“There is no Frigate like a Book / To take us Lands away.”
Emily Dickinson wrote these words in her quiet room, understanding something I didn’t grasp for decades. The greatest journeys begin within.
I know her poem only because of my 11th grade AP English teacher, Mr. Cox. As a rambunctious and cocky 11th grader, would I have taken any of my “super valuable” time to read poems, sonnets, short stories, even books? No way.
But because of his work (and the work of countless other teachers along the way), I did read. A lot. I learned tons of material and information that didn’t matter to me at the time…but matter a lot today.
My focus back then was simple. Be the best student, get the highest test scores, pass as many AP tests as possible, and earn varsity letters in multiple sports. Mostly, I wanted to beat everyone else, pure and simple. It helped that I was blessed with an almost photographic memory and could recall facts and formulas with ease (sadly, not so much nowadays).
I carried that mindset into college. I loved being the student who defined the grading curve for the class. I was annoyed if I didn’t get every single point on an assignment, midterm, or final. I had an almost uncontrollable drive to outshine everyone…as if that was all that mattered.
I was completely wrong.
On the bright side, that drive and motivation made me a successful student and propelled me into my early career.
On the other hand, seeing everyone as my competition, and less as people, meant I probably missed out on a lot of fun. And lots of friendships that never happened. I was so focused on the destination that I forgot to notice who was traveling with me.
That realization connects me back to Dickinson’s frigate in ways I never expected. She saw the book as a vessel capable of carrying anyone, anywhere, without cost or permission. But what I’ve learned over nearly fifty years since high school is that I was asking the wrong question. It was never “How far can I go?” It was “Who am I becoming, and who’s helping me understand?”
My journey from that hyper-competitive teenager to what I hope is a much more caring, thoughtful, empathetic, nuanced, and life-giving person has been propelled by those same teachers I mentioned earlier, and a longer line of guides who keep showing up at the right time in my life.
I didn’t realize it then, but those books, poems, and teachers were all part of my fleet of frigates. Each one quietly helped me close the distance between knowledge and understanding, between my ambition and wisdom.
My mentors, family, and friends have all been vessels that carried me through changing seas. Some taught me to sail straight into the wind. Others reminded me that drifting for a while can be part of my journey as well. Each lesson mattered, even the ones that didn’t make sense at the time…especially those.
Over time, life has a way of sanding down our sharper edges, revealing something deeper underneath. My focus slowly shifted from being the best at something to becoming the best version of myself.
Now, when I think about Emily Dickinson’s frigate, I picture something far greater than a book. I picture a lifetime of learning, carried by the people who invested their time, wisdom, and patience in me. Mr. Cox, and others who gave freely of their time and wisdom, helped me see that the destination isn’t solely becoming the top of the class. It’s finding a profound depth of understanding, the expansion of empathy, and the ability to see beauty and meaning in small, unexpected places.
If I could go back and talk to that 16-year-old version of myself, I’d tell him the real tests aren’t scored on paper. They’re graded every day in how we treat people, how we listen, and how we show grace.
I’d tell him that the frigate he thinks he’s steering alone has always been guided by grace. The true measure of his voyage will be how much space he makes for others to come aboard.
We’re all learning to sail, carried by the steady hand of God.
There are certain destinations in the world that feel larger than life. The Taj Mahal is one of those places. For many travelers, seeing it with their own eyes is a once-in-a-lifetime moment.
We were finally there. We had made it to Agra. All that remained was to step inside the gates and witness the iconic white marble glowing in the sun.
Only one problem.
There was no sun. There was no white marble. There was no Taj Mahal.
There was only fog.
We woke that morning filled with hope. The rooftop restaurant gave us a commanding view of… absolutely nothing. We stared into a wall of haze, sipping coffee and laughing at the absurdity of our timing. Surely the fog would lift. Surely the Taj Mahal would reveal itself.
