Head-dibs

(the following playlist was covered by the Crossings Community Church worship team, arranged and directed by Brandon Auten. Ten singers, five guitars, three keyboards, two drums sets, one bass, one violin and one cello and the best sound and lighting team in the world.) THE GLORY OF CHRISTMAS THE REASON FOR CHRISTMAS THE SUFFERING IN CHRISTMAS THE SON OF CHRISTMAS: "what have I done to deserve a love like this?" THE SAVIOR IN CHRISTMAS

This writer said it best: "I often read the ancients. Marcus Aurelius, Seneca and Epictetus feel like old friends. This may sound pretentious. I don’t care. They feel like people whose company I would have loved. They talk about timeless issues and this makes them real to me. They are not blighted by prejudice or dogma. They are honest and open in their musings. They don’t hide their flaws. They are not seeking sainthood just wisdom. They are seekers of the “good life.” They are sincere in their quest for understanding what is the best way for a human to live his or her life. To encounter such voices is to recognise that others have thought the same thoughts, experienced the same feelings, sadnesses and joys." From Peter Lyon's timely article, " Musings Of A Blind Stoic ."

I'm at the point in my life where I could be happy with a small armload of books. When I survey the blocks of paper occupying my shelves, I am grateful for the minds who share their thoughts in them, but it's a crowd of voices. I'd like to surround myself with a few great men who have great things to say--the kind of men who would pull a knife from their pocket, slice off a chunk of apple and ruminate with horse-sense on things that really matter. I am spending some time with an old friend I've not visited in well over 30 years. I'm out on a pond outside Concord, Massachusetts. You might know the place, on the way to Boston. You might know my friend, the anarchist Henry David Thoreau. Giving the Stoics a break, I'm reading Thoreau's "Walden And Civil Disobedience" with pencil in hand. No agenda. Just visiting. Just one book from the pile I'd rescue from a fire or wouldn't mind being stranded with. (I carry three in my backpack at all t...

"Anything that can be prevented, taken away or coerced is not a person's own. But those things that can't be blocked are their own." (Epictetus, Discourses, 3.2.4) Think for a moment about the the things you work so hard for. Think also about someone you may know who works so much harder for something you would consider less, beyond daily living. How many scrape and claw and fight and sweat and grieve over one model of car or piece of electronics? There are some amazing refrigerators out there, some with computers built right into the door. Truth is, like any other refrigerator, it's going to break down. Something is bound to stop working. The only difference between that one and mine is that mine is going to be less expensive to repair. But what is really yours? What do you really own? As it stands, you may have forgotten how some bank somewhere might actually own all your stuff. It's not yours. Yet. The car I've been driving for years will finall...

“People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive.” ―Joseph Campbell (1904–1987), Professor of Literature

Last month I was challenged to run 100 miles with a friend, but by month's end we came up 4 miles short due to sickness. That sort of pictures most things I try--great starts and lousy finishes. At first I am disappointed when I come up short or fail but then I remember that sometimes I'm not supposed to finish. Failure becomes training ground. Like all those journeys and expeditions you read of where great explorers packed up their gear and left for months or years--some to die, some to fail, few to finish. That's the way it goes. At least we tried. Had we not tried, we would never know what we could or could not do. There's always another chance to try again, as long as we live. That's how great things get done. By trying. But I am getting ahead of myself . . . As December begins, one wonders how to begin a new month while also thinking about closing out another year. This last year I've been reading The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday. Each month has a th...