Hopeful Thinking

People cling to the belief it’s all going to end badly. Things look pretty shaky right now. But that’s just because we’re looking in the wrong end of the binoculars. The view is somewhat accurate in content, but too narrow, hard to make out. Distorted. It’s difficult to see the larger reality: We are so used to progress we feel like passengers standing in the aisle of a speeding train. We can barely perceive the true speed at which we are moving forward. We feel as if waiting in line at the cafe counter is an eternity of standing still. But it is an illusion. If you take a step back to look at the wider timeline of known human history we have come a long way. And our progress is speeding up. Most notably, our social progress. Just a blip of time ago, whole populations of countries were enslaved by others as a common practice. It has taken (and is taking) a long time to eradicate slavery on this planet. Several thousand years and counting. But you can see the shift over time in what...

    I spent much of my adult life resenting stop lights. I want to move, not grind my brakes to powder in the second hilliest city in the country stopping at every single red light and sign. Attempting to intuit a solution to my tension about this issue (which I definitely inherited from my father), I actually looked to one of the prevailing life practice concepts from many world faiths. Nonresistance. “What we resist persists,” Carl Jung said. There is deep truth to that. When we resist someone or something it has a tendency to use its creativity to develop bigger armor and weapons against us. Nonresistance means working toward what you actually want rather than pushing against—and ultimately giving your energy to—the very thing you don’t want.     I was definitely resistant to traffic lights. But if I felt stress from their existence, what good would that do me? They are a reality of life in any town larger than 250 people. Resisting traffic lights i...

Things look kind of scary right now, it's true. No matter what side of the fence you're on, there are people you love who are on the other. Our recent political campaign season exposed a deep cultural wound. Ironic to the point of seeming cosmic, the two most recent people to occupy the Oval Office could not possibly have been starker versions of the American Dream if they were characters in a Hollywood film script. We have been presented with a most compelling contrast. A contrast much deeper than party lines, deeper than color, deeper than the opportunity gap. Regardless of your views on Obama’s politics, our first black President exhibited fundamental grace, inherent class, thoughtfulness and welcoming. The contrast? The plantation owners have now banded together to become president out of spite. But I also see something really beautiful happening. Probably the most disappointing thing to our current Oval Office Temp’s ego will be how ineffective and unloved he will reall...