Our guide, Kuldeep, assured us everything would be fine. He had led more than 500 tours of the Taj Mahal. He knew everything there was to know about its history and its beauty. We boarded our bus, grabbing our special cloth bags with a picture of the Taj printed on them. These were designed to hold the single water bottle we were allowed to bring inside the property. And we set off with excitement.
Fog. All the way there. Fog in the parking lot. Fog at the security lines. Fog as we walked the long approach toward the main viewing area. Each time Kuldeep stopped to point out an “excellent vantage point,” we nodded with wide eyes, imagining the magnificent structure hidden somewhere in the mist.
We took photos pointing at the picture on our water bottle bags. That was the only Taj Mahal available to us from any vantage point.
As we walked toward the building, we eventually reached the outer wall and finally saw something. White marble appeared just a few feet above our heads. Then the stone vanished again into the haze. The grand dome. The sweeping arches. The delicate inlays. All shrouded in fog.
We were standing beside one of the wonders of the world and could only see a sliver of it.
Our group laughed so much that day. Not because we had traveled halfway around the world only to miss the view. We laughed because we were sharing something unforgettable and slightly ridiculous. We were experiencing a story that would last much longer than a postcard-perfect photograph.
Kuldeep shook his head with disbelief. In all his tours, he had never experienced this. He told us we were a very select group of visitors who could claim something few on Earth could say. We visited the Taj Mahal, but we have never actually seen it.
He was right. I still have never seen the Taj Mahal in person.
The destination was never the prize
You might think this would be a disappointment. But when I look back on that trip, the fog made everything richer.
The destination was never the prize. The people were.
We shared meals and conversations and inside jokes. We tried foods that were new to us. We navigated chaos and beauty side by side. We saw India’s contrasts and colors and kindness. We saw devotion expressed in temples and marketplaces. We saw how history and modern life can exist on top of each other without barriers.
The Taj Mahal is extraordinary. I would love to see it someday with clear skies and a rising sun. Yet I already have what I came for.
When I think about all the amazing places I have been blessed to visit, a pattern appears. I never say, “Remember when we saw that famous landmark.” I say things like:
– Remember how we got lost trying to find it? – Remember the tiny restaurant we discovered afterward? – Remember the guide who became a friend? – Remember that amazing gelato place in the middle of nowhere?
I have my memory of that rooftop breakfast. I have the echo of laughter on the bus. I have the photos of my family and friends pointing to a water bottle bag as if it were the crown jewel of Indian architecture.
The world is full of wonders. But relationships are the wonders that stay with us.
The real bucket list
If someday I return to the Taj Mahal and finally see it, I’ll smile and take it in. But I know the picture etched into my heart is already complete. It’s filled with faces and voices and laughter. It has the beauty of our shared experience.
Checklists are fine for airplanes. But our lives deserve something better.
The best adventures can’t be captured by a camera or a perfect view. What lasts are the relationships made stronger by shared surprises, setbacks, and moments of wonder.
This story, fog and all, remains one of my favorites.
Photo by Mark Harpur on Unsplash showing the majestic beauty of the Taj without fog.
The photos below are mine showing what we actually saw. Unfortunately, the amazing water bottle bag photos are stored on a drive I can’t see…a little bit like that morning in Agra more than a decade ago.
There it is!Can you see the Taj in the background?Can you see the Taj on the right?
I saw The Secret Life of Walter Mitty on an airplane ride recently. At a significant moment in the story, we hear the line, “Beautiful things don’t ask for attention.”
The photographer in the story chooses not to take a coveted photo of the elusive snow leopard. Instead, he simply enjoys the beautiful moment with his own eyes.
Real beauty doesn’t need to perform. It’s authentic and humble, whether anyone stops to notice or not.
A person of character lives this way. They have no need to prove themselves. They show up with kindness, consistency, and honesty. The neighbor who shovels snow from an elderly woman’s driveway before dawn, leaving no trace. Or the teacher who stays late to help a struggling student, never mentioning it to anyone.
The beauty of their character reveals itself in the way they live each day.
