Donald Miller's Blog, page 43

What Men Don’t Talk About Enough

Sometimes I worry about the guys. Men are every bit as human as we women are, but it feels like they get to open up about it less.

My husband Craig tells me that ninety percent of his conversations with other men are about weather, news, and sports.

I know this isn’t true for all guys.

But it feels true for many.

And I think it’s really dangerous to be part of a culture that insists you hide your vulnerable self all the time. I don’t think this hiding is good for men or their people or the world. Somebody’s gotta set the guys free.

Photo Credit: Mikaela Hamilton

And I think a lot of people agree, because often when I’m out speaking, someone will raise her hand and say, “Hey, Glennon, where’s the truth-telling and hope-spreading revolution for the guys? My husband needs it.”

That happens all the time.

And that is why I cried my way through reading Scary Close. When I finished this book, I was in a little bit of shock and so I left it on Craig’s side of the bed with a sticky note that said, “Is this book as freaking good as I think it is?”

And THE NEXT DAY, Craig walked into my office teary-eyed and said, “Yeah. It’s that freaking good.”

He’s not a huge reader, but he finished Scary Close in one day, and he’s on his third reading now.

So, anyway.

Just wanted you to know that some help is on the way. I’m really, really grateful for my friend Donald Miller and all the amazing people at Storyline. Craig is grateful, too.

Also, I just really like saying, “my friend, Donald Miller.” How you doin’ Donald Miller, old buddy, old pal? I hope my friend Donald Miller is having a good day today.

K, I’m done.

Well almost. I wanted to leave you with this quote from Craig when I asked what he loved about Scary Close:

I don’t know. I’m still soaking it in. But I think what Don just convinced me of is that all these thoughts I’ve been thinking, all these feelings I’ve had my whole life, all these fears I’ve been keeping to myself… they’re okay. They’re normal. I’m not nuts. Or maybe it just means that Don and I are both nuts. But I’ll take that. I’ll take it. I’m just so glad I’m not the only one. After I finished reading Scary Close, I just felt relief. Relief is the right word.

And if you haven’t read the book yet, you can get it here.

What Men Don’t Talk About Enough is a post from: Storyline Blog

Why Losing Everything Could Be the Best Thing For You

When you’re writing a screenplay, you normally want to have something happen about fifteen minutes from the end of the story in which everything is lost. All the progress that’s been made for the lead character has to wash down the drain. And then, unless you are writing a tragedy, you figure out a way to redeem the situation in the final minutes.

It’s formulaic, I know.

But it works.

You’ll find the “all is lost” scene in almost every movie you go see this Spring. The reason is because it increases dramatic tension, but it’s also in the story because so many people can identify with it.

I can remember three seasons in my life in which I felt like all was lost. They were extremely painful. Two of them happened within the same year.

Looking back, though, that year has gone on to form me more than any other. I am a better person in every way because I went through that pain.

I’m less cynical now.

I have a stronger work ethic, make better decisions, and have a stronger faith. All because I once lost everything.

While the “all is lost” moment in life can be painful, it can also be good. There aren’t many major characters in Scripture who don’t lose everything at one point in their lives. And I’m talking about heroic characters. Mary lost her reputation. Job lost his health and his money. Paul lost his position in society and not to mention his life. Moses nearly lost his mind.

The list goes on and on.

If you come to a place in your life where you feel like you’ve lost everything, maybe you’re right where God wants you to be.

The trick that pulled me through (I didn’t learn this till the third “all is lost” scene in my life) was to ask myself what I was learning while I was still in pain. The third loss was a business loss, so I kept asking myself how the loss served me.

And it served me in many ways.

It took away my addiction to possessions and status, it taught me a better way to run my business, it humbled me, and helped me become more disciplined in my work.

The psychologist Viktor Frankl said when we find a redemptive perspective on our suffering, it ceases to be suffering. I believe that’s true.

God is using the “all is lost” season in your life for His purposes.

And when we submit to His purposes, any death can be redeemed. He’s living proof of that.

Why Losing Everything Could Be the Best Thing For You is a post from: Storyline Blog

Two Ways to Make Everyday Life Feel Like a Vacation

For the last few years, my friend Bob has hosted a retreat in Canada for his friends. The lodge where the retreat is held is 50 miles from the nearest road, outside of Vancouver, British Columbia.

