Our Blog
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On Hatred
We rarely invite hatred into our lives. It’s an emotion we know intimately, one that makes us shift uncomfortably. Yet it arrives uninvited—when an old wound is reopened, in the venom we reserve for betrayal, or in disdain for entire groups we’ve never truly known. Hatred settles like fog, obscuring vision and chilling the heart.…
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Hearing Without Listening—
You NEVER listen to me.” “You only hear what you want to hear.” “How do you always turn it back on me?” “I might as well be talking to a brick wall”. These complaints echo through countless relationships. Paradoxically, the closer we are to someone, the worse we often listen. We bring our most attentive,…
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Why We Think the Way We Do
Imagine you’re a pilot on the tarmac at Salt Lake International, Prior to takeoff, your mind is not on last night’s dinner conversation or problems at home. Your full concentration is on running your checks, talking to the tower, assessing external conditions. Throttling down the runway, your mind is absorbed in the moment. You lift…
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MAN’S BEST FRIEND: Grief as Love’s Shadow
Things Come in Threes The proverb “good things come in threes“ traces back 500 years to German folklore, rooted in the expression “aller guten Dinge sind drei”— “all good things are three”. This whimsical notion has evolved into a mantra of resilience, encouraging a third attempt when the first two tries have faltered. A darker…
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A Tribute to my Mom
Reatha Mary Cardon. Her name was as unique as she was, and utterly timeless and old-school. She was exactly the mom I needed—not a heavy-handed disciplinarian, nor a ‘cool’ mom, nor a ‘best friend’. She was my mom, and I her boy, Her sole concern was to show me how to be a good person.…
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Knowledge vs Wisdom
Acquiring Knowledge in Youth We spend our first twenty years or so of life acquiring knowledge. We learn our ABC’s and our math facts. We discover all those squiggly little lines will turn into reading and stories and adventures that you can absorb and sometimes—when we are lucky—we can disappear into them. I still wonder…
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To Thine Own Self Be True—On Self-Love & Care
Self-Love vs. Self-Care On the topic of self-love, the average, well-meaning person has a tendency to get a little ahead of themselves. Love itself is not easily defined. Self-love and self-care are often used interchangeably, but they are not at all the same. For this essay, I suggest that “love” should be thought of purely…
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Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs: Will I See You at the Top?
KEEP ON CLIMBING—THE 5 TIERS OF HUMAN ACHIEVEMENT On the last day of high school, my classmates and I swapped yearbook signatures, scribbling heartfelt goodbyes before scattering into the world. As a starry-eyed teen, I wrote “Keep on Climbing” in each, adding a clumsy stick figure scaling a mountain. Decades later, despite being weathered by…
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Inherited Shadows— When Someone Close to You Hurts Others
Reconciling Good Memories with Devastating Truth I never imagined I’d be writing to someone my father harmed. Growing up, my memories of him were good. He wasn’t always around, but when he was, he sang songs, played guitar, and gave me funny nicknames. I felt loved and I loved him back. He was kind and…
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The Interplay of Physical & Mental Health
Mental and physical health are often treated as separate entities, yet they co-exist within the same body. Poor health can have profound effects on emotional well-being. A life-threatening diagnosis, like cancer, instantly shifts priorities, making everything else seem trivial. Accidents or injuries causing incapacitation, disfigurement or chronic pain have an emotional impact that lingers for…