A long (cool) vacation. Last Friday, Kia and I returned with our family from a 12 day vacation. It’s the longest vacation we’ve had in years, and it marks the 2nd double digit vacation we’ve taken this year. It’s one of the priorities we set when we attended the Storyline Conference in June of 2011. […]
RIP Sam Wagner.
Life is short. I just learned a high school friend passed away from a tough battle with cancer. Sam was a son, dad, friend, artist, athlete and loved life. It felt like he was living life on his terms. Here’s a video he made last Fall highlighting his art. I have 2 simple thoughts as […]
4 tips to declare independence (today).
Happy 4th of July! Tomorrow we celebrate Independence Day in America. I honestly got confused about what actually happened on this date in 1776. I knew it had to do with the Declaration of Independence, but what happened in what order? My history lessons from 20 years ago failed me (sorry Mr Hoduski…my high school […]
Have you gotten soft? 4 values of hard work.
2 BIG Projects In the past few weeks I’ve completed 2 big projects that required an amount of hard, physical labor on my part. A beautiful garden First, I promised Kia a set of raised garden beds for her Mother’s Day gift. I spent a weekend doing research, gathering materials, building and installing the boxes. […]
4 steps to make better decisions.
This land is my land… 5 years ago this summer, Kia and I purchased a piece of property. We had come to a fork in the road, and we knew we needed to make a decision. We made a choice, and continued down the path. It took us somewhere we weren’t planning. We originally looked […]
What RISK looks like. Pastor. Martyr. Prophet. Spy
Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy I recently finished reading a biography – Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas – on Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer was a German born and raised theologian and scholar during the early 20th century. He is best known for his theological writing in the midst of an anti-Christian Nazi Germany. Dietrich Bonhoeffer […]
Failure hurts. Admitting failure hurts worse.
Great leaders. I love reading, learning and applying leadership skills. A good leader is the able to assess a situation and determine whether it is working well or not. A great leader not only assesses the situation accurately, but a great leader makes tough decisions that are best for the organization (business, church, family, etc). […]
What they didn’t teach you in school. The 90/10 rule.
Boys and boxing movies. Growing up, every boy is a fan of boxing movies. This weekend I watched Real Steel with my boys. It was Rocky with robots, and they loved it. As a kid, I was a huge fan of the Rocky series Character (Rocky) overcomes major obstacle(s) (Apollo Creed, Mr T, Russian, economics, […]
Music to live by (and listen to).
Building your brand. A great way to build your personal brand is to step away from your “normal” voice or topic online (your blog, Facebook page, Twitter account, Pinterest board, etc). For myself, I’ve found sharing music that I like is a good way to connect with others. You may or may not be a […]
What will you say to your daughter?
Sarah Kay Sarah Kay is a spoken word artist who also travels the country encouraging children and teens to express themselves through spoken word poetry. She began her story at the Bowery Poetry Club in NYC at the age of 14, and she’s never looked back. In her TED presentation (which I encourage you to […]
