Life Talk with Craig Lounsbrough

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues.  Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes.  All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire.  Today's thought is: “If I don’t passionately desire freedom for all of my fellowmen, it’s likely that I haven’t been sufficiently...

How do we change a nation?  We might start by changing ourselves first.  Change begins with us.  We know that, but we also doubt that changing us changes much of anything else except us.  How far does that kind of change go?  Does it really have a broad sweep and a wide impact?  Does it really count all that much?  In the scope of history, much less the scope of this single day, will it matter?  W...

You Are Silent Now -Remembering the Sacrifices “You are silent now who once stood on battlefields ravaged by destruction unimaginable, holding in those desperate places the line of freedom for others you would never know, and who would never know you.  And being one of those you never knew, I would give all I have to clasp your hand one single time, look into eyes that witnessed the bloodied carna...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  Christianity stands for principles that are not stood for in our culture.  It stands for something lofty, but costly.  It stands for principles that are timeless rather than those that suit the times.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”  “So it is that this man named Jesus handily performed feats that were astounding in their scope and utterly impossible in...

Defined By Our History “The nature of our histories are always secondary to what we choose to do with them.” Craig D. Lounsbrough Our histories impact us. However, what impacts us doesn’t define us. Our histories can scar us, cripple us, leave us plagued with deficits, and reeling from loss. Our histories can leave us with overwhelming insecurities, fears that sabotage our dreams, and a deeply run...

Who are you giving yourself away to?  To what propaganda have you come to subscribe?  To what bit of media polished bias or refined political spin have you succumb?  Who has your ear, and therefore holds the heart to which your ear is attached?  What are the voices that have methodically and patiently lulled you into some sort of comatose complacency where you no longer engage this rare, but incre...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  Christianity stands for principles that are not stood for in our culture.  It stands for something lofty, but costly.  It stands for principles that are timeless rather than those that suit the times.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”  “So it is that this man named Jesus handily performed feats that were astounding in their scope and utterly impossible in...

  Father’s Day Some Thoughts   Hi, I’m Craig LounsbroughWelcome to LifeTalk   On Father’s Day week, I want to change the program up a bit and share something a little different on this Father’s Day week. Sometimes it’s a single thought that changes everything. Not some sweeping set of ideas or broad-based philosophy, but a handful of words. Just a handful of words that hold within them an idea tha...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  We spend our lives acquiring what we think we need to fight the battles that we think we’re fighting.  In a world fraught with fear and uncertainty, we assimilate whatever grants us this sense of invincibility and power for whatever battle we think we’re fighting.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”  “I do not weaponize my life for God by rigorously acquirin...

Defined By Our Deficits “Any deficit that you have can never stand against the asset that that deficit is waiting to become.” Craig D. Lounsbrough You know, we come to define ourselves more by what we lack than by what we possess. We define ourselves by the successes that we haven’t had, the relationships that didn’t work, the careers that never happened, and the dreams that never got off the grou...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  We ignore our conscience because we want to do what it says we shouldn’t.  But, we also ignore the consequences of ignoring it.  Consider this “Thought for Life:” “Disabling your conscience is like disabling your smoke detector.  It doesn’t stop a fire.  It just leaves you ignorant of the fact that there is one.” I hope that you ponder that thought today. ...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  We run after a lot of stuff.  Our time, our energy, our finances, and much of our lives are spent chasing stuff.  And when we catch that stuff, we typically find that it doesn’t do for us what we thought that it would do for us.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”   “The insanity of it all is that the search for that which will fill us incessantly drives us...

In the Footsteps of the Few I Was Thinking To Think Outside the Box   “Every child is an artist.  The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” Pablo Picasso   I think that most of our thinking (despite how much there is to think about) is really pretty standardized and chafingly rote. We think in predetermined patterns and pre-existent templates that require no real thinking. And while...

Too often we don't take the time to really ask why we support what we're supporting.  We get swept up in some energizing movement, or we're utterly captivated by some cause.  Something feels inherently good and the premise that drives it appears sound.  We find that an army of people have raced to the forefront of this cause, or it's embraced as long overdue, or it appears right for the times. But...

Am I Passionate for the Right Things? “In full uniform, the color guard marched by as part of the parade.  And as they did, he forced his horribly slumped and deeply aged body out of his worn wheelchair and stood to ram-rod attention.  He held a salute until the guard had passed, and then he feebly collapsed back into his wheelchair.  As I stared in ever-warming admiration, emblazoned across his h...

  Defined By Our Appearance “If the mirror doesn’t give me much back, it’s because it’s not designed to reflect the things within me that make the reflection truly magnificent.” Craig D. Lounsbrough The world has set an airbrushed standard of what we’re supposed to look like. This photoshopped menagerie of idealized versions of a perfected humanity demands something of us that none of us can achie...

The Self That I Long to Believe In Bigger on the Inside Than the Outside Attempting to Define Success to Define Ourselves “It would make sense that our worth should be, and in reality is based on something that cannot be proven for any other reason than its value lies forever beyond the most magnificent achievements that would serve to even remotely evidence it.” Success has been accorded an endle...

Finding Ourselves Somewhere Else In the Footsteps of the Few Not Where We Were It seems that we have some vague and rather ethereal sense of where we’re going in this thing called life.  For the more contemplative soul, that sense might be quite refined.  For the casual traveler, it might be a bit more nebulous and scattered.  For many, where they’re going is defined by the tasks of the day, rathe...

Our freedoms are not a "right."  They are, in fact, a "privilege."  They are not ours to abuse.   Rather, they are ours to cherish.  But as we abuse these rights by demanding our right to them or exercising them in ways that will destroy these very freedoms, we forget that they are fragile.  Very fragile.  They are not permanent.  They are not guaranteed.  They will not stand under the weight of o...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  We need to stop.  We need to put down our calendars, set our phones aside, strip ourselves of the voices incessantly clamoring for our attention and listen.  Just listen.  For life is not what we’re chasing.  It’s what we’re leaving behind in the chasing.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”   “Rich is the person who stops long enough to listen to a bird sing...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  We spend our lives acquiring what we think we need to fight the battles that we think we’re fighting.  In a world fraught with fear and uncertainty, we assimilate whatever grants us this sense of invincibility and power for whatever battle we think we’re fighting.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”  “I do not weaponize my life for God by rigorously acquirin...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  We build bridges or barriers.  If you think about it, everything that we do builds one or the other.  And the function of a bridge is quite different than the function of a barrier.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”   “Every decision will build a bridge or a barrier.  Therefore, what stands in front of you at this moment illustrates the decisions that you...

Dear Mom: I realize that on days like Mother’s Day people tend to wax nostalgic, venerating those Mom’s among us who have passed.  It is, I suppose, a way to express both our deep respect and enduring gratitude, while somehow holding you a bit closer in heart and mind since we can no longer hold you in our arms. Mom, you are missed more than the reach of words and the span of syntax can hope to ex...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  Sometimes we feel helpless.  In the midst of tragedy, or painful losses, or devastating moments, we often feel that we are helpless to do anything other than standby and watch.  Yet is that really all that we can do?  Consider this “Thought for Life:”   “Prayer inserts me into the middle of any battlefield regardless of how gruesome or bloodied.  And in the...

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life.  It’s my sense that God doesn’t need me to speak to you.  He’s quite capable of doing that without me.  But there are times when I sense that He wants me to speak something of Him to you.  And this is one of those moments.  Consider this “Thought for Life:”   “I don’t always preach God, for His existence is obvious.  Rather, I preach what will happen to our...