To get there, you have two options: a quick seaplane flight directly to the dock, or a long couple of bus and ferry rides.

I have always taken the long way.

I like to think taking the long way makes the arrival that much more enjoyable. There’s something special about riding through the mountains and experiencing every single bend in the journey.

The retreat usually lasts a few days and is what you may expect — time with new and old friends, full of conversation and good food. We take seaplane rides, scream at waterfalls, and slide down natural rockslides in giant tubes.

Photo Credit: Mandy Reid

While the lodge is a special place, I’m convinced we can all recreate the enjoyment and rest felt on vacation in our everyday lives.

Here are two things I notice about the lodge:

1. The long version of the story is always told.

When I’m at home, there are voices in my head that say things like: You’re behind. You’re already late. You don’t have time.

I often hear these voices when I get in the car on my way to work or when I’m sitting down at my computer and opening up my email for the first time. To combat these voices, I react.

I rush to the office and don’t take time to ask my coworkers how their previous evening was. I invite the short version of the story and get to my desk to catch up as quickly as possible. And I don’t take many appointments to avoid feeling behind, although I love being with people.

At the lodge, these voices aren’t present.

At the lodge, there’s time for anything and everything. There’s no work to catch up on, just friends to catch up with. And when we catch up, we always tell the long version of the story. And the long version of the story is the best version of the story, which leads to my next observation.

2. Some time without distraction allows for depth.

If you’re like me, your phone calls, text messages and emails are coming in throughout the day. When I’m in a conversation and my phone alerts me, it’s hard to stay fully engaged, whether I check my phone or not. What did I just miss? I wonder while trying to keep my eyes locked with the person I’m talking to.

Our phones are a distraction and often keep us from connecting deeply with one another.

At the lodge, there isn’t cell phone service or WiFi. That means no calls, texts, or emails coming in, and therefore, no alerts mid-conversation.

Without distractions, the conversations go deeper.

Don gave me an analogy about writing once that relates to this. He said, “If I’m writing, imagine I’m a deep sea diver. If my door is closed and you need something, I’m able to answer your question, but I have to come back up to the surface. No matter how hard I try, there’s a chance I won’t ever find my way back to what I was looking for.”

And I believe the same is true in conversation. In conversation, we’re deep sea diving with one another, and every phone alert brings one of us back to the surface. It’s not until we cut out the distractions that we’ll be able to deeply connect.

And we need to deeply connect.

I want my life to look more like my time at the lodge. I want to build in more rest and connection into all the other days I have at home. And you know what? I think it’s possible.

This week, quiet the voices in your head that are telling you to rush. Ask for the long version of the story and get to know the people around you more deeply. Turn your phone off at meals and engage with the people right in front of you.

We all desire more rest, connection, and adventure. And yet we forget we have the power to make decisions every day that can either help make our lives feel more rushed or more like a vacation. What does it look like for you to move toward the latter?

Two Ways to Make Everyday Life Feel Like a Vacation is a post from: Storyline Blog

The Most Destructive Thing You Can Believe About Yourself

I went through a season several months ago where things in my life just didn’t feel right. I wasn’t exactly where I wanted to be in my career, but I wasn’t sure how to move things forward. I could tell my marriage wasn’t living up to its full potential but I felt blank about how to make it right.

Needless to say, I was feeling a little discouraged.

I had talked to several friends about what to do and tried their suggestions. One friend suggested I stop letting people “walk all over me” and start being a little more assertive. It was a good suggestion, in theory, so I put it to use. But in the end I just ended up feeling even more like I wasn’t myself.

A few weeks later, I was at a party.

We were milling around a friend’s house, sipping wine and eating little plates of cheese and meat. A friend, who also happens to be a counselor, asked me how I was doing.

I told him I was okay—but not great. I was feeling a little out-of-sorts, I said. I gave him a few details and then waited patiently for him to tell me what I should do about it.

He looked out the window. Outside the window there was a Dogwood tree. I knew it was a Dogwood tree because this was a house where I spent a good deal of time and had talked about it with my friends who lived there.

The first winter they lived there, they almost cut the tree down.

It was so bare and unsightly.

And it blocked the view of the rest of the backyard.

But then, a few months later, we all learned together that Dogwood trees are those beautiful creatures that explode into a frenzy of pink blossoms in the spring.

