People today have pretty stressful lives. I know I do, with the demands of running The Center, writing and speaking, commitments to my faith community, to say nothing of being my wife's husband and my kids' dad. It's a lot. Because life is stressful, with many demands on time and energy, sometimes nutrition derived from [...]
It is very easy to fall into the trap of thinking your worth as a person also comes from what you do instead of who you are. It is also easy to see your worth as being reflected off others instead of shining out from inside. When you allow other people or outside situations to [...]
On my desk at The Center in Edmonds, Washington, is a beautiful, flat rock. Carved into this rock that I use as a paperweight are the words, "Nothing is etched in stone." I keep this motto in front of me as a reminder that God has given me an overwhelming sense of freedom to exercise [...]
As a general rule, most nights per week, your children need to eat at home with the family. Hot, nutritious meals with a variety of flavors, tastes, and textures should be the norm. Weekday breakfasts and lunches may not be the most appropriate time for "experiments," but a dinner now and then certainly can be. [...]
What do actors do when they get a new script? In my limited theatrical experience, which happened far longer ago than I care to acknowledge, actors get together and do a read-through of the script. Sometimes, an actor is given the entire script and other times, an actor is given parts of the script, which [...]
Bill was a classic stay-putter. Almost thirty, he’d never kept a job for more than a year. In between episodes of work, he found friends to take him in or crashed in his parents’ basement. By doing that, Bill was wearing out his welcome just about everywhere, including the basement. For almost a decade, Bill [...]
Even with so many people engaged in academic pursuit, there is still a sizable segment of the population who foregoes postsecondary education and instead jumps headfirst into the world of work. After that giddy, heady feeling of success and affirmation with the first job offer, comes the stark reality for many that you actually have [...]
Teens live amid such tumultuous waters, it can be hard to detect if something is just an adolescent squall or if there's a real storm brewing. As a parent, you're caught between a rock and a hard place. You don't want to be perceived as a meddling parent. You want your teenager to learn how [...]
While there is no dispute that the incidence of depression is growing, the response to this growth is changing. The trend has been away from traditional psychotherapy and toward a pharmaceutical solution. As reported by Scientific American, "Between 1996 and 2005 the percentage of psychiatry office visits involving psychotherapy decreased from about 44.4 percent - [...]
Oftentimes, a decision to start exercising is made in desperation and disgust. Desperation says, “Start now and start hard.” Disgust says, “You deserve to feel bad.” These twin voices come from frustration, and they doom our exercise attempts to fail. Why? Because, physically unprepared to begin at such a fast pace, our bodies and our [...]
