Decide Who You Want to Be

February 27, 2026

Arnold Schwarzenegger writing in his Pump Club newsletter taught,” Old Question: Why does change feel so hard for me? Better Question: What identity am I trying to grow into, and what’s one action that person would take today?”

Arnold has been a long-time fitness evangelist. But these questions work for other changes you may wish to make. Being a better follower of Jesus, for example. Or establishing a prayer or meditation routine.

 “We tend to act in alignment with who you believe you are. And change doesn’t start when motivation shows up. It starts the moment you create your new identity, and it continues with actions that turn that belief into reality.”

Like I advised on countless New Year’s Day posts regarding resolutions. Just write what kind of person you’d like to become this year.

“Psychologists studying habit formation find that identity-based habits outlast outcome-based goals. Instead of focusing on what people want (lose weight, get fit), researchers examined who people believe they are or are becoming.”

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Find The Simple Explanation

February 26, 2026

A famous quote from mathematician and physicist Blaise Pascal reminds us that a great deal of the work is in the revision: “I would have written a shorter letter, but I did not have the time.” Source: Provincial Letters (1657)

I could write an essay on this, but it will stand as is. And it works for other communication, as well.

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Finding The Sacred

February 25, 2026

Spirituality is not just about finding quiet in a noisy world. It is about finding the sacred in the mundane.

Pause, look around, absorb that which surrounds you. Relish the moment.

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Love In The Midst of Hate

February 24, 2026

Albert Camus’s writing formed some of my outlook on life during my university years. I suppose his philosophical work, The Rebel, struck the chord of a generation. But it’s really his novels that evoke insights. He also worked in the French Resistance during the Nazi occupation and World War II. He left us with this thought:

In the midst of hate, I found there was,  within me, an invincible love. In the midst of tears, I found there was,  within me, an invincible smile. In the midst of chaos, I found there was,  within me, an invincible calm. And in the depths of winter,  I found there was,  within me, an invincible summer.  This makes me happy. For it says that  no matter how hard the world pushes against me,  there’s something stronger,  better within me, pushing right back.

The apostle Paul observed in his letter to the Romans how some people (meaning non-Jewish people) had “the Law” on their hearts and instinctively knew right from wrong.

Stephen West in a recent podcast episode of Philosophize This, discussed philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre’s thoughts about why moral conversations seem so unsatisfying. He despairs of people knowing what’s right from wrong.

But our tradition observes a different psychology. Excepting the psychopaths, we know when we are about to do something whether it’s the right thing. It’s inside us. Like Camus’ love.

Read the thought again. Despite the chaos swirling around us, which is much less than Camus experienced, can we find that invincible love within us? Stop, search within, however briefly, find that love. It’s there.

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Live An Integrated Life

February 23, 2026

Jesus hated people whose words and actions were not integrated. These reveal hypocrisy. I’ve recently pondered some of the political leadership class who are going around preaching one message, yet their personal life is completely opposite.

We have seen far to many of the religious leadership class whose cup is burnished bright on the outside, yet the inside is coated with crud. (To paraphrase Jesus.)

Do not be like these. Strive to align your words and life with the teachings of Jesus around love. 

As one rabbi said, after the commands to love God and love one another, all else is just commentary.

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God Is Not An Idea

February 20, 2026

Sometimes people cross my path who discourage me. So many seem to think that God is an idea. Or a proposition to agree with and/or argue. Certainly many people get their kicks thinking about God. Playing with ideas applying rationality to deduce who or what God is. I even remember the “God is dead” movement, members who looked at culture and deduced if people no longer believe in God, perhaps God no longer exists.

Carl Jung, the pioneering psychologist, was asked toward the end of his life if he believed in God. “Believe?” he pondered. “No, I don’t believe; I know.”

I’m with him. If you have experienced God even in the briefest of encounters, you know that God exists. Perhaps there are things you still need to believe (or not), such as healing an individual or creating the universe.

Jesus said (recorded in John) that God is Spirit and must be worshipped in Spirit. When you feel the experience of the spirit and employ discernment to assure that wasn’t just gas (or some false feeling), then you know.

