Category: Bridge
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Why Do We Rush to Make People Feel Better?
Someone starts crying. Don’t cry. Someone is worried. Everything is going to be okay. Someone is disappointed. Maybe it happened for a reason. Someone is grieving. At least you had all those wonderful years together. Someone is angry. Try not to let it bother you. Most of these things are said with love. We see…
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Not Everything You Feel Is Yours
Something strange happens when you finally get quiet. You start noticing how noisy everyone else is. Not loud. Noisy. You walk into a room feeling perfectly fine and ten minutes later you’re tense. Someone rushes into a meeting carrying urgency and suddenly everyone is moving faster. You spend an hour with someone who is angry…
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How Do You Know a Good Human When You Meet One?
A friend recently told me something about his brother that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about. His brother is one of those people who leaves a wake behind him. Conflict. Hurt feelings. Broken relationships. Illegalities. Messes that other people somehow end up cleaning. And yet he keeps moving forward—unscathed. Things work out. Opportunities…
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How Do You Know a Good Human When You Meet One?
A friend recently told me something about his brother that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about. His brother is one of those people who leaves a wake behind him. Conflict. Hurt feelings. Broken relationships. Illegalities. Messes that other people somehow end up cleaning. And yet he keeps moving forward—unscathed. Things work out. Opportunities…
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Are There Really Only Two Types of People?
That’s something that I have believed for many years – givers and takers. You are probably thinking right now which one you think you are. Some people seem to move through the world asking, What can I get from this? Others seem almost constitutionally wired to ask, What can I give and contribute? We tend to know which…
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The Conversation You’re Having Before the Conversation Even Starts
Do you ever stop to wonder why we spend so much time preparing for a conversation leaving little room to be truly present in the conversation? Think about how often we do this. You’re driving to work and already having the meeting. You’re in the shower explaining yourself to your spouse. You’re walking toward someone’s…
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Why Is It So Hard to Let Someone Be Wrong About You?
Think about that. We all do it. And we do it so often we don’t notice. We are constantly on guard to prevent it and when it happens, it consumes our attention through worry and doom-casting. And when someone does get you wrong, there is a sudden and almost irresistible urge to “clear this up.”…
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The Practices of Remembrance
If you’ve read the previous essays, you already know I believe the veil isn’t built all at once. It accumulates. Layer by layer. Every disappointment. Every fear. Every certainty. Every adaptation that once helped us survive. Which raises another question. If the veil naturally thickens… what thins it? I have come to believe humanity has…
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The Witness and the Wheel
There is a part of you that has been working tirelessly for as long as you have been alive. It learned to anticipate danger before you knew what danger was. It learned which words earned approval. Which mistakes carried consequences. Which parts of yourself felt safe to reveal. And which parts were better kept hidden.…
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The Forgotten Sun
I have a suspicion. Not about ancient wisdom. About ourselves. I suspect most people spend the first decade of their lives becoming who they are… …and the next several decades becoming someone else. Not intentionally. Lovingly. Patiently. Almost invisibly. We begin life remarkably authentic. Watch a young child long enough and you’ll notice something adults…