WELLBEING

“Write one good sentence.”

This was Ernest Hemingway’s answer to the question, “How do you write a book?”

For about a year and a half I’ve been reaching out to you twice a week with these posts, prayers and poems. My goal has been (and remains) to focus on the one subject that I think has the transformative power to positively (and instantaneously) shape e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g else. That one subject: thinking about how we think.

Most of the time, most of us don’t do this. 

Notice, I seldom write about current events or opinion in mass or social media. In part, I’m steering clear of the divisive or derisive. But in particular, I steer clear here in order to focus all our brain power (yours and mine) on what lies beneath the thinking that up on the world’s surface, is revered as the reigning wisdom. 

Question: What is the singular purpose of every sermon or political speech you’ve ever heard? Answer: To shape how you think. 

Unfortunately, both politics and religion already have or are quickly coming to a screeching halt as either the means or the messengers of authentic wellbeing--a wellbeing we don’t just desire--A WELLBEING THAT IS EVERY ANIMATE AND INANIMATE BEING'S BIRTHRIGHT. Sadly, I say this even of Christianity--and I’m one of its pastors.

One of my favorite sayings is…”If you see a snake, never mind where it came from!”

Never mind the individuals who espouse the thinking that got us here, both politics and religion are being co-opted by long, sharp, ego-infused fangs of thinking that are blatantly unsurvivable for any but the very most privileged perpetrators of their poison.

Learning to write one good sentence is something we begin doing as toddlers with “Me want Mommy.” or “No sleep!” But it does not and cannot end there. Neither can learning how to think. Rather, it’s a commitment we must--and can--continuously make to ourselves and each other for the rest of our lives.

Just as a single “good sentence” is the secret to writing a whole book, thinking a single “good” thought upon another, and another, is the secret to transforming the whole of our thinking, feeling, acting…our living.  

There, I did it again! We pastors tend to talk a lot before we say anything. Guilty as charged! But I love writing to you (whoever you are) about these things and will continue to do so. In return, please remember, your wisdom is welcome here…and in the world. 

Life. Let’s think about it. Together.

TODAY.

LET’S GIVE THE WORLD & OURSELVES A GIFT.

LET’S TAKE TIME TO THINK ABOUT HOW WE THINK.