Humility makes this possible. It allows a life to shine without glare, to influence others by being genuine. Like mountains that reflect the glow of sunrise or wildflowers blooming unseen in a meadow, people of quiet integrity embody a beauty that doesn’t depend on recognition.
In our culture that rewards noise and spectacle, this is easy to forget. We’re told to broadcast accomplishments and measure our worth by attention. Yet the most meaningful lives belong to those who live true to themselves, free from the need for applause.
The things that endure, whether in people or in nature, carry their beauty without fanfare. They simply are.
There’s a paradox in writing about something that exists most powerfully in silence. Maybe that’s the point. Celebrating this kind of beauty without claiming it for ourselves.
But we can learn to recognize it. To be shaped and inspired by it. And, in our quieter moments, we can strive to live it.
Photo by Patrick Schaudel on Unsplash – some of my fondest memories involve waking up in a tent on crisp mountain mornings, basking in the beautiful glow of the rising sun.
I recently turned 59. Not the big 60 milestone but knocking on the door. In honor of this “almost-milestone” birthday, here are 59 lessons or truths I’ve picked up along the way that may be helpful for you:
Family is the greatest treasure. I’ve learned this from countless dinners, phone calls, and quiet moments of simply being together.
Love grows when you give it away.
Small kindnesses matter more than big speeches. Holding a door, writing a note, or showing up means more than most people will admit.
A campfire has a way of pulling people closer. Some of our best conversations happened with smoke in our face and stars overhead.
Walks in the woods teach patience. The trail never hurries, but it always leads you somewhere good, even if the trail leads back to where you started.
Listening is often better than speaking.
Start, even if you don’t know the finish line.
Forgiveness frees the forgiver.
Work hard, but not so hard you miss the laughter at the dinner table. That laughter is life fuel.
Friendships need tending like gardens.
A calm mind shapes a calm day. How you manage your thoughts sets the tone for how you live, not just how you lead.
Prayer steadies shaky ground.
Scars are inevitable but can become footholds.
Your children and grandchildren remember the times you kept your word. Integrity is how love earns trust over a lifetime.
Music can heal a weary spirit.
Laughter with grandchildren is holy ground. Even the silliest joke can create amazing memories.
Take pictures but also put your phone down.
The best conversations happen unplanned, often on the way to somewhere else.
God shows up in ordinary moments.
Start with what you have, not what you lack.
Be quick to encourage. A word of encouragement can feel like oxygen to someone gasping for air.
Time with your spouse is the best investment you’ll ever make.
A sunrise reminds us the story isn’t over.
Be generous with money, with time, and with grace.
Don’t underestimate a good meal shared…even a bad meal shared.
Patience is a form of love.
Read good books slowly. And read them aloud. I’ll never forget the nights of reading Harry Potter chapters to my kids, one voice carrying us all to another world.
Children teach us as much as we teach them.
A soft answer turns away wrath.
Slow down for sunsets.
Stay curious, even at 59.
Hold babies gently, but often.
Let go of what you can’t control.
Keep your promises, even the small ones. If you can’t be trusted in the little things, no one will trust you with the big ones.
Coffee or a meal with a friend beats any meeting.
Rest is productive.
Gratitude doesn’t just brighten the day. It multiplies joy in ways you can’t measure. It shifts ordinary moments into holy ones.
The journey matters more than the finish line.
Never be too proud to say, “I was wrong.” Or “I don’t know.”
Faith isn’t about knowing all the answers.
Celebrate progress, not perfection.
Trails are better with company. I’ve seen some of the deepest conversations unfold at mile three.
Be the first to say “thank you.”
Find work you believe in, but don’t let it define you.
Love is the legacy worth leaving.
Don’t compare. Contentment is wealth.
Your words can build or break. Choose to build. Always.
A long hug can mend a broken heart. I’ve felt that healing in the arms of family.
Keep learning, keep growing. Continuous improvement matters. Even the smallest step forward is still forward.
Tradition ties generations together, especially if that tradition involves an old family recipe that takes hours and lots of teamwork to make.
