For a year we’ve lived our lives in the first person. Our focus has been on “my health, my body, my safety, my family, my opinion, my choices and my anxiety.” This is, of course, not surprising as the existential threats of pandemic, financial loss and ideological civil war continue to loom over us. I...Read More

I love strategic thinking and planning, especially when it’s all about me! I relish taking a personal retreat, carrying one of those huge post-it note flip charts with me. I enjoy spending several days dreaming about the future and crafting a plan to get there. The last time I did one of those personal planning...Read More

OK, yeah, you’re thinking “I love you” is only three words. Those are THE best words you could ever say to someone, agreed. But there’s something almost equally powerful in this phrase – “I see in you…”. When you utter those words and follow them up with the admirable characteristic you indeed see in your...Read More

“The first duty of love is to listen.” Paul Tillich I spend a good part of my day listening to people.  When someone wants to discover their calling, it requires them to thoughtfully recount their life story. And I am present to bear witness to their memories. It is exhausting to listen. And it is...Read More

A picture is worth a thousand words. All the theory about calling and destiny makes so much more sense when you see it in a picture. So, here you have one. A picture of a young woman, Cassie Anderson, who is taking the leap into her destiny! – Dave Rodriguez  ” A person’s steps are...Read More

This morning I was thinking about death. No, I’m not ill, nor are any of my family. But the topic has certainly been front of mind lately. There’s the daily tally of COVID deaths I see every morning in the New York Times. The memorial service I’m conducting this weekend for a young lady whose...Read More

I usually enjoy retrospectives – looking back to capture the essence of a season we’ve enjoyed or endured. Not this one, though. I have little interest in revisiting the heartbreaking images of mobile morgues, sobbing healthcare workers, violent US Capitol terrorists, and murdered defenseless black US citizens. Our emotional guardrails have been severely damaged, and...Read More

Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash It’s a time of resolutions. We are one year removed from the fateful beginning of The Year of the Pandemic in America. No more needs to be said about this year of our discontent. Thankfully there are signs of hope. The third deadly wave seems to be waning and...Read More

A few weeks ago I was deciding on a book of the Bible I wanted to read in my time of daily reflection. I found the perfect part of the Bible to fit my mood, the book of Ecclesiastes. For those of you who are unfamiliar with that particular piece of scripture, let me summarize...Read More

A commonly held belief these days is that post-pandemic we will likely not get back to normal. Things will have been so fundamentally altered that relationships, careers, lifestyles, hopes and dreams will be, at least, modified. I wrote about this topic a number of months ago (which feels more like years ago). This season is...Read More