Category Archives: motivation

motivation

6/15/2020 – the undefined shape of truth

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It is not always needful for truth to take a definite shape; it is enough if it hovers about us like a spirit and produces harmony; if it is wafted through the air like the sound of a bell, grave and kindly.     

    –         The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe

Over the last few weeks of action in our country, I have tried my best to listen and to learn. To force myself to look at inconvenient truths, to weigh my own understandings against those of others whose perspective I don’t regularly see through. To acknowledge the ugliness that does indeed exist in the world, whether I choose to look at it or not.

It has been an often inconvenient ongoing exercise. But it is one that I know in my heart is the right thing to do, and that makes it not as scary to look into the figurative mirror. The unease and the defensiveness of instinctual reactions is more easily diffused for me when I know that I’m doing the right thing.

The words above by Goethe have been giving me hope through this. Even more challenging than doing the work of breaking down my own biases and recognizing how I benefit from the world today in a way that others do not, is trying to see a way toward a productive path forward of fixing these deeply rooted problems of injustice and inequality woven into the threads of our entire society.

Just as frustrating as taking the journey itself, is watching others obstinately refuse to take it. Watching our current president purposefully antagonize the very wounds that many are seeking to heal is simultaneously infuriating and saddening. Seeing people refuse to sit down and talk to each other, to learn from one another, is depressing. 

And yet, opposite of that I see room for hope and truth. I see people acknowledging things they never have before. For the first time, I see people empathizing in ways they previously have not. People are listening.

We live in a time where no one listens anymore. We only shout.

But right now, if you pay attention closely, and you look out over the cacophony and the multitudes, I see more people with mouths shut and ears open than I’ve seen in years. And it gives me hope. I see people who have previously been discouraged to the point of apathy suddenly taking action. And it gives me hope. I see society’s weak suddenly finding strength.

And it gives me hope.

And reading Goethe’s words above, the thing I am hoping for us most as a society is that Truth becomes a thing we learn to embrace again. That it isn’t a scary thing. That it shouldn’t be something we are ashamed of, and that the noblest thing we can do is seek it always, regardless of the shape it takes. I hope that it shines a piercing light into our speech, our politics, and our relationships, so that fiction or plausible deniability no longer guide us, but the patient, reconciling transparency of truth becomes a thing we all chase and aspire to. That truth will become an attribute that all individuals seek to prioritize again, instead of greed or gain. And I hope it is enough.

“…it is enough if it hovers about us like a spirit and produces harmony; if it is wafted through the air like the sound of a bell, grave and kindly.”

motivation

6/8/2020 – Amplify

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Find the good. It’s all around you. Find it, showcase it, and you’ll start believing in it.
~ Jesse Owens

The last two weeks have been both encouraging and exhausting. Terrifying and exciting. Frustrating and hopeful.

One of the core initiatives of the current Civil Rights movements of Black Lives Matter activists is to amplify black voices. So rather than sharing my normal weekly thoughts of things I’m focusing on, I’m going to quote other black voices in this week’s writing, as well as highlight/share the things I’m reading currently to deepen my understanding of our country’s history of racial oppression and how it affects the lives of our black brothers and sisters daily.

With the onslaught of information, emotion, direction, learning, outrage, and more that has been flooding into our news feeds, it has probably gotten a little overwhelming for some people. While I think it is important to contribute to and immerse oneself in this wave of information that is seemingly “suddenly” available (in quotes because it’s always been available, but never more culturally thrust to the forefront and prioritized, unfortunate as that is, than it is right now. And there’s no time like the present to contribute to the improvement and repair of society), I also think it is good to check in frequently and review progress as it is being made, to ensure everyone knows the general direction in which we are all marching.