Tell stories. Your family needs them. Stories pass down more than facts. They carry history and identity.
Choose wonder over cynicism.
You can’t outgive God, but you can follow His example.
Every season has its beauty. Even Oklahoma summers with their heat and humidity have sunsets worth pausing for (clearly I appreciate sunrises and sunsets).
Be present. Tomorrow isn’t promised.
Family trust is sacred. Break it once, and it may never return the same. Protect it as carefully as you protect your home.
Celebrate the small wins. A child’s smile, a project finished, or a quiet evening with family. Cherish these moments.
Joy often hides in the small, ordinary things.
Life is a gift. At every age, unwrap it with wonder.
4 Bonus Lessons (which means I came up with four more that I didn’t want to exclude)
Adapt or be left behind. If you’re the best buggy whip maker, prepare to adapt when automobiles come out. Don’t cling to the past so tightly that you miss the future.
The quiet miracle of savings and compound interest. Einstein was right. Compound interest is the most amazing thing. Steadily and quietly setting aside a portion of your income builds your wealth over time. It also provides peace of mind and freedom for your future self.
Learn outside your lane. Take time to study things that don’t seem connected to your work. The most important lessons often come from entirely different fields.
Travel opens two windows. When you visit a new country, you learn about their culture, their food, their people. But you also return seeing your own home differently…with gratitude, with perspective, and with fresh eyes.
“If you could erase one memory, what would it be?”
We all have memories that sting. Failures. Regrets. Accidents. Loss. Moments we wish had gone differently. It’s easy to imagine how much lighter life might feel if certain days had never happened.
I wouldn’t erase any of them.
Every memory, good and bad, shapes who I am today. The hard ones give me resilience, humility, and perspective. The joyful ones give me hope and fuel. Together, they’ve woven the story that brought me to this moment.
If I erased regret, I’d lose the lessons.
If I erased pain, I’d lose the growth.
If I erased loss, I’d lose the clarity it gave me about the value of life and love.
I carry each memory with gratitude. Gratitude that even the hardest chapters are part of a larger story. Gratitude that none of it was wasted.
Gratitude that grace has been big enough to redeem even the parts I once wished to forget.
Photo by Jason Thompson on Unsplash – because grace brings life out of the hardest places.
Ideas and wisdom often arrive with familiar roots.
My views on leadership come from my lived experiences and lessons I’ve learned from great builders and thinkers like Andrew Carnegie, Peter Drucker, Tom Peters, Ken Blanchard, Marshall Goldsmith, Zig Ziglar, Stephen Covey, Jack Welch, Seth Godin, Jeff Bezos, Gary Vaynerchuk, Tim Ferriss, Jocko Willink, James Clear, and countless others.
I’ve also worked with amazing managers and mentors over many decades, including a few who taught me what not to do.
Since I find myself often returning to these lessons, I thought it would be useful to write them down in a list for easier reference.
Leadership Foundations
1. Leadership begins in your mind long before it shows up in your actions.
2. Self-awareness is a leader’s first and most enduring responsibility. Know how your actions land, then lead on purpose.
