas Carol shows us a greedy, money loving, cruel man turn into a generous and loving gentleman.

I also reflected on the events of this past weeks in Minneapolis. The loss of life is tragic, but the one glaring theme that nearly everyone missed is that each one of us makes choices. In addition to a man losing his life, the nation lost its mind. Each person choosing how to react. Each side, tribe, political party blaming the other side.

I’m choosing to pray for the dead man’s family, for the shooter and his family, for our country’s citizens, and for our elected leaders. I’m choosing to crowd out the evil in my heart with more good.

Join me.

Imagine having the cartilage in one of your hips disappear over a six month period. That’s what happened to my son 3 years ago, ending in a hip replacement at the age of 16.

He was born a big baby and from the start he was always in the 99th percentile or higher throughout childhood. Growing pains were a constant companion, or so we thought.

When he was 15 we discovered he had the genetic marker for a disease called Ankylosing Spondylitis, a rheumatoid condition that attacks the low back, hips, pelvis and knees primarily, although your eyes can also be affected.

He was the youngest patient in the orthopedic practice that did his hip replacement. This seems to be a trend since he was also the biggest baby for the OB practice my wife went to.

It seems that we’ll be seeing the same orthopedic surgeon again, this for the other hip. The last week or so my son has been having more difficulty with his mobility, gradually getting worse and worse. His Physical Therapist told him that going back to get his other hip checked out ASAP was needed.

This kid has been through a lot during his teenage years. Going through high school basically crippled by this disease, getting a hip replacement, feeling like he’s different, like he needs special treatment, is not something he deserved or wanted. He just wanted to be normal.

Thankfully this is not new territory for the family. We know what the solution is and what’s needed to get through this process. If he needs another hip replacement, then so be it.

As soon as I heard the news from my wife, my mind went immediately to this verse in Isaiah. I’ve heard it all my life, but for some reason my head was not in the space to receive it in times of trouble before. Today, however, God knew exactly what I needed and sent me this promise.

It’s not a promise to remove trouble or calamity. It’s a promise to get through whatever life sends our way.

Over the past three years I have been on a journey to unlearn old responses to life and to learn new responses to what life brings to our doorstep each and every day. The world teaches us to be cynical, to expect disappointment, and to hate our enemies. The Bible teaches us to have faith, hope and love, with the greatest of these being love.

But what is love and what does it mean? What does it say about our character? According to Paul in his first letter to the church in Corinth, it says a lot. As I’m on my own journey of healing, recovery, and reconciliation, I return to 1Corinthians 13 often, reading this chapter again even though I’ve done so hundreds of times before.

The first 3 verses essentially cover talent, intelligence, and virtue as characteristics to admire. Who wouldn’t? These are the currencies by which we buy higher status within our Developed World communities. These traits, however, don’t matter if you don’t have love.

So what is love? I think The Message paraphrase version of 1Cor 13:4-7 says it beautifully:

“Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Love doesn’t strut, Doesn’t have a swelled head, Doesn’t force itself on others, Isn’t always “me first,” Doesn’t fly off the handle, Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others, Doesn’t revel when others grovel, Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, Puts up with anything, Trusts God always, Always looks for the best, Never looks back, But keeps going to the end.”

‭‭1 Corinthians‬ ‭13‬:‭4‬-‭7‬ ‭MSG‬‬

So as I look at the things that I have written down to work on in 2026, none of them matter if I don’t have love. The META resolution then must be meditation on what love is and how it is to be lived. Will I fail? Sure. I accept that ahead of time. But I’m ready to give myself grace and the strength to get back up and keep striving toward living a life of love.

This is my first piece on SubStack. If it resonates, please restack, like, text to your community. I appreciate any comments that anyone takes the time to write.