Here are a few things I’ve either been tracking myself, or cobbled together from my social media news feeds (I’m sure there is a lot more):

I am lucky that whatever fear I have inside me, my desire to win is always stronger.
~ Serena Williams

Officers being held accountable for gross misuse of authority, nationwide:
– Minneapolis upgrades charges to officers in George Floyd murder
– “No-knock” warrants suspended in Louisville in response to Breonna Taylor murder by police (they were at the wrong address)
– Denver officer fired for tweets celebrating police violence
– 2 Officers fired in Atlanta for tasing a couple while in their car
– 6 additional officers charged for additional violence during protests
– Louisville, Kentucky Chief of Police fired.  – due to shooting of David McAtee
– San Francisco announces new hiring policy prohibiting hiring of police with history of misconduct  
– Seattle issues ultimatum to police unions demanding accountability for racist practices

You don’t have to be one of those people that accepts things as they are. Every day, take responsibility for changing them right where you are.
~ Corey Booker

Racist monuments to infamous white supremacists removed/destroyed in:
– Birmingham, Alabama
– Bentonville, Arkansas (scheduled)
– Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
– Alexandria, Virginia
– Richmond, Virginia
-Fort Myers, Florida

Start where you are, with what you have.  Make something of it and never be satisfied.
~ George Washington Carver

Policy change campaigns launched:
– Denver, Colorado announces Senate bill SB20-217, police accountability reform bill
– California Prosecutors launch campaign to stop District Attorneys from accepting police union money
– Atlanta denies proposed expansion of prison system

I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs.
– Frederick Douglass

Movement to de-militarize and lessen power of police nationwide begins:
– Mayor of Tulsa agrees to not renew Live PD contract
– Minneapolis announces plan to defund police
– Los Angeles announces $150million reallocation from LAPD budget to community social programs
– New Jersey announces Policing reforms
– Richmond, Virginia announces Police reform
– Portland, Oregon discontinues use of armed police officers in schools

Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.
~ Barack Obama

I am encouraged by these progressions made only in the last 2 weeks! This only proves to me that we are capable of so much more in our society, and that for once in a very long time, I am seeing how positive change can be forced on a larger level. I keep thinking about what is possible if the pressure is continuously applied for a month, 3 months, a year. 

It’s not enough to simply hope.. I think one should always be learning something, so I have committed to re-prioritizing some of the books I was planning to read, as well as following a few local and national black activists that are thought leaders of this change. Here is a short list of some of these sources:

Ta-Nehisi Coates – 
– Between the World and Me – a black father’s letter to his son, about the ways of the world.
– The Case for Reparations – article in The Atlantic from 5 years ago, sparked a very interesting dialog about the use of policy in property, housing, and even lending as tools of segregation and wealth oppression against the Black Community.

@Chescaleigh – Franchesca Ramsey is an actor, author, and writer of MTV’s show, Decoded. I find her voice to be enlightening on the subject of race in today’s climate, and she’s good at breaking things down in simplistic bites.

Rachel Cargle – Rachel is a black author that has a 30-day course called “Do the Work” on her website at www.rachelcargle.com/ that I’ve just begun. It helps point out my racial blindspots so that I am becoming more aware of the disparities between my privilege and the privilege of others.

Shaun King – Activist, Podcaster, Speaker, Shaun King’s podcast, The Breakdown has been an informative, timely, and thoughtful look into today’s social justice issues. He also has a project at www.GrassrootsLaw.org which is “a policy plan that will radically change the system and confront police brutality and mass incarceration head on.”

These are just a few voices that I’ve chosen to begin listening to in order to educate myself on these complicated issues (there are plenty of other accounts I have followed on social media, but i haven’t delved deep enough into them yet to post them here). I have also begun following a few local activists and public servants here in my community of Denver in order to become more aware of local politics, with the intent of eventually finding a way to donate my time and money and get involved in my community.

What about you? Have you read any of these individuals’ work? Who are you following that I should know about? What are you learning? Would love to hear from you, and would love to keep these conversations going.

Every time you state what you want or believe, you’re the first to hear it. It’s a message to both you and others about what you think is possible. Don’t put a ceiling on yourself.
~ Oprah Winfrey

motivation

6/1/2020 – Why Violence?