3. Character outweighs credentials over the long haul.
4. Integrity compounds like interest. The longer you hold on to it, the more it grows.
5. Values are the compass that keep you on course when circumstances shift.
6. Humility is the strength to put others first.
7. Influence comes from trust, not job descriptions.
Vision and Direction
8. A leader’s vision must be big enough to inspire, but clear enough to act on today.
9. Clarity reduces fear. Ambiguity fuels it.
10. Momentum builds when people see the destination and believe they can reach it.
11. Vision is not just what you see. It’s what you help others see.
12. The clearer you are about the goal, the less room there is for fear to grow.
13. Purpose is the map. Storms are just temporary detours.
14. Belief in the destination turns small steps into powerful strides.
15. Every action should feel like part of the same bigger story.
16. Sometimes waiting is the boldest move you can make. Strategic patience is powerful (and extremely difficult).
People and Relationships
17. The right people in the right roles multiply results beyond what you can imagine.
18. A culture of respect will outlast a culture of urgency.
19. Listen like the person speaking might hand you the missing puzzle piece.
20. Pass the applause to others but keep the accountability close to your chest.
21. Trust is invisible, but when it’s gone, everything feels heavier.
22. Relationships need regular deposits of attention, not just withdrawals of effort.
23. Helping someone else win creates a tailwind for your own success.
Decision-Making
24. Good decisions blend facts, values, and the courage to act.
25. The first idea is often just the trailhead. Walk farther.
26. Energy without wisdom burns out. Wisdom without energy gathers dust.
27. Choose the option you can defend in the daylight and live with in the dark.
28. A quick, small decision can open doors a perfect plan never reaches.
29. It’s easier to fix a wrong turn early than to build a new road later.
30. Never cash in tomorrow’s credibility for today’s convenience.
Resilience and Adaptability
31. A setback is a classroom, not a graveyard.
32. Flexibility is a skill, not a personality trait. Practice it.
33. Change is the proving ground where talk becomes action. Priorities sharpen, assumptions get tested, and leadership shows up in decisions, owners, and dates. If nothing changes (no decision, no owner, no date) it was only talk.
34. Adapt your tactics, but never your core.
35. The best views are earned with effort you once thought impossible.
36. Challenges test your limits so you can discover you’re stronger than you ever imagined.
37. Sticking with it usually turns “almost” into “done.”
Growth and Learning
38. The best questions are the ones you don’t yet know how to answer.
39. The moment you stop learning, you stop leading. Sometimes before you notice.
40. Pride blocks the front door to growth. Curiosity leaves it wide open.
41. Ask for feedback before circumstances force it on you.
42. Teach your knowledge, always remembering that your actions teach your values.
43. Every conversation nudges someone closer to, or further from, their best self.
44. Failure carries lessons that success hides. Corollary: High water covers a lot of stumps.
Impact and Legacy
45. Success without significance is empty.
46. The influence you have on people’s lives will outlast your achievements.
47. Your legacy is written in the lives you touch, not in the titles you hold.
48. Leadership is something you borrow from the future. It must be returned in good condition.
49. The most meaningful titles are the ones people give you, not the ones on your nameplate.
50. Think in decades when deciding what to plant today.
51. Your success is multiplied when others stand taller because of you.
52. The best proof of leadership is when growth continues without your hand on the wheel.
53. Leave every place and every person better than they were when you arrived.
Communication & Culture
54. Say the quiet part kindly and clearly. Clarity without kindness bruises. Kindness without clarity confuses.
55. Stories travel farther (and faster) than memos. Stories move people. Memos inform them. Stories turn intention into action.
56. Consistency in small signals (tone, timing, follow-through) builds culture faster than slogans.
57. Meetings should create movement. Reserve live time for decisions and collaboration. End with owners and dates. If it’s just a podcast, send an email. If only two people need to talk, make it a call and give everyone else their time back.
