Refresh: What to do with your one wild and precious life? Alcuin’s answer
I do love it when I stumble upon a relatively little known character from history and suddenly realise how much we all owe to them. Alcuin definitely fits into this category. Read on for more of his 8th century life… including his role in devising modern punctuation and the question mark. It’s definitely worth a refresh of this post which originally appeared in May 2022. Wonder what to do with your one wild and precious life? Alcuin’s answer… “Tell me, what is it you plan to do With your one wild and precious life?” asks Mary Oliver in her poem The Summer...
Read MoreBecause the Goal of the Journey is the Company…
I’ve often heard it said that when we are young, we think that the goal of the journey is its destination. It’s about getting somewhere. As we get older (and hopefully wiser), we see that the goal of the journey is the journey. In other words, what we do is good in itself, and we find pleasure along the way, regardless of if we finish up at some desired endpoint, or fall short of that target. More recently I heard this extended one step further, “the goal of the journey,” said the speaker, “is not the destination, or the journey, but the company we have along...
Read MoreRefresh: From FOMO to Hello to Here…
It can be hard to be “here where my feet are” – especially if we are driven by anxiety over what we might be missing out on. This reflection was originally posted in Dec 2019, and I thought it more than met the requirements to appear as a Refresh… From FOMO to Hello to Here Do you, like me, often want to be somewhere else? It’s not that I’m unhappy where I am, it’s just that in a world filled with many options and possibilities – well, why wouldn’t you explore them all? Those younger than me tell me it’s FOMO, aka fear of missing out. Here’s the irony. FOMO can...
Read MoreBeing Counter Cultural: Opposing the 3P’s of Polarisation, Popularism and Post-truth
I’ve been working through Alastair Campbell’s book, But What Can I Do? It’s a call to relevant political engagement at a time characterised by polarisation, popularism and post-truth. Campbell sees these three P’s as the curse of our time, dangerous tools used by power holders for short term gains at the expense of long term flourishing. It’s hard to deny his analysis. He is adamant that far too many political leaders are simply not “serious” people, but that they are chasing the latest head line to ensure their name is on everyone’s lips. You...
Read MoreRefresh: The Virtue and Vice of Agnosticism
I don’t usually suggest that agnosticism is a virtue, though this refresh post wisely reminds us that context makes a difference, and that it is as well to be unsure about some things. The post originally appeared on 26 June 2022. The Virtue and Vice of Agnosticism We are sometimes too sure of things we should be open minded about, and too uncertain about the things that really matter. Agnosticism, that tantalising space where we see all sides of an argument and put a definitive answer in the too hard basket, is sometimes a virtue, and sometimes a vice. Let me give a few examples from...
Read MoreConnectedness or Autonomy? From Should to Could
The right of each individual to be astonishing, amazing, independent and – well, individual – has never been more firmly asserted than now. You see it in the shift in our vocabulary. It wasn’t that long ago when people would seriously ask what they “should” do. There was a reasonable community consensus of what constituted the good and moral life, and with that consensus, there was some pressure to conform and to do the things we “should” do. Today we are more interested in all the things we “could” do – and tend to get irritated...
Read MoreRefresh: 7 Signs of a Healthy Relationship
This refresh post from 22 July 2021 explores the ever pertinent question of what signs we can look for to indicate we are in a healthy relationship. Of course, if the signs aren’t there, we can move into the “what can we do about this?” territory. Hope it’s helpful… 7 Signs of a Healthy Relationship I’ve been asked the question often enough, “How can we be sure our love will last? How can we know if our relationship is more than infatuation?” Many decades ago I was helped to explore the question by Anthony Kosnik’s (ed) work Human Sexuality: New Directions...
Read MoreWhy we need confident humility and humble confidence
It seems counter-intuitive to say we need confident humility or humble confidence, but bear with me. It’s not as absurd as it may sound, and there is more than enough research to confirm that the best leaders are confident and inspire confidence when they are also personally humble. Why are both needed, and does it matter? The word humble has it’s roots in the Latin word humus, or “earth”. To be humble is therefore to be from the earth or down to earth. It helps us to understand the beatitude “blessed are the meek (or humble) for they will inherit the...
Read MoreRefresh: On Being a Progressive Conservative, or a Conservative Progressive
This post originally appeared on 30 June 2021, but given how rapidly Christianity is dividing into different tribes, and how hostile the interchange between them is becoming, it strikes me as being more important that ever. Hope you enjoy the read, regardless of where you are in the range… On Being a Progressive Conservative or a Conservative Progressive Is the world so simple that we can quickly attach a valid label to everyone? We often act as though it is – or certainly we do in the world of theology, where we try to separate between those who are theologically conservative and...
Read MoreBecause regret should be a signpost, not a home…
Some of you have asked how my 30 Proverbs Challenge is going. Others have asked what my next book will be. The answer overlaps in that I hope the 30 Proverbs Challenge (a proverb a day for a month providing wisdom for faith, flourishing, family, fortune and the future) will be my next book. I’m working on several key sayings at the moment, some of which readers of this blog have sent me, so my thanks to them. Today’s proverb gives a little taster of what I’m thinking about. Proverb: Regret should be a signpost, not a home. Most of us live with some regrets. There are challenges we backed out...
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