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In a conversation with someone I care deeply about over the weekend, the question was asked: “Why do they need to use violence to get their point across?”

It’s a question I’ve seen countless people asking on social media in the last week. I’ve heard people demanding answers in heated discussions. I’ve seen various forms of it, including dismissive versions like “how does stealing TVs solve racism?” 

It’s a great question, and a valid one. Because no, the single act of stealing a TV does not end racism in America. If that is your argument, congratulations, you can have that point. 

But you’ve also missed the larger point altogether.

Have you ever been bullied? I mean truly, mercilessly, repeatedly bullied. Over and over by the same jerk, and there was nothing you could do about it. I have. I was bullied a lot as a kid. A lot.

I couldn’t escape it. Everything I did was always wrong, was always pointed out to me. I felt stupid, I felt small, I was defenseless. I lost all confidence. I questioned myself in everything I did. It grew to affect me in ways that were totally unrelated to the acts of bullying I endured. I couldn’t talk to girls and had trouble making friends. I felt no value in myself at all, so why would they? I lost motivation in almost everything, and I started giving up. I stopped trying to play baseball (which i loved), i stopped getting good grades and gave up on getting into a good college. I had no hope. I became isolated. I had no allies to help or defend me.

When I wasn’t being bullied mentally and emotionally, I was being physically bullied. So why didn’t I fight back? Isn’t that what they say? If someone bullies you, fight back. So why not fight back? Because I was tiny, and I didn’t know how to fight. I didn’t start growing as an adolescent until a couple months before graduating high school.  I didn’t have a prayer of being able to defend myself. I was so scared. It was easier to give up, or comply, no matter how wrong the bully was, so that the torment would end quicker, than it was to fight back. 


When you are repeatedly and intensely bullied, the thing you begin to feel is “hopeless.” Especially when you have no one supporting you. Hopeless. It’s a dark feeling, and one that many people never truly feel in their lives. 

But one day, I’d had enough. After years of the abuse, I didn’t care anymore. I couldn’t take it. I reached my end. I picked the fight, over something so trivial and stupid, I don’t even remember what it was. In that isolated moment, I was in the wrong. AndI knew I was going to lose, but I didn’t care. 

The feelings of hopelessness, worthlessness, depression, and helplessness… for a minute, they all faded, and for the first time, I felt something else, something very, very different. For a minute, they were all replaced by raw, uncontained rage. I blacked out. I don’t even remember very much about the next few minutes.

I got my ass kicked. Soundly. I was no match for the size and skill advantage of the bully, and it wasn’t long before a break in the fighting caused me to get up, dust myself off, and then run away. There was no question that I had lost the fight, completely and totally. That night, all the feelings of hopelessness and worthlessness returned, and I cried myself to sleep.

But something had changed. I had used violence for the first time in my defense, and I was confused by it. For a few brief moments, I hadn’t felt worthless. This was confusing to me, because I grew up going to church and being taught that violence was always wrong. But now, something about it felt… different. It didn’t feel good, but it also didn’t feel as bad as I’d been taught it was. There was an allure to it now, it felt tempting. It felt productive. I felt alive.

I look back over the last 19 years of my life since that night, and i have regrets about using anger and violence to solve my problems. It set a dangerous precedent for me that has become one of my biggest struggles (mainly anger, not as much violence), one that I’ve only begun to truly control and deal with in the last year or two.

But something else happened that night. It was the beginning of the end of the bully. I may have lost the fight, but the spell of control and power was broken. Word got out that I had stood up to the bully, and others began to rebel as well. I never allowed that power to be wielded over me again, and it wasn’t long before the bully was powerless and alone for a change, as no one would even talk to the bully, eventually. The bully became depressed. 

