Don’t Spend Your Life Being Little
Stalled in Chicago traffic wasn’t Carrie’s idea of a wonderful day. Planted in the driver’s seat, she silently broiled. Her anger didn’t stem from her two passengers, her husband and mother-in-law. Instead, she was furious with herself. Getting trapped in traffic was ohhhh soooo avoidable, because Carrie was adept at driving Chicago, maneuvering skillfully and comfortably […]
The Heart Trumps the Spoken Word
A tragic accident took her son’s life. In a mere flash of a second he was gone … gone forever. I had never met the mother nor the son, but my friend had. “What can I say to her?” she asked. We’ve all been there—someone we care about is in the throes of immense grief, […]
Keep Your Mouth Shut! Really?
Numerous times in our lifetime—no, in a single day—we’re faced with a dilemma: Do I open my mouth or keep it zipped? Do I take the risk or play it safe? It’s not easy being verbally courageous. I fail at it more times than I succeed. But when I do succeed, it leaves me feeling […]
Getting Naked
We all carry around our share of shame-debris. That is, unless we grew up in a perfect environment with perfect parents, perfect siblings, perfect everybody, or—let’s face it—planted on a perfect planet. Recently, I discovered a video where Brené Brown makes us feel pretty normal about our shame. She also makes us feel normal about our […]
The Latest Wow: The Power of Love
Remember Beth? I mentioned her in an earlier post. She and Sam got a divorce several months ago but then decided to give it another go. In that post I asked her, “What made you change your mind?” She said, “I’ve discovered that anger fades a lot faster than love.” They’re living together now to discover whether the […]
She Turned Me Into a Puppet … But Puppets Can’t Love
“She turned me into a puppet, and then wondered why I no longer loved her. The answer is simple—a puppet doesn’t have a heart.” “As men, we share a single purpose: to find that one special female who will kill us just slowly enough that by the time we reach 80, we’re already dead.” To read […]
The Latest Wow: Military Officer Endorses Tears
I want to share with you a touching email I received from a Naval Officer stationed in Viriginia Beach. He wrote to me after reading “Tears Are As Natural As Breathing”—the column I refer to in the previous post, “Dare to Cry.” Here it is: “Salee, I just wanted you to know that shortly after […]
Dare to Cry
“Tears are a sign of a soul feeling awake.” — Michael Meade I love that quote because it slams the notion that something is wrong with shedding tears. In truth, something is probably wrong if we don’t. Like so many of us, I learned at an early age that tears aren’t acceptable, and that they stand […]
Black or White?
By this time of year, winter has clearly worn out its welcome—we’re tired of it. If we’re not mindful, the dreariness and cold can transport our mood to the basement. As for the snow, it’s pretty but it does create its share of challenges. The other day, a colleague and I were watching it come down […]
Get in Touch with Your Inner Teenager
Let’s face it, there’s something about our teenage spirit we miss. Yes, back then we were reckless–even stupid at times, but there was something horrendously precious about it, too. Call it our free spirit, our drive, our passion. How do we recover that spirit? Maybe the answer lies in recovering that which we abandoned amid […]