58. Celebrate progress out loud so people know what “right” looks like.
59. Honesty scales when leaders go first. Name the hard thing and show how to address it.
60. Culture forms around what you tolerate as much as what you teach.
Execution & Accountability
61. Strategy stalls without a calendar. Put names and dates on intentions.
62. Start now. Ship one useful thing today. Ride the wave of momentum that follows.
63. Priorities aren’t what you say first. They’re what you do first.
64. When everything is urgent, nothing is important. Choose the one thing that unlocks the next three.
65. Inspect what you expect. Review, refine, and recommit in frequent loops.
66. Own the miss publicly and fix it quickly. Speed heals trust.
67. Scoreboards matter. People work smarter when progress (or lack thereof) is visible.
Faith, Purpose & Centering
68. Quiet time isn’t empty time. It’s where courage and wisdom refuel.
69. Purpose steadies the hands when the work gets heavy.
70. Gratitude turns pressure into perspective.
71. Servant leadership begins by asking, “Who needs strength from me today?”
72. Hope is a discipline. Practice it especially when results lag.
Leading Through Change & Uncertainty
73. Name the uncertainty. People handle the unknown better when it has boundaries.
74. Trade predictions for scenarios. Prepare for several futures, not just your favorite one.
75. Replan without blame. The map changes when the terrain does.
76. Communicate more than feels necessary. The vacuum of silence fills quickly with speculation.
77. Keep experiments small and reversible, so learning is fast and affordable.
78. Endurance is contagious. Your calm can be the team’s shelter in a hard storm.
Coaching & Talent Development
79. Grow people on purpose. Make development a standing agenda item.
80. Coach with questions that build judgment and ownership.
81. When you delegate the result, delegate the authority to achieve it. Authority and responsibility should be in balance.
82. Set intent and boundaries. Agree on check-ins. Then step back so the team can step up.
83. Size stretch work to the person’s readiness. Provide the right challenge, real help, and visible sponsorship. It’s okay if they reach the result by a different route than yours.
84. Build a bench before you need one. Succession begins on day one.
Supportive Organizational Behavior
85. Make it safe to disagree. Invite the view that challenges yours.
86. Credit ideas to their source. Recognition fuels contribution.
87. Write agendas as outcomes, not topics.
Systems Thinking & Process
88. Correct the mistake and improve the system that allowed it.
89. Turn recurring work into checklists and rhythms so excellence is repeatable. Then automate it.
90. Map the flow of work end to end. Prune any step that adds no value. Unblock the rest.
91. Measure what matters. Review it at a pace that improves the work.
Stakeholders & Customer Focus
92. Start with the customer and work back to today’s priorities.
93. Define success in customer outcomes, then align processes, metrics, and rewards.
94. Close the loop by telling people what changed and why.
Conflict & Courageous Conversations
95. Address tension early while the knot is small.
96. Separate the person from the problem. Aim at the issue, not the identity.
97. Put the real issue (the skunk) on the table. Agree on facts before you debate fixes.
Energy & Well-Being
98. Protect time for deep work and recovery so decisions are sharp.
99. Model healthy boundaries. Your example sets the team’s norms.
100. Choose a sustainable pace over heroic sprints. Consistency wins the long game.
Leadership is a skill to be learned and practiced over a lifetime. It grows through steady reflection, small improvements, course corrections, and new discoveries. These reminders pull us back to what matters when life and work get noisy.
Whether you lead a company, a classroom, a project, or a family, your influence reaches far beyond the moment.
The truest measure of leadership is the people we serve and the leaders they become.
Photo by Marcus Woodbridge on Unsplash – I love the idea of a lighthouse showing the way, standing firm and steady especially when the waves are their scariest.
The glass slipper fits perfectly. The prince takes Cinderella’s hand. The castle doors swing open, and as the camera pans out over the kingdom, the narrator’s voice declares, “And they lived happily ever after.”
The end.
What comes next?
Did Cinderella and her prince travel the world together? Did they have children who drove them to the brink of exhaustion? Did she struggle to adjust to palace life? Did they face illness, loss, or financial strain? How did they support each other as they learned to build their life together?
“Happily ever after” is a blank canvas. It conjures a series of images in our head. Successes we dream of, milestones we hope to reach, adventures we’re planning, moments of pure joy we can almost taste.
For some, happily ever after is a corner office overlooking the city, business-class flights to international conferences, and coming home to a modern apartment where everything has its place.
For others, it’s Saturday morning pancakes with kids mixing the batter in a cloud of flour dust or teaching their daughter to ride a bike. Quiet evenings on the porch planning their next camping trip.
Still others may crave a life of endless travel, vagabonding from place to place, sampling cuisine from every corner of the world as they go.
There are as many versions of happiness and fulfilment as there are people.
Social media tries to curate our happiness by showing us picture-perfect moments. Engagement photos against stunning backdrops, vacation snapshots from exotic locations (often peering over two perfectly poured wine glasses on a balcony), career announcements celebrating promotions and new ventures.