But why do I share this story? Because it’s the same thing that is happening in America right now. Black people have been bullied, in ways that white people can’t possibly comprehend, for hundreds of years, and they have run out of rational ways to react to it. The bullying is still happening, often on full display of the public (but exponentially more commonly in very subtle ways that you can’t see unless it is happening to you), and the reaction is emotional, it’s physical, and at the moment, it is violent. Sure, there are some people stealing TVs and breaking windows and escalating the aggression, but that in no way diminishes the point that protesters are trying to make. 

They have tried to enact change in every other way possible, and none of it has worked.

I am not promoting the burning of buildings and looting of stores.

But would you criticize me for using violence to stand up to my bully? I’m guessing you wouldn’t. Do I regret it? Yes, a little. Would I use violence today to stand up to my bully? Honestly, probably not, when I think about it. But did things change for me? Yes they did, in many ways. So it is a difficult conundrum for me to consider.

So during the madness occurring on the streets of our cities right now, when you ask “Why do they have to use violence to get their point across?”  
I will answer your question with the same question directed back at you:
“Why do they have to use violence to get their point across?”

motivation

5/25/2020 – Memorial

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“Show me that the good life doesn’t consist in its length, but in its use, and that it is possible – no, entirely too common — for a person who has had a long life to have lived too little.” ~ Seneca

In a country that notoriously doesn’t take enough time off work to stop and take a breath, I’m thankful that we have a holiday that begs us to stop and remember the warriors who have fallen in service of it. In addition to a mindfulness of gratitude, I think every fallen soldier would also want us to take a moment to contemplate if we are making the most of the gift of their sacrifice.

And so for today, I leave you with a simple question: Are you making the most of it? Do you wake up with an excited vigor for what you are working towards? Do you experience the periodic moment in the middle of your day where you suddenly realize “this is my life, and I love it”?  Or even better, do you have projects or goals in front of you that make you even a little nervous about? That frenetic energy that comes from staring at an obstacle course ahead, but knowing that the only thing you can do is run straight at it and embrace the challenge.

Do you have any of these things in your life right now? Even in the margins, in small fragments? If not, ask yourself why?  And the key word in that sentence is yourself. That’s not a situational question, It’s not a question of “why haven’t any of these things found me?”  No, it’s a question of why you haven’t put yourself into a place to find it.

Inspiration is always available. You just have to reach up and grab it. The easiest way to find it is to force yourself to do something new.

And if you do have these things in your life, consider yourself fortunate. Contemplate them today, call out why and how you are grateful for them. If it is a person that grants you this joy and motivation, make sure you tell them today.

If you do have these feelings, these motivations, these joys, then enjoy today with the confidence and hope that you are living life the way those who sacrificed for us would prefer. You are earning it.

motivation

5/18/2020 – …From tribe and fire

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Rather than relay to you what my focus is for the week, I want to share someone else’s words. I have only 2 requests: Read it, and then read it again. On the 2nd read-through, go slow and imagine each bit of imagery provided, as separate moments in a life. Then think about them all strung together, like lights on a string across your backyard patio at dusk.

Small Kindnesses
     By Danusha Laméris

I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk
down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs
to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you”
when someone sneezes, a leftover
from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying.
And sometimes, when you spill lemons
from your grocery bag, someone else will help you
pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other.
We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot,
and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile
at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress
to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder,
and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass.
We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange.
What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here,
have my seat,” “Go ahead — you first,” “I like your hat.”

—
If you feel like it, please share with me your thoughts after reading this. How does it make you feel? How does it make you want to interact with the world around you?

Go out and do that this week.

motivation

5/11/2020 – What if _?

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“If we ever do want to become wise, it comes from the questioning and from humility – not, as many would like to think, from certainty, mistrust, and arrogance.    ~ Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic

Why are we so bad at “uncertainty?” Why does lacking a definitive answer make humans so uncomfortable? Why are we unable to be patient and wait for clarity to come to us?

Why, instead, do we manufacture our own certainty? Why are we unable to accept that what we don’t know is not a reflection upon our own value and character as a human? Why do we rush so quickly to premature judgment?

