Tag: Life Coaching
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Honest reflections on Unhealthy Relationships part 2: complaints
We can often find outselves hiding our needs in a complaint. We haven’t had a date in a week. You never listen to my ideas. You never take initiative. All these can easily be reframed as a simple request to have your needs legitemately met. Could we go out on a date tonight? Can we […]
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Life Lessons: 49 Life Lessons. Lifecartography, 9 years later.
49 Life lessons learned by age 49. As I approached 40 years old, I decided to sit down and write. I wanted to write things I had learned, so that I wouldn’t forget them. Well, research says that you don’t forget as much as your library gets bigger. But that’s beside the point. So those […]
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3 last minute gifts guaranteed to please
It’s the day before Christmas and the stores are packed. What can you give that person you know well? You are wondering the aisles, thinking how meaningless the whole thing is. What do you get to truly express your heart? Or the relative showing up at the party that you know nothing about? Here are […]
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How to be popular: Life Lesson #27
The secret to popularity. The first popular kid I remember from school was in 4th or 5th grade. From then on, the popularity contest ran full swing until graduation night, populating the hallways of highschool with “in” kids and everyone else, “cool” kids and everyone else. These were rarified airs to travel in, and being […]
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Life is not school. Life Lesson #26
Life is not school. “Man, I got in trouble for that one.” A friend told me about something he was called onto the carpet for at work. Really? In trouble? Define that, will ya? School, particularly the western model, begins around age 5 with kindergarden. For a minimum of the next 13 years, and often […]
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Free Coffee is not a human right. Life Lessons #25 .
” The precedence of privilege tends to lead to the assumption and demand of right.” This one comes from Mike McClaflin, Africa Regional Director, AGWM, former military officer and king of the short one line answer. A few years ago, I heard Pastor Barnabas Mtokambali from Tanzania speaking about privilege. “We bring pastors in from […]
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Learn to talk to a human. Life Lesson #24
Learn to talk. (credit to my older, wiser brother, Stephen Porter, on the original idea here). I speak 6 languages. Not fluently, and I have an accent in most of them. Swahili was the most recent one I learned and what a fun, challenging experience. My sixth language though? Digital media. You may be a […]
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Get over yourself and get counseling. Life Lesson #15
Go to counseling. There, I said it. A couple days ago, I wrote about dealing with your baggage. But it goes beyond that. I have friends who are separated. Others who are divorced. Others headed that way. I’ve got broke friends. And then I have some who have survived adultery, drugs, and all sorts of […]
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Why being a Marine is better than being a narcissist. Life Lesson #13
<<Important disclaimer. Be all you can be is the slogan of the US Army, not the Marines. But I thought the titled sounded better this way. Call it editorial license. My sincere apologies to all the offended parties.>> You can’t “be anything you want to be.” Pop mantras are dangerous and lead to disappointment. Seriously. […]