• neurons
    Christmas,  Neurons

    Neurons Ring! Are You Listening?

    I remember a lecture on neurons and the paths they take at adult Sunday school one winter. The lecturer was a respected psychologist and had been influential in my husband’s life. So I was primed to take what he said seriously. He pontificated at length on the manipulation of our neuro-nets by the world of advertising. From his point of view, Christmas provided the perfect opportunity for people to be set up for greed and disappointment. I don’t necessarily disagree, except that God made our nervous systems for a reason. He mentioned how the smells of pine and cinnamon, the ubiquitous strands of lights, and the shiny wrapped presents send…

  • love
    family,  love

    Six Signs that You Love with Intention

    I am always amused by titles like this one until I dive into the topic. Learning to love well takes a lifetime of dedication to the art. Most posts on the topic of love have a long to-do list. And while I agree that love does indeed manifest as action, those lists don’t prove generally helpful to me. After all, my husband and each of my children are so different that what looks like love to one feels unloving to another. Neither am I here to recount the five love languages, as helpful as they can be. I think that to love well, basic guidelines read more like emotional maturity…

  • spirit
    soul,  Spirit,  Spiritual Maturity

    The Care and Feeding of the Human Spirit

    For most of us, the line between soul and spirit is an amorphous one. In fact, many use the terms interchangeably. However, I believe they are two separate, though not unrelated, parts of our identity. Just as God exists in a trinity, so do we, being made up of body, soul, and spirit. Because of this, I think a quick definition of the soul and the spirit is in order. The soul is the seat of your thoughts and emotions. The soul often receives a bad rap. To behave in a soulish way is Christianspeak for acting poorly. But the soul is an important part of our makeup. We spend…