L.I.V.E. Life Inspired Views for Everyday

Send us Fan Mail When I was a little girl, my dad's nickname for me was, "Mrs. MaGoo." He probably coined the name from a popular children's cartoon in the early 50's and '60's called, "Mr. MaGoo," who was a blind, kind, elderly man and was always mistaking something for what he thought was really there. We do the same. Catherine Ryan Hyde wrote a thoug...

Send us Fan Mail The book,  The Power of Mattering: How Leaders Can Create a Culture of Significance by Zach Mercurio, has become a favorite of mine. It is applicable to anyone because it teaches skills that ensure that those around us know they are valued and significant. It's similar to giving and receiving love. People don't give and receive love in the same ways. Learning what expres...

Send us Fan Mail In the first season of Ted Lasso, Nate Shelley is introduced as the quiet, insecure "kit" man for the soccer team. When Ted asks his name, he doesn't believe he heard him right and says nothing. Ted succeeds in starting a relationship with him and in the end, he becomes one of the coaches, all because Ted showed him value. He let him know that he had significance in...

Send us Fan Mail Has someone ever told you a story about another person and you respond with, "Yup, that sounds like them." Or have you seen or heard other telltale signs by the way of something said or shared or done and you immediately know who it was? People come to know us in so many ways, but definitely by our words, attitudes and choices. It is wise now and then, that we take inven...

Send us Fan Mail How often have you heard someone say, "Well that's a first!" Or maybe they say, "Well, I had a first today!" Firsts are fascinating events. Some of them are powerful enough not only to stay with us in memory, but sometimes they change our lives. Probably because of the brain structure, the role of the amygdala, we remember a lot of our firsts because they...

Send us Fan Mail When I was in high school, I had a friend who loved quotes like I did. We found one that left an imprint on me for all these years. It is not that I am following the wisdom within this phrase faithfully, but having it memorized and referred to often, makes me mindful. The quote says, "While you are dreaming of the future or regretting the past, the present, which is all you h...

Send us Fan Mail The famous former Roman Emperor, Marcus Aurelius wrote, "In the end, character isn't defined by grand gestures, but by the small moments when we think no one is watching. It's our daily choices - our response to rudeness, our handling of power, how we treat friends, children, the elderly - that reveals the core of who we are." I love that. Thanks for listening.

Send us Fan Mail There are some things in life that are "wants," and some things that are "needs." Art sometimes seems like a "want," like "I want to learn to draw," or "I wish I could sing." However, it is different from the "need" for art. Art is as old as civilization. It has survived when human survival was threatened. It is like the...

Send us Fan Mail Algorithm is defined as a procedure for solving a mathematical problem that frequently involves repetition of an operation. Repetition. Repeating something we do or think over and over, creating a pattern, which leads to learning and remembering. Like one of my favorite quotes by Frances Hodgson Burnett, "You learn things by saying them over and over and thinking about them u...

Send us Fan Mail One day, when I was a TAG teacher in Forest City Elementary School, our school counselor resigned. I happened to meet Dave Cunningham, the former school counselor and now the assistant principal, in the lobby the next morning. I asked him if he was going to apply for the counselor position. Dave said, "No, I thought you would." Those five words changed my life. Five litt...

Send us Fan Mail One of the daily feeds I get in my email is  The Writer's Almanac.  It recounts birthdays and anniversaries of famous people of the arts or historical events. I enjoy reading how some of the authors, musicians, or artists were enlightened by an experience or some inner need to write, draw, paint, or make music. It amazes me that they could not say no to the need within to do...

Send us Fan Mail We all handle stress in different ways. Some ways are healthy and some not so healthy. But however it is handled, we all need to deal with it from time to time. I will never forget hearing Dr. Amid Sood speak in a TEDx talk once. He described all these terrible things that had happened to him from cancer, to heart attacks, to strokes, it was a list that almost made you gasp that a...

