When the Best-Laid Plans Stall

 There is a peculiar moment that comes when clarity meets resistance. You have thought it through. You have imagined the outcome. You have even rehearsed the discipline required. And yet, when the moment to act arrives, the ground does not break as cleanly as expected.

Blow the Candle

I once listened to a teacher speak to a pupil about how to deal with being upset. The advice was surprisingly simple. He said, “If you ever feel overwhelmed, blow a candle.”

Moments We Walked Past

As the year quietly draws to a close, one thought weighs heavily on my heart: how much unconquered ground we often leave behind. Not because life was unfair, and certainly not because God failed us, but because many promises demand a response from us that we were unwilling, unprepared, or too comfortable to give.

When the Norm Is the Constraint

Innovation is often spoken about as though it must arrive with a loud bang. New technologies, complex systems, grand announcements. But in reality, some of the most meaningful innovations begin quietly, almost modestly, with a small decision to look at the norm and ask a different question.

The Quiet Trauma of Being Misread

 I walked into an open room and found my friend seated quietly, absorbed in a book. The room itself felt ordinary, but the moment was not. Something about the stillness made me pause. I asked what he was reading. He looked up, smiled faintly, and said it was a story about misunderstanding.

Self-Regulation, Niceness, and the Quiet Work of Becoming

The responses to my recent post, “The Older Me”, have stayed with me. Some were direct, some indirect. Some were kind, some were uncomfortable. All of them, in one way or another, held up a mirror. And I have learned that how we respond to mirrors often says more about where we are than what we see in them.

The Older Me

My recent birthday arrived without ceremony. No loud reckoning. No sudden wisdom dropped from the sky. Yet something shifted quietly, the way truth often does when it has been forming for a while and finally finds permission to surface.

What Is Inside the Box?

We are often told to think outside the box, as though the box were a visible structure somewhere around us, something imposed by society, culture, systems, or tradition. The phrase is repeated so often that it has become advice we accept without ever stopping to examine its true meaning.

When Worry Knocks

Worry has a way of showing up even when nothing big is happening. One small thought appears, and before you know it, your mind has carried the matter to places you never planned. It happens to everyone, even the most confident people.

Keep Becoming

Grace does not redeem history. It relives it.