Why are we afraid to say “i don’t know”?

What if, instead of reacting immediately to every scary thing or suspicious thought we are introduced to, we simply didn’t do anything? What if we just decided to sit on those thoughts for a bit? What if we didn’t expend so much energy hammering away on the keyboard? What if we didn’t re-share that video that raises a lot of “important” questions that “everyone needs to see”? 

What if we didn’t allow our nervous, insecure thoughts to control our brains? What if instead we looked for healthy ways to empower our brains to control our thoughts. What if we slowed down?

What if we were able to take an honest look at what we do know, and what we don’t know? And what if we could find a way to accept those 2 things, regardless of how little control it causes us to realize we actually have over everything?

What if we just paused, and waited for the answers to catch up to us? Would we miss that time? 

Or do we instead know for certain that the way we are reacting quickly to things now is definitely the best way? Does it feel like the best way? Are we definitely accomplishing more? Are we winning? Are we proving to everyone that we definitely know more than the next guy? Do we feel better now?

What if we tried something different?

motivation

5/4/2020 – True Freedom

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“As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler; solitude will not be solitude, poverty will not be poverty, nor weakness weakness.” ~ Henry David Thoreau

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about personal freedom. Not the type of “personal freedom” you see fueling facebook arguments and public demonstrations on capitol building front lawns. I mean the type of freedom that allows one to feel content and beholden to no one, and how to achieve it.

On the surface, “true freedom” sounds quite simple: being able to do whatever the hell you want. But that’s not quite it, is it? I think it is necessary to analyze a little deeper, which leads to thinking about needs versus wants. Put more simply: True freedom is having everything you need.

But what do you really need? Have you ever really thought about this? An earnest examination is not so simple. Do you need that extra outfit you’ve been eyeing online and can’t wait to buy? Do you need the new model iphone? Do you need that promotion at work? That new gadget or car? Why? Will it really make your life finally achieve that elusive balance you’ve been seeking?

If you’re a little uncomfortable with this line of thinking, it’s okay. I am too. It goes against everything most of us are taught as children. “If you work hard enough, you can have anything you want” is a thing we hear a lot in America. Forgetting about whether or not it’s accurate, is that a healthy way to think?

Throughout civilization’s greatest thinkers, this has been a common point of contemplation, and thus, there is no shortage of clever quotes to point us in the direction of wisdom and learnings of those who came before us. From Socrates (“The secret of happiness, you see, is not found in seeking more, but in developing the capacity to enjoy less.”) to Thoreau (quote above), from Gandhi (“Live simply so that others may simply live.”) to Fight Club (“the things you own, end up owning you). The human race is seemingly surrounded by cautionary wisdom that we can’t be bothered with. We can’t help ourselves, the allure of excess is too great. 

The encouraging side of this dissonance however, is that it actually starts to feel really good when you figure out how to start telling yourself “no.” When you begin stripping the unnecessary from your life, it can almost become enjoyable, and the more uncompromising you become with yourself, the more attractive it all becomes. This is something I’ve been learning these last couple months.

I’ll cap this with an example that I read recently in my “the Daily Stoic” book, by Ryan Holiday.

“The late fashion photographer Bill Cunningham occasionally declined to invoice magazines for his work. When a young upstart asked him why that was, Cunningham’s response was epic: “if you don’t take money, they can’t tell you what to do, kid.””
That’s the most punk rock thing I’ve ever heard. That’s true freedom.

motivation

4/27/2020 – Little Things

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While I am busy with little things, I am not required to do greater things. ~Saint Francis de Sales

Reading these words felt like a gentle slap across the face. I really, really needed to hear them in a way that should have been more obvious to me.

For the majority of my life, I’ve always sought out those “big moments”, whether it be the crucial play of the game in sports or grand romantic gestures for a love interest (which usually only took place in my imagination instead of reality). Unfortunately the side effect of this type of movie magic romanticizing was that I often found myself bored with the everyday moments, the little things. They just don’t capture the imagination quite as dramatically, do they?