Send us Fan Mail Leaving a place you have loved and moving toward another opportunity always carries mixed emotions. My dad was a pastor. While in the seminary, he and some of his classmates wrote a book compiled with stories each of them had written describing how they received the call to the ministry. My dad had been a farmer and thought he would always be a farmer...until he felt called to bec...

Send us Fan Mail I have three wonderful books by Kobi Yamada. Their titles are, What Do You Do With an Idea, What Do You Do With a Problem, and What Do You Do With a Chance. These titles spurred an intriguing question. What do you do with a word ? One word can change a life, a career, or a relationship. We have so many opportunities to use a word to do something with our lives. All we have to do i...

Send us Fan Mail There is a philosophy in Japan called Nagomi. It's an ancient word that focuses on calming. It's derived from the Japanese verb, "nagomu," which means to calm down or be comforted. When things get so busy you wonder if you are ever going to get all things done, you need something that brings you balance, that encourages you to trust that everything will be acco...

Send us Fan Mail I grew up always wanting to be liked and accepted. It was hard for me to understand how someone got the courage to disagree with another's opinion or suggest what they wanted to do instead of going along with the crowd. I never wanted to risk doing those things because I wanted to be liked. During my doctoral studies, we were given an assignment to write a growth plan, giving...

Send us Fan Mail As you know, I have been writing in my journals since 2004 after a young English major from St. Ben's University, named Katie Silus, introduced them to me on a plane from Denver to Minneapolis. We exchanged addresses before disembarking and two weeks later, I received a small Moleskine journal and a salsa recipe in the mail from Katie. She changed my life. I am in Journal #23...

Send us Fan Mail Remember a while back when I shared the story about the greedy King, who never smiled? He learned that there was a magical quiltmaker living in the mountains. He asked one of his soldiers why he had never received a quilt from the quiltmaker. The soldier replied, "Because she only gives her quilts to the poor." When the king demanded she give him a quilt, she refused. He...

Send us Fan Mail Last week during class, I showed my students a video clip on being resilient. After it was over, I asked them to write down everything they could remember from the clip. I'd like to ask you to do a similar exercise. Take a piece of paper and pen and for 30 seconds, write down everything and everyone you do not want to take for granted. Did it get easier the more you wrote or...

Send us Fan Mail If you reflect with me for one minute who were the three kindest people you know, who might you choose? What is the evidence that points to the reason you chose them? Would you be in someone's top 3 list of kind people? What would the evidence be that they might choose you? What gives me hope today is that kindness in the end is always stronger than hatred. It lingers in some...

Send us Fan Mail Bonnie Benard, wrote, Resiliency: What We Have Learned, in which she identifies four questions to help understand one's meaning in life. We should consider asking ourselves: 1) Who am I? 2) What do I love? 3) How shall I live? and 4) How can I make a difference. "If there is meaning," says Benard, "there is purpose." Notice that purpose does not necessaril...

Send us Fan Mail The power in stories is that you can use the same story to support many different ideas or concepts. You can also tell stories over and over because not only do we learn something different each time we hear a story, but stories ignite something amazing...connection, hope, peace, inspiration, pleasure...and so much more. I'm reminded this week of a story I have told many time...

Send us Fan Mail Dear Family and Friends,  Have you noticed that when you look through a stained glass window, you cannot see the shapes beyond it very clearly or distinctly? You can hardly even distinguish shapes or colors. But yet there is beauty and purpose in the side you do see. Stained glass is a great metaphor for life in many ways.  Today I will talk about hard things. Like looking through...

Send us Fan Mail Liese Greensfelder, from California, decided in 1973 at 18 years of age to pursue a dream to help people in time of need, so she joined The Norwegian Committee for International Education and Youth Work to work on a Norwegian farm. She was to live with a family on their farm and work over the summer. When she arrived, there was no one at the train station to meet her. She eventual...

Send us Fan Mail My dad was amazing at making relationships and initiating conversations with people. If you had asked him how he was so good at that art, he would probably have said, "Well, I ask a question, and then I listen." And that is exactly what he did. One of his favorite books was, How to Win Friends and Influence People, by Dale Carnegie. He suggested I read it. It has since b...