So my friend looked out the window at the tree and said to me, “what advice do you think the Dogwood tree would give you?” My stomach dropped a little, the way it tends to when a therapist asks you a question you think is weird, but you’re pretty sure you’re supposed to know the answer to.

We stood there silently for a moment and this thought rose up from within me somewhere: “I think she would say, be patient. All things bloom in their own time.”

A few things stuck out to me in that moment.

First of all, I realized this friend was the only one of my friends who didn’t give me advice when I asked for it. In fact, he basically asked me to give advice to myself. He used the Dogwood tree as a way to help me objectify the situation and get the most clear-headed response.

Second, I realized the advice I had given myself was better than the advice any of my other friends had given me—even though they’re all very smart people with lots of wisdom to share. My advice was better because it was well-suited for me and for my specific situation and because I am, well, me.

It’s like a pair of jeans that just fit.

It worked.

In that moment, I realized something really destructive I had believed about myself for a long time that was keeping me from making the progress I wanted in my marriage, career, and life. It was why I was feeling so discouraged and why I was dwelling on my problem and complaining that I didn’t know how to fix it.

I believed I was broken, sinful, and only bad all the time. I believed I couldn’t be trusted.

That’s why I was asking everyone else for advice, without ever considering the option of consulting that still, small whisper inside of me that helps me and calms me and keeps me at peace by gently showing me the next step.

With this advice—the advice I gave myself—my spirit settled.

I felt at home with myself again.

I felt at peace. The discouragement lifted. And even more than that, all the next steps I knew I needed to take began to become clear and manageable to me.

I’m not sure where I picked up the idea that I can’t be trusted.

I wonder if it was my own distortion of the Christian message or if it was insecurity getting the best of me. But either way, what I realized in that moment is that if God is in me, and if He is in you, we can be trusted. In fact, that quiet teacher that lives inside of our hearts might just be the most valuable teacher we have.

I love the way Parker Palmer puts it:

“…we all have an inner teacher whose guidance is more reliable than anything we can get from doctrine, ideology, collective belief system, institution or leader.”

To be fair, I also feel like I should point out that I had a hard time hearing the voice of wisdom inside of me until, in community, someone helped me to mill it out. Often times this inner wisdom gets buried beneath the noise of insecurity, pain and fear.

In order to help each other grow and blossom into our own, miraculous selves, we have to learn to trust ourselves, to stop thinking of ourselves as “only bad all the time.” We have to learn to help each other, in community, get beneath the noise of fear and get to the quiet wisdom we carry inside.

The Most Destructive Thing You Can Believe About Yourself is a post from: Storyline Blog

What is Transparenting?

If you’re a parent, you know how scary it is when your child starts pulling away from you. And it’s frightening when they stop communicating. One of the reasons it’s so frightening is we never feel like we’re done parenting, or honestly, that they’re ready. We are deathly afraid they are going to repeat our mistakes. We fear they will have our temper, or daydream like we do. We fear they’ll argue the way we sometimes argue with our spouse.

Pulling away is, of course, natural in various phases of a child’s development. And every parent has fears. You’re not alone, for sure.

Kids are going to pull away to define their own identities, but some parents are trying something different and it’s helping them stay in the loop with their kids, and staying in the loop is the key to remaining influential in their lives.

What they’re trying is this:

More transparency.

By that I mean they’re letting their kids in on their own shortcomings. One way to increase the chances of your kids not having your faults is to, well, admit them.

That’s not to say these parents are telling their kids everything, or making their kids feel like their problems are somehow their children’s fault, only that they are letting their kids know they’re human, too. And more, that it’s okay to be human.

Photo Credit: Mikaela Hamilton

Kids who grow up in homes where they learn it’s okay to make mistakes are much more likely to grow into healthy adults. If you think about it, a child that grows up learning it’s okay to make mistakes and they don’t have to hide their true, flawed, selves is much more likely to go to their parents for support and advice. Why? Because they learned from their parents they don’t have to hide.

When we go to our kids and say things like “Hey, son, can we talk? I noticed you’ve got a bit of a temper. I want to tell you I think you got that from me. I’m sorry. I feel terrible. Can I tell you how much it’s cost me and what I’ve learned to do about it? And can we stay in conversation about it? Mostly, though, please know I’m sorry about that. Parents tend to pass their best and worst characteristics on, so let’s mitigate the damage as much as possible.”