Last week I took a break from writing. If I’m honest… I just didn’t feel like it. I sat down a couple times and stared at the keyboard endlessly before ultimately giving up, again and again. Coming off a couple tough weeks, I was lacking the creative inspiration. And when paired with the lack of momentum of habit, there just wasn’t anything there. So I gave myself a break. I decided that if it wasn’t going to be authentic, I wasn’t going to do it.

One of the other problems with this “seeking the big moment” approach is that, by default, I am constantly putting myself under the pressure to one-up myself in a way that can become unhealthy. Not to say that reaching higher is bad, it isn’t, but there is an intelligent balance to be struck, and I’m not always very good at finding it. 

So lately, I’ve been trying to find more quotidian things to mindfully appreciate and enjoy. It almost feels uninteresting to write about them, but I suppose that is kinda the point, if I’m serious about learning this concept. Some of these simple things have been making my own coffee (I buy my beans from local roasters i really like and I use a Moka Express to pull espresso shots), or riding my bicycle (which i haven’t done regularly since childhood), or building playlists on Spotify and channeling my inner high school kid making mixtapes.

Yesterday I woke up and made myself a beautiful cup of coffee. I took my time to grind the beans extra fine for the espresso I desired and spent a whole minute just appreciating the aroma of the fresh grind, taking note of the differences and similarities between scent and taste, and the gift to appreciate as I began brewing with my Moka Express, I added a little oat milk to make a cortado and then slowly enjoyed the complex flavors of such a remarkably simple beverage.

Not long after that, I was on the road, muscling my way through a 20 mile ride (which isn’t impressive to serious riders, but I’m just getting back into this!). I took particular pleasure to feel the wind in my face and the burn of my lungs and legs as i pushed myself faster and harder along the bike path. I stopped at the halfway point at a park and laid down in the grass, soaking up sunlight, imagination drifting along with the clouds in the sky as I listened to my American Southwest-themed playlist. I imagined I was a cowboy resting alongside my old horse in the middle of a long journey in search of some wistfully unknown adventure. It was a silly little fiction in my mind, but I let it float along until it ran out of energy. I then practiced a breathing exercise for 10 minutes before hopping back on the bike and finishing the ride.

It was an incredibly simple day filled with numerous little things. And yet, when I was finished and laying in my bed that night, it felt like one of the greatest days I’d had in a very long time.

motivation

4/13/2020 – Restorative moments in brutal times

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Last week was a tough one. If you’re reading this, you likely know that my day job involves a mission that started with a little girl with severe epilepsy that found success and life with a cannabis oil years ago. Last week, we lost her.

I’m going to share what I wrote on my social media accounts, and below that, I will share a hopeful update…

Devastating news to wake up to.

I first met this little girl at a backyard party a few years ago at Joel Stanley’s house. I was having a beer and chatting with friends when I noticed her sitting quietly a few feet away, just taking in all the social interaction around her. The conversation I was in ended and I found myself alone for a few minutes. Typically not being very good with kids, and very aware of Charlotte’s fame as the face of the world’s cannabis-as-legitimate-medicine movement, I actually found myself slightly intimidated by her presence and avoiding eye contact as she gazed curiously at me. And I don’t get intimidated. Ever. Yet here I was, being reduced to nothing by a 9-year-old’s stare.

After standing alone hanging onto my beer for dear, insecure life, hoping someone would come back and save me from Charlotte’s inquisitive watch, I finally caved and made eye contact. 

Nothing happened for a minute. But i already felt stupid, so I decided that I wasn’t going to lose a stare-down with this damned kid. Our eyes remained locked for what seemed an eternity, and with every passing second, my resolve steeled and my confidence returned.

