LIFE IS COMPLICATED. And there are many motivations to get us up and out of bed in the morning, doing whatever things we do, making whatever choices we make. For many the motivation is simply to do a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay. To take care of one’s family and loved ones. For some it is to
AT THE CHURCH O THE PINES, it is a day for truths. As all days are. Truth. Truth. Truth. Truth. It is repeated over and over, from every tree, every animal and bird, every cloud passing overhead, every whispering breeze. The message never varies, and never is there so much as an interruption for a lie. And one is suddenly,
THE LETTER THAT CHANGED MY LIFE, and the next step… Today I am feeling grateful. Tidying up a storage area in the cabin, sorting through materials from my 12 years as president of the Listening Point Foundation, I was powerfully reminded of the profound effect that beloved North Country author Sigurd Olson had on my life. That connection began with
EVERY BONSAI has its own personality, its own character. This character is revealed—and created—by the care it receives—the water and light, the nurturing, pruning, and shaping. Human beings, of course, are exactly the same. “As the twig is bent…” This combination of nature and nurture, of freedom and intent, of extrinsic and intrinsic, is one of the fascinating things about
I ATTENDED a funeral yesterday. And in saying goodbye to David—a good, kind, and gentle man, who always elevated those around him—I thought again of how our lives are so much more than we know. Of how all things are more than we know—intertwined with one another, hinting at depths we seldom explore or understand. But sometimes, perhaps in the