You Were Made for This

Our relationship with time can re-energize us when we return to the rhythms of life that once brought us joy. Today's episode illustrates the point. I love living where I do because of the four distinct seasons of the year. Each one with its own unique joys and challenges. You know what I mean. Unless of course if you live in Barrow, Alaska or in Bangkok, Thailand. I love the rhythm of having one...

The longing to belong is a powerful motivator in relationships. It can spur us on to reconnect abandoned relationships, as we see in today's episode of an adult adoptee finding her birth mother. In today's episode we finish the interview with Gail Rohde we started in episode 29. Our conversation with Gail is based on the premise that everyone has a story, and the more we know the story of others,...

Behind every relationship is a story. The better we know the story of the people in our life, the deeper our relationship will be with them. Today's episode is about a woman's search for her own story. The story surrounding her adoption. Everyone has a story, I mean everyone. In an earlier broadcast I mentioned that when I was a creative writing teacher back in the last century, I would take my st...

Remembering life-giving relationships from our past is to remember God's love for us in sending just the right person, at just the right time, to do just the right thing we needed. It's a Memorial Day to remember. This episode shows how. I don't know if they have something like this in other countries, but in America the last Monday of May is a national holiday to honor the men and women who gave...

We knew it was coming. Our 22-year-old daughter Jennifer had already told us they were planning to get married.  So the priority mail letter I received from her boyfriend Tim, inviting me to breakfast, was a tip-off the size of Mt. Rushmore.  Here's how this important conversation went down. They were both coming to town for Thanksgiving, and he wanted to meet with me the day after. Our Thanksgivi...

When relationships problems stare us in the face, we sometimes freeze, retreat, and do nothing. Today's episode suggests another approach for when we just don't know what to do. The four years I spent in college were some of the happiest and most transformative years of my life. It was there that I was exposed to the physical sciences, social sciences, the arts, literature, and my first and greate...

No matter how difficult our job, there are ways to view our work and daily responsibilities that can bring out the best in us, and draw us closer to God. Listen in to learn how to be encouraged when our 9 - 5 activities are getting us down. Our relationship with our work is one of the key relationships of life. How we view what we do to earn a living tells a lot about ourselves. Some of us are ble...

There's a richness to learning together in community. Today's episode is listeners sharing what they've learned so far in this podcast, which will hopefully encourage and stimulate your thinking about relationships. For several years Janet and I have had season tickets to our local repertory theater company. We go with three other friends and see five plays each season. What makes it more fun and...

"The most powerful words in the English language are 'tell me a story,'" says Pat Conroy. Today's episode contains two relationship stories that illustrate the power of doing something small that achieves something big. I can't seem to get the episode from two weeks ago out of my mind, #21, "The Most Important Relationship of all." The relationship story I talked about certainly is an active part...

Relationships are often built upon what we learn from others who share their stories with us. We grow when their story becomes part of our story, so we then have something to pay it forward to others. Listen in to learn how. I've been thinking more about last week's episode #21 "The Most Important Relationship of All." It was about a story told to me when I was 19 that set me on the path I've been...

Relationships are important, but there is one that is more important than all others. What we decide about that relationship will set the trajectory for the rest of our life. Listen in to learn more. Am I the only one, or do you ever think about how the trajectory of your life has been shaped by a single event you experienced many years ago? And how when that event occurred you had no idea how it...

What should our relationship be with people who talk too much or otherwise annoy us? Should we write them off as too self-absorbed and move on? Or is there another way to relate? Today's episode explores this issue. A listener in Florida contacted me recently about a problem they were having that I sometimes have: People who talk too much. People who talk AT you, rather than WITH you. "It is so ve...

Our relationships are enriched and encouraged when we get to know people outside our own generational and relational box. Today's show brings encouragement in abundance from a Millennial and her Generation Z sister. The last two episodes, 17 and 18, about the relationship between two sisters, has triggered some thinking in me that I want to share with you today. There's been quite a bit written ab...

Today I want to finish the interview we started in last week's episode 17, " Two Sisters - Part 1." If you listened to that show you may recall that I spoke with two sisters in their '20's, Hannah and Abby Barbeau. It was to learn what we could from them about sibling relationships, and also their thoughts about other relationship matters. Their perspective, as a millennial and someone from Genera...

I recently had breakfast with a pastor friend who retired last year. A very young 70-old guy who is now off doing other meaningful things with his life. Among other things, Mike and I talked about the transition he led his congregation through to prepare for his passing the baton on to the next generation of leadership at his church. He talked about the importance of the older generation disciplin...

Relationships between missionaries and those who send them are designed to be mutually beneficial. Today's episode describes how to care for that relationship, and what the people back home get in return. Listener Responses to Prior Episodes The first one is from a missionary who served in Asia, and is now living in Germany. She responded to Episode 9 Shadows Connect Us with Each Other. "I was tou...

One relationship situation that can be a challenge for a lot of us is relating to someone grieving the death of a loved one. Before we delve into this issue, I want to share some Listener Responses to prior episodes I find that the study of relationships and people is a life long journey I am glad to be on. Although sometimes it is rather depressing, when people don't want to embrace change or gro...

Hello everyone and welcome to episode 14, Relationship Skills - Level 4. This episode is the last of our series on the 4 levels of relationship skills. But before we dive into this topic, I want to share some listener responses to our podcast that have been coming in since we started at the end of November 2018. December 19. Hi John, I just wanted to let you know how much I enjoyed the last two po...

Hello everyone and welcome to episode 13, Relationship Skills - Level 3. If you are a first time listener, please know that this podcast is all about relationships and transforming them into the best they can be. We started a series on the four levels of relationship skill a few weeks ago. And today we're focusing on level three. I'll have links to the previous tywo episodes in this series at the...

In episode 11 last week I mentioned that the first step in improving our relationship skill is to assess the level we are it in our relational development. Knowing our starting point helps us see what how far we have to go to become more skilled in our relationships. It can motivate us to move to higher levels of relational expertise. Let me run through the four levels real quickly, then we'll com...

Last week in episode 10, I talked about the two features found in every good relationship, the first being want . The desire to  want the relationship to be the best it can be, as evidenced by taking action to enhance a relationship. Relationships take work and if we're not willing to work at it, they're not going to be sustainable. We have to  want it bad enough to work for it. That's the first f...

If you've listened to any of our previous episodes you'll know by now that this podcast is all about relationships. Relationships are what we are all made for. Fulfilling, life-giving relationships. Some of our relationships are like that. But others sometimes are not. What's the difference between good relationships that work well and those that don't'? It comes down to two words. The first is wa...

In last week's episode 8, I was going to comment at the end about my interview with Charley and Ruth Shirley, but our executive producer, Carol thought that would detract from what they had to say. So rather than prattle on (Carol hates prattle), she suggested I put my comments in the show notes, which I did. At the end of the show I mentioned that today's episode would be about the four levels of...

Hello and welcome to all our listeners to episode 8. Today's show is a day of firsts. It's the first episode of 2019 - Happy New Year, by the way - and it's also the first interview we're doing in the podcast. I want to get the new year off to a good start, so I'm sharing this particular interview because it's something I think you'll find uplifting You know, most of us have at least 1 or 2 relati...

Welcome to episode 7, the year in review and the year ahead. I like to think of it as the best of 2018. But since we only started on November 28th, it's also the ALL of 2018. By way of a brief review, and for any first-time listeners, this podcasts is all about relationships. Experience and observation have taught me that relationships are one of the most rewarding aspects of life, and at the same...