And then something magical happened. Charlotte’s seemingly blank expression made an abrupt right turn and a radiant, goofy smile erupted onto her face, completely disarming me, and letting me know that it was indeed funny, even if I hadn’t gotten the joke we’d just shared. Now, even more than before, I felt really stupid about how I’d just reacted to the previous 60 seconds, but the image of that silly, playful little smile was now burned into the backs of my eyelids and I didn’t care. My icy heart was completely melted, stripped of it’s protection. She gave me one last patient look and turned away, searching for someone new to observe.

Charlie, I didn’t know you as well as many, but that isn’t really the point, is it? Your impact on this world was felt far and wide, and you created a path where there was none, providing a hope for people who desperately needed one. And you also gave people like me, with no real dog in the fight of “alternative treatment,” something to take up arms and fight for.

You may be gone now, but we will all remember you, and the cause you represented. But maybe more personally, I’ll always remember that time you gave me a mental ass-whooping without even saying a word. You may have been given a tiny, feeble body, but I saw only a towering giant.

*UPDATE* :   last night a large group of people parked their cars outside of Paige’s (Charlotte’s mother) house, raising up mobile phone lights, glowsticks, and candles from the safe distance of each person’s automobile. Unaware of what was happening, Paige and her husband came outside to see well over a hundred people directing their love, support, sympathy, hope, and positive energy to Paige and her family. Overcome with emotion, Paige and Greg approached every car individually (maintaining proper social distancing) and thanked each person through tearful smiles.

I’m not going to elaborate much, but the moments I got to share with them are some of the most raw, authentic, and painfully restorative moments I’ve experienced in my life. My heart was broken wide open for them, but even now I’m not quite able to articulate my feelings. Loss is such a powerful wave, sometimes all you can do is let it take you.

But I also came away from the experience with a sense of healing, and positivity, and hope in humanity. The fact that so many people were willing to suddenly and creatively venture out and show their support and love, especially in such dark and perilous times, is something that I desperately needed to see. And Paige, with tears on her face and a humble smile, I could still feel her fiery courage beneath the visible pain she was experiencing. It had a renewing effect on me. It reminded me of how important and beautiful and powerful that little girl was, and how this lioness of a woman had fearlessly fought for her, against every law, doctor, and politician that stood in the way. It reminded me that every sacrifice, though small in comparison, that I’ve made to work alongside this cause has been completely worth it. Thank you Charlotte, and thank you Paige.

motivation

4/6/2020 – This will all make sense someday

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“Whenever you find yourself blaming providence, turn it around in your mind and you will see that what has happened is in keeping with reason.” 

~ Epictetus, Discourses

About 4 weeks ago, this quote was a featured topic of the day in my “The Daily Stoic” readings. I knew it was a good reminder, so I wrote it down, but I didn’t realize that it would still be sticking in my brain over a month later, due to drastically different circumstances.

It’s a funny and simple reminder that I want to pass on to you today. Obviously everything is such a strange upside down world we are all living in right now, and the surreal, sobering reality of it is impossible to avoid anymore. And with that, reasoning with yourself that someday you’ll be able to look back on all this and say “…and that’s why that all had to happen” with a degree of awareness and wisdom is comforting to me.

I was speaking with a friend yesterday and I mentioned wistfully how badly I wanted to go camping up in the mountains and get away from all this. He replied matter-of-factly with a “yeah but it’s cold up there at night right now.”  It ended the topic pretty quickly.

Understandably, I was simply dreaming of better days, and there’s nothing wrong with that, even if it isn’t very productive at the moment. But my friend’s response also put things in perspective in a real, yet helpful way. The point is that while it’s okay to dream, it’s also useful to keep some small measure of reality nearby. Would a camping escape solve all my world’s problems right now?  Not if I was freezing to death.

And so it is with that semi-humorous reminder that I look at our present situation and remind myself that it won’t be so long before I’m looking back on this time of pestilence and isolation with a sense of greater understanding and perspective. I encourage you to see it this way as well.