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Category: Understanding Love

The Right People

Published on April 27, 2022

You can be plump in the middle of a crowd and still feel lonely.

Lonely doesn’t have to do with being around people.

It has to do with being around the right people.

How do you find the right people you ask?

When you stop turning left, of course.

No, seriously.

You find yourself in the wrong groups because you’re turning into them. If you’re not connecting with the people on your “left,” go “right.”

In other words, question the choices you’re making. Are the people around you making you feel seen, heard, and connected? Or the opposite? Likewise, do you feel like you can genuinely see, hear, and connect with those around you? Or not so much?

If the vibe is off then it’s time to honor new curiosities; learn new skills; join new clubs; try new challenges; volunteer with new organizations—it’s time to turn “right.”

And if you’re having a hard time figuring out what “right” might look like, then you need to spend more time with yourself.

Because if you aren’t connected with yourself (and your own aptitudes/interests/curiosities), how is anybody else supposed to be able to connect with you?

Step 1: Figure out who you are.

Step 2: Go where people like you go.

Step 3: Introduce yourself to those people.

Step 4: Make friends with those who introduce themselves back.

Connecting Points

Published on April 26, 2022

We don’t form connections over what’s perfect, we bond over what’s imperfect.

Remember this when your trials result in error, mistakes, and failure—those are connecting points, not disconnecting points.

The Pre-Req To Connection

Published on April 17, 2022

The solution to loneliness isn’t exotic destinations.

…It’s connection.

And connection happens when you say to the world: “This is who I am.”

Rather than waiting for the world to notice you and, at best, say: “This is who you’re going to be.”

Because how can anyone else connect with you if you aren’t first connected with yourself?

The Antidote

Published on April 9, 2022

The antidote to harm: Love.

The antidote to hate: Love.

The antidote to indifference: Love.

The antidote to fear: Love.

The antidote to cruelty: Love.

Be a walking antidote to the poisons of the world.

Love, Like Death [Poem]

Published on April 1, 2022 
The size of your love for another
Isn’t equal to the size of love
the other receives

The most beautiful love letter ever written
Pales in comparison
to a simple hug from the one that’s right

If there’s anything I’ve learned from love in this life
It’s that love, like death,
isn’t something you get to decide

Exercising Your Advice

Published on March 14, 2022

You can only help in so far as you are strong.

Those who never build their own strength remain weak—and their ability to help others remains weak, too.

Imagine a person who has never lifted a weight running around a gym, giving people 20 minute lectures on how to lift weights.

Now imagine a jacked person who is usually quietly focused in the corner walking over to you and offering you a quick, 20 second correction on your form.

Which would you prefer—the 20 minutes or the 20 seconds?

Of course you’d prefer the 20 seconds.

Because the advice is coming from a place of strength.

And in order to build that strength, what did the jacked person have to do?

Avoid running around the gym giving people 20 minute lectures on how to lift weights and focus on him/herself!

This is the oxymoron of helping others. You can only help others better when you become better. And the only way to become better is to focus on yourself—and occasionally ignore the never-ending call to help others.

Don’t run around offering help to people if you haven’t spent time helping yourself.

Quietly stay focused in your corner until you’ve reached your point of being full.

Then, pour from your full cup the full strength of your advice.

Don’t Say Forever [Poem]

Published on March 9, 2022 
Don’t say forever
Like you know what that means
You’ve been here but a blink
And in but a fraction of that
You promise the rest of time
Like you know what that means.

Here's what I think you mean:
The size of my feelings
Feels like the size of forever
Squeezed into the size of this moment
And it's bursting at its seams.
If there's one thing I really want you to say
—It's exactly what you mean.

Because here's what I know:
This smallest piece
Of the greatest whole
Becomes our greatest whole
When it is no longer just a piece.
The size of what we have right here
—Is all we'll ever be able to truly give and receive.

So, before you give away
A bursting moment for an overused cliché
Package the size of your feelings
Within the size of this moment
And give this one complete gift to me
Where you're still able to feel and say
—Exactly what you mean.