Now that’s a dream parent.

But it’s not always that easy.

Just being more authentic and vulnerable with your kids will change the life of your family forever. But there’s a lot more to being a great parent than that.

If you want to know more about NOT passing your faults on to your kids, we’ve created a monumental tool to help. We hired a film crew and flew some experts to Nashville to work directly with a young couple trying to raise their kids well. What happened on camera was awesome.

We’re releasing the material in the form of an online course. In just 5 sessions, you and your spouse will get much-needed inspiration and strategy about becoming great parents. And it’s about a 100th of the price of family counseling. For the next 2 weeks, you get the course for $39.95 (offer expires March 17th).

Before bed each night, plop a laptop on a pillow and spend 20 minutes with Mark and Jan Foreman, parents of Jon and Tim Foreman who front the band Switchfoot.

And learn from them how to be great parents.

Mark and Jan don’t pretend to have it all figured out, but it’s hard to argue with their success. They’re the humblest of guides and you’ll find yourself encouraged and inspired.

Right now you can watch the introduction to the course for free. Even the free introduction will give you inspiration you may need as a parent. And until March 17th, the course is available for $10 off. The value is incredible.

Here’s to raising a generation of adults who are comfortable in their own skin, feel free to be human, and consider their parents some of their closest friends.

What is Transparenting? is a post from: Storyline Blog

Pay Attention to What Makes You Cringe

DC Talk, a band from the 90s, once sang, “Some people gotta learn the hard way. I guess I’m the kind of guy who has to find out for myself.”

While this may be true for most, my approach to life has been the exact opposite. I’ve always learned quite a bit from paying attention to the mistakes of people around me.

I was the youngest of five kids.

We were a blended family from early on, so I spent a lot of time around my older sister and three older step-siblings. As an observant nine-year old, I figured out pretty quickly what I could get away with and what I couldn’t. There was always a line I knew I could tip-toe up to, and as long as I didn’t cross it, I wouldn’t get in trouble. And I learned about how close I could get to that line from watching my brothers and sisters.

From an early age, I learned there was real value in paying attention to the mistakes of those around me. I learned that ultimately, every situation is an opportunity to learn, whether it’s us in the situation or someone we’re connected to.

Learning from others applies to business, too.

At Storyline, we’ve learned what we want our company to become from experiencing and paying attention to the mistakes of other companies.

Photo Credit: Mikaela Hamilton

For example, I had a horrible customer service experience when I was moving this past Fall. I’d gone to pick up a rental truck, and as they were asking me to pay, the amount quoted at the cash register was a few hundred dollars more than the estimated total I was given over the phone a few days prior.

As I inquired about the difference to the cashier, he didn’t acknowledge my situation at all. Instead, he communicated, Well, that’s how much it is and I can’t do a thing about it. It would have taken them 10 seconds to acknowledge my concern and make me feel cared for.

But they chose not to.

The fact that I wasn’t cared for as a customer made me frustrated and reminded me of the undisputable importance of acknowledging and informing our customers. I never want anyone to feel the way I felt that day.

Whether it’s in business or something you experience at home, pay attention to what is happening around you. Pay attention to what makes you cringe. Learn from those who “have to learn the hard way,” and keep yourself out of the same experiences.

Pay Attention to What Makes You Cringe is a post from: Storyline Blog

What Are You Shining a Light On?

After watching the events of the Boston Marathon happen a couple years back, we’re tempted to think the world is a terrible place. And in some ways, it is. But what we don’t often consider at times like that is how many good people there were surrounding the bad.

From the destruction, we heard stories of marathon participants running past the finish line to local hospitals where they donated blood. Another man was caught on video rushing toward the explosions and ripping off his belt to create a tourniquet for a wounded victim.

The accounts of heroism were numerous.

One reporter told the story of a man who was rushing in and out of the danger zone, carrying people a hundred yards to safety. Joe Andruzzi, a retired NFL football star who won the Super Bowl three times with the New England Patriots, was seen carrying multiple victims away from the finish line. All three of Andruzzi’s brothers were firemen who rushed into the wreckage of the Twin Towers on 9/11.

I follow friends on Twitter who immediately tweeted they had room in their homes in Boston for anybody who needed a place to stay. More friends than I can count tweeted that they’d stopped, pulled over their cars and were praying. Restaurants in the area offered free meals.

