My dad, who will be 95 this summer, was the 9th of 10 children growing up and living through the great depression in Hampton, Virginia. He attended the University of Virginia for both College and Medical School before being shipped off to Okinawa during World War II. After the war, he settled in Baltimore where […]

The holidays bring with them the potential for considerable stress and anxiety. Most folks can’t help but have hopes and expectations and if these aren’t met, upset feelings are right around the corner. Unmet expectations and thwarted intentions (the major causes of upsets) occur more frequently around family gatherings. So how can we be with […]

One of the hardest things for us to do as leaders, spouses, or parents is to accept ourselves exactly the way we are and accepting our situation exactly the way it is. We are, as a society, very oriented toward self-improvement.  In many ways this is a good thing.  It’s natural for us to want […]

Not too long ago, I was waiting in the outer office for a client of mine to finish a phone call. He was having a very heated dispute with a vendor and the argument, with a heavy dose of profanity, was easily heard by everyone in the small office. I noticed that his assistant got […]

In 1991, at the end of George Bush Sr.’s first term, I remember him being criticized for not having a vision or a purpose for being president. The story being written was that he just wanted to be president, not necessarily take the country anywhere once he achieved that position. Whether or not this was […]

The natural tendency of life is to increase and expand. Whatever there is becomes more and more over time. Everything we observe seems to grow and move in the direction of increase. That impulse is in us as well. It is what sparks our desire, what makes us want to express ourselves as fully as […]

There is an ancient story about a man who, one dark night, has lost his keys and is looking for them under a lamppost. Another man approaches and, learning of the man’s problem, offers to help locate the missing keys. The helper asks, “Where were you when you dropped them?” The man points to a […]

I saw a documentary in an IMAX theatre about an ambitious project that the Smithsonian Institute once undertook. They wanted to create a life-sized flying dinosaur, a replica of the famous pterodactyl. The hardest part for them was to figure out how this ancient bird was able to change direction in flight. They toyed with […]

I read a disturbing statistic the other day in the news. The article stated that reported incidents of domestic violence were up 300% in the areas around the Gulf of Mexico where workers had lost their jobs. The job losses were attributed to the oil leak and the moratorium on new drilling. I can imagine […]

Last week my friend, Dave, and I took a three day bicycle trip along the C & O canal next to the Potomac River. He and I usually take week-long motorcycle trips each summer. Bicycling was different. We were surprised at our being able to talk to each other while we rode side by side […]