The reason to develop spiritual practices is to cultivate the embracing of the spirit. Just like when I sit down to write and haven’t an idea, just the sitting with my pad or computer forces my thinking. Sitting in mediation or study (reading, listening, writing) starts me on the path of experience.

A children’t song, quoted by the theologian Karl Barth, goes, “Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.” Actually, people knew that for 360 years before there was a Bible. And many people know it in all the centuries since even unto today because of the experience of the Spirit.

It’s open to you. Just open yourself to it.

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Unplugged

February 19, 2026

When a company I worked for closed in the mid-80s, I did some PC support. Answers to two questions solved 90% of the problems. Is it plugged in? (i.e. do you have power?) Turn it off, pause 20 seconds, turn it back on.

Later working with industrial automation, the same two questions when a customer called.

This week spanning four decades of experience, the same problem/solution arose.

I was reminded of these experiences upon reading this thought from Ann Lamott, “Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.”

Feeling a bit stressed? Perhaps somewhat despondent? Can’t get started on that project?

Take a few minutes to unplug. Shut the laptop. Set the mobile phone to mute and dock it far away. Turn off the TV. Just sit. Unplugged. Five minutes can do it. Ten is great. Twenty—a miracle.

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Change and Grow

February 18, 2026

You are under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago. Alan Watts

Matthew, the apostle and author of a Gospel, tells us about the beginning of Jesus’s ministry:

From that time Jesus began to proclaim, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”

That word “repent” carries emotional baggage to many of us. The word simply means change. We were living one way, then we change and live another. When Jesus said it, the strong implication was that we would change for the better. And better being defined as living according to his teachings (following this proclamation, Matthews tells us Jesus assembled some disciples and began teaching crowds of people; the subject matter of the teaching he records as the “Sermon on the Mount”).

Not only are we under no obligation to be the same person we were five minutes ago, we are encouraged to evaluate where we are and change direction for the better.

I have read a contemporary philosopher whose concern rises from a observation that all the gurus and influencers promoting continuous improvement programs lead to a culture of narcissism. Too much “all about me.”

Following Jesus’s way actually means change isn’t about ending with us. It’s what comes next. We must change our ways (and some of more often than once!) so that we can better serve others.

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Make Your Choice

February 17, 2026

Mahatma Gandhi wrote decades ago, “Formerly men were made slaves under physical compulsion; now they are enslaved by the temptation of money and of the luxuries that money can buy.”

Today, Gary (and many others) look at the culture noting beyond the temptations of money and power, there reside the insidious temptations of social media and deep conspiracy theories.

Jesus taught millennia ago, “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”

Where your attention focuses, so focuses your heart. Where is your focus? What is your master?

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Curiosity Killed the Cat–Not

February 16, 2026

What did school teach you?

Memorize the text and remember long enough to repeat on a test?

Granted, It is useful to our lives to have memorized many things. Sure, you can look them up in seconds on your smart phone. But, what if you’ve made the intelligent decision not to always have the smart phone?

To this day, I still have qualms about chemistry. A year of high school and a further year in college did not help. I kept asking why. They kept responding, just memorize the balance equation and repeat it on the test.

But I was curious about how it all worked.

What is your religion teaching you?

Memorize these verses in order to recall them to win an argument?

Jesus often responded with a question when approached by someone with a question. Maybe that means questions are good. He also complimented people for asking a question.

Some people are afraid of questions. Perhaps a question might shake their faith. I’ve recently come across an interesting thought—The opposite of faith is not doubt; it is certainty.

I don’t have faith in gravity. I’m certain that if I jump up then I will come down. 

When Jesus says that he offers peace to us, I have faith I can receive that peace. But then I look around and question—there certainly doesn’t appear to be a lot of peace out there. What’s up, Jesus?

I’m curious. What did he mean? How do we receive it? What will it mean to us to ingest that peace?

It’s OK to question. It’s OK to seek that peace (or other things) Jesus offered with faith even though I may not be certain. That’s called life. Practices exist to help me find that peace. But circumstances exist that lead me to wonder if peace is possible.

I’m with the guy who was the most honest person in the New Testament, “I believe; help me in my unbelief!”

I will read, and question. I’ll continue to be curious. I don’t think curiosity really killed the cat. I don’t think it’ll kill be. I think we’re both stronger for it.

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