We see this at every terrible event, don’t we?

So much more light than darkness. So much more love than hate. So much more courage than cowardice.

There are a few very loud theologians who want us to believe the heart of man is evil, as is spoken of poetically in Scripture. But they are often wrong (and emasculating) in the way they interpret and teach this idea. They use it as a method to devalue and thus control people.

The real idea is that apart from God, true purity does not reside in us. Without His light shining through us, we are dark inside.

But we often take this too far.

We devalue the true goodness that is, while earthly, in every human being. We all reflect on the goodness of our Maker, whether we know that Maker or not. When we shine a light on the courage, bravery, kindness and altruism displayed by every human being, we say to the world, “See that goodness inside of you? That comes from your Father. You got that from your Father,” and, as such, invite people to know their God.

It would be tempting in times of destruction and loss to focus on the negative, the terrible. It would be tempting at times like these to shine a light on what Satan has done and what Satan is doing. But we shouldn’t. We should shine a light on what God has done, who God has made brave and courageous, and what God is doing in the world.

Fred Rogers (a Presbyterian minister turned children’s show host) once said, “Look for the helpers. You’ll always find people who are helping.”

What Are You Shining a Light On? is a post from: Storyline Blog

How to Create a No Judgment Zone

Sometimes I get judgey. Okay, a lot of the time I get judgey.

When I watch people with yucky colds snot, sneeze, and clear phlegm from their throats with no sign of soap and water or hand sanitizer, I judge them.

When a parent lets their child throw a temper tantrum, sweetly calling their child’s name while the child’s yelling ruins my ear drums, I judge them. When someone I know is in a relationship with someone who has bad character and says “but we have so much fun together” as an explanation for why they stay in the relationship, I judge them.

I’m pretty good at judging.

And it always seems like a good idea, until someone judges me. Then it doesn’t seem fair for anyone to misunderstand, shame, or make assumptions about me.

Judging someone else is a one-way street that always arrives at a dead end.

Judging doesn’t help us to understand other people and it can be a sneaky and negative way for us to attempt to feel better about ourselves by verbally, or with our thoughts, throwing someone else’s face into the mud.

Many of us are familiar with school zones that require us to drive a certain amount of miles per hour, or construction zones that make us slow down and change lanes.

No judgment zones work in the same way.

When we take the time to suspend our judgment we slow down our criticism. We shift our perspective from condescending to understanding.

Photo Credit: Mikaela Hamilton

Life is hard. Some of us are doing the best we can—getting out of bed in the morning, taking breaths, and making it through another day. Working, parenting, loving and being loved, are all things in life that take hard work. It also takes work just to be yourself when it often seems easier to hide behind a façade.

When we create a no judgment zone in our lives we experience a glimpse of what God does for us.

We give each other grace.

We make room for each other’s wounds, mistakes, quirks, and imperfections.

We remember the days that we are tired, sick, spent. The days we are short with each other and our anger gets the best of us. The days we made all the wrong choices when we had all the best intentions.

Human beings are terrible at judging.

But God is great at it, because only God can see the intentions of a human being’s heart.

So the next time you are tempted to be judgey, remember how it felt the last time someone judged you. Think of how you felt on your worst day and give other people the same grace you needed. Think of the love and grace that God gives you even when you don’t deserve it. These are the best tools to create your own No Judgment Zone.

How to Create a No Judgment Zone is a post from: Storyline Blog

What to Remember in the Dead of Winter

A few days ago, I took a walk in the wooded area behind our home. I went to check on the daffodils whose buds started peeking out due to a warm spell in late winter. I’m not really sure why I checked on them, as there was little help I could provide them against the impending cold.

However, while on my walk, I noticed that my Lenten Rose bush was in full bloom. The Lenten Rose is a small shrub that can’t really figure out its place in the rhythm of things.

I relate to it.

It almost dies back in the winter, but not fully. While its green leaves are muted, they never quite submit to brown. It’s not particularly flashy and isn’t chosen all that much for yards and landscapes. If plants could tease one another, I think it would be the butt of the plant jokesters.

And while it’s often seen as nothing special, every year it brings tears to my eyes. I have two of them in my yard.

