15May 2014 by CJ

My wedding anniversary celebrates the ultimate gift

Love & Relationships
“Love does not consist of gazing at each other, but in looking together in the same direction.” ~Antoine de Saint-Exupery On May 20th, 2014 my wife and I will celebrate our 13th wedding anniversary. As cliché as it sounds, it really does seem like yesterday since we walked down the aisle as man and wife in a beautiful and memorable garden ceremony. A lot has changed in 13 years. So many cherished family members and friends, who were only too happy to attend our nuptials, have passed on from this life. I can still remember many of them dressed-up in their Sunday best – dancing, laughing and sharing in our special day. But one thing hasn’t changed and that’s the commitment we made to each other over a decade ago.…
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12May 2014 by CJ

Let the emotions that break us, heal us.

Love & Relationships
This weekend I did something people rarely do anymore – I wrote a letter. Armed with a blue pen, pad of yellow-ruled note paper and the handwriting skills I learned back in 2nd grade, I was all set to begin this old school approach to communicating. At first I considered an email or a phone call, but felt a handwritten letter provided the more personal touch I was hoping for in this delicate matter. It was a letter to my parents, whom I haven’t spoken to in five years. A little history. I grew up in what I always perceived to be a very close family unit – never dreaming that one day my relationship with them would become difficult to maintain as a free-thinking adult. Growing up I had…
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28Apr 2014 by CJ

Being someone’s caregiver is one of the greatest honors

Generosity & Kindness, Life & Living, Love & Relationships
Being a caregiver is not easy. But it’s truly amazing what you’re capable of when you have no other choice – when reality is staring you in the face and you’re the one people turn to for guidance, support and attention. Tia Walker, author of The Inspired Caregiver: Finding Joy While Caring for Those You Love writes: “To care for those who once cared for us is one of the highest honors.” And while it’s not necessarily an ideal supported by American culture, many understand what a gift it is to give back to those who’ve given so much to us over the years. To accept the “role reversal” that often comes along with being a caregiver not with bitterness, but with tenderness. And while the relationship will certainly change,…
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08Apr 2014 by CJ

Charity is not about what you gain, but what you can give

Generosity & Kindness, Love & Relationships
“When you say "I" and "my" too much, you lose the capacity to understand the "we" and "our".”  Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free I think perhaps the greatest shortfall of mankind is its inability to look beyond themselves with any kind of real charity. So often you hear people saying things like “my” problems and “my” needs as though they were the only people living in society. One’s ego can easily convince us that our lives, our complaints and our problems are unique – that no other human being walking the Earth could possibly understand or relate to what we’re feeling or going through. We then turn that internal understanding into an excuse – “I” am simply too busy to do this or that; you have no…
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19Mar 2014 by CJ

Losing Methodist parishioners is due to not practicing what they preach

Information & Education, Life & Living, Love & Relationships
Many years ago, I used to consider myself a practicing Catholic – regularly attending services and abiding by the rules and restrictions drilled into my head since I was young. But then I became a free-thinking adult. And after watching the poor handling of the sex abuse scandal and their bias towards the homosexual community, I concluded that the Catholic faith was NOT a religion I wanted to be a part of. My wife on the other hand is a loyal and faithful Methodist. She still attends the same church she was christened in almost 40 years ago, the same church her family has attended for generations. Looking for a little spiritual guidance, I began going with her and was surprised how different this religion truly was. Honesty, humility and…
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