Photo Credit: Mikaela Hamilton

In late winter (or early spring), long before the daffodils or crocuses peek from the ground, blooms quietly emerge from this little plant. While other plants show off their blossoms, the Lenten Rose is demure about it. Bowing its head, the blooms gently fold themselves against its leafy foliage.

Sometimes one has to look for it, as it tries to conceal its several shades of purple and pink against a white background.
Truth be told, the winter is always hard for me.

I don’t do well with the sun going down early, dark cloudy days, and the lack of green. It’s also the season of my darkest hours in years past, and the reminder of it all sometimes settles in like a heavy fog. As the winter progresses, something in me always needs a sign, begs for a sign, of hope.

And then one morning, near the beginning of the season of Lent, this dear little shrub greeted me, full of blossoms, showing up several weeks earlier than usual.

It declared, “Spring will come.”

“That which has descended into the earth will emerge again.”

And within a month, the Lenten Rose will be proved right. I think that’s why Easter is my favorite day of the year. The signs of hope will be proven true. Lent will be over, the stone will be rolled away, and as Wendell Berry says, I can “practice resurrection.”

Whether you live in a temperate climate or one that has seasons, all of us have a winter—a time where things feel dormant, dark, and little hope can be found. As you trudge through the barren landscape, as you walk through this season of Lent, let this faithful flowering shrub whisper its story to you saying, “Winter will not win.”

What to Remember in the Dead of Winter is a post from: Storyline Blog

What a Relationship with Jesus Feels Like

I got acquainted with Jesus just out of high school. I’d grown up attending church and loved going to church but it’s hard to say I really knew Jesus till much later. I’ll never forget it, actually. I was reading The Bible late one night and happened across a passage in the book of James. The text said faith without works was no faith at all.

Very suddenly, that passage made complete sense to me. I knew very clearly, and quite mysteriously, the way to know Jesus was to take action, was to follow Him, and do things. I’d spent my entire childhood learning about Jesus, learning about right theology and even more about wrong theology, but I’d never once taken action in following Him.

So, I did.

I went outside and started walking down the street. I needed to physically take action.

It didn’t make any sense; I just knew I needed to move. I felt like God didn’t really care about what kind of action I took, I just needed to take action. I don’t think I went to bed that night till 5am. I just walked the streets, trying to follow Jesus.

And for the next two years, my life was a complete whirlwind. I poured through The Bible and the book was truly alive. Though I’d read it a million times, I’d only read it as a religious person, not as somebody who actually knew Christ. And as I read it anew, the text spoke to me in ways it never had before.

The words were like food, like water.

I parsed over them and underlined whole sections. I wrote passages on index cards and carried them around in my pocket.

I also kept taking action. I’d write a letter every day to encourage somebody, printing passages of Scripture at the bottom of each note. I started attending camps, began reading book after book, started teaching The Bible at a local church and so on and so on.

And more than this, I started talking to God all the time. I didn’t use crazy King-James language or manipulative emotion, I just talked to Him and I loved talking to Him. I believed He was listening. It felt like He was listening.

After about two years, the luster wore off.

Today, I study The Bible and it certainly seems alive but it’s not like it used to be. I find The Bible fascinating and am still drawn mysteriously to Jesus, but it’s more like being with somebody I’ve spent years with than with somebody I just met.

I read once that when a person falls in love the brain creates a chemical that bonds the person to their love interest. Sadly, after two years, that chemical subsides and another chemical is created that continues the bond (if nurtured and protected), but the bond is less passionate, less energetic, and more thoughtful and familial.

I suppose that’s how I feel about Jesus now.

I feel like He’s family.

Or, more appropriately, I feel like I’m in His family. It’s almost like we once had a passionate thing and now we’re just kind of growing old together.

Often, when people try to get me worked up about Jesus, zealous and emotional, I don’t necessarily feel like it fits me. I’d have to fake it if I acted that way. To me, faith is about maintaining and protecting a solid relationship in which there is now about fifteen years of history, too many memories to name, lots of great, slow work to do and plenty of other people to introduce Jesus to so they can start their relationship as well.

What’s very cool and comforting to me, though, is I experienced the same brain chemistry that happens in an intimate relationship, only I experienced it with God.

The whole thing helps me believe He’s really there. Now that’s something to act on.

What a Relationship with Jesus Feels Like is a post from: Storyline Blog