These snippets of other people’s lives create a happiness catalog. A collection of achievements and experiences that can feel like requirements for a well-lived life.
We may start believing that fulfillment looks like someone else’s Instagram story, someone else’s LinkedIn update, someone else’s holiday letter.
Seeking fulfillment by following someone else’s template is always a fool’s errand.
Sure, be inspired by someone else’s success. Maybe borrow a travel idea, or try something new. But their world operates differently than ours. Their values, circumstances, and dreams belong uniquely to them.
What brings them deep satisfaction might leave us feeling empty. What fills our hearts might seem trivial to them.
True fulfillment can only come from our own perspectives, our own values, and our own definition of what makes us, and those we love, happiest.
Real “happily ever after” is wonderfully messy and beautifully imperfect. It blends all the goals and aspirations we have with all the compromises and adjustments we’ve made along the way.
Goals that seemed essential in our twenties might be irrelevant in our forties. The dreams we never imagined decades ago can suddenly become our life’s new mission.
This evolution reflects an ongoing process of learning who we are and what truly matters to us. Independent of what we thought we would want…or what others told us we should want.
Happily ever after lives in the ongoing appreciation of what we’ve built and who we’ve become. Our story matters because it’s still unfolding and it’s authentically ours. It doesn’t need to resemble the someone else’s highlight reel.
The glass slipper that fits you perfectly will look nothing like Cinderella’s. Maybe it’s a hiking boot, flip-flops, a running shoe, or something very formal, made of fancy leather…or no shoes at all.
You choose.
And that’s exactly as it should be.
Photo by Ella Heineman on Unsplash – because one of my greatest joys is making breakfast for my kids and grandkids on a Saturday morning…a wonderful part of my happily ever after.
Are the stars just as bright from above as they are down here?
Do you get to see the ones you love? Your parents, your brothers and sisters, your old neighbors, that one special friend who always made you laugh?
Is there coffee in Heaven? Is it better than your favorite blend on a cold desert morning?
Do you remember everything now? Things once forgotten.
And now that you know, what do you know?
Do you hear us when we talk about you? When we laugh at your stories and try to retell them just right?
Do you miss us, or does love work differently there?
Can you see how much we love you still?
Are you proud of the life we’re trying to live?
Do you see how we carry your lessons forward, quietly passing your wisdom down, one small act at a time.
I wonder if you recognize your love moving through our family in the lives your grandkids and great-grandkids are creating.
And I was just wondering…
When it’s my time, when I finally get to see what you see, will you be waiting for me with open arms, and smiles, and one of your special meals that feels so much like home?
Somewhere along the way, I’ve noticed a quiet truth.
The thing I was working toward (the goal, the vision, the project, the finish line) always required other steps. Preparation. Research. Practice. Training. A foundation. A warm-up.
While I tried to focus on the thing I wanted to do, most of my time was spent doing all the other things that needed to happen first.
Building a deck means hauling lumber, squaring the posts, digging holes…and at least three trips to Home Depot. Writing a book means staring at blank pages, deleting paragraphs (and chapters), and researching obscure details that may never make it to print. Staying in shape means lacing up your shoes at dawn when no one else is watching. Starting a business means filling out countless forms, talking to lots of people who say no, and revisiting your reasons why, countless times.
These tasks are not detours or distractions. They are merely steps on the journeys we’ve chosen.
If we can learn to love these quiet and often unnoticed tasks that prepare the way, we may find the joy we’re seeking was there all along.
We might discover that the thing we’re chasing isn’t the prize. It only led us to the road we were meant to walk. To meet the people we were meant to meet.
So go ahead. Lace up your shoes at dawn. Cut that first board. Tape off all the areas you don’t want to paint. Make that first sales pitch. Get to know people you never expected to meet.
Embrace all the steps that come before the thing.
It turns out, they are the thing.
“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” — Abraham Lincoln
“Time heals all wounds,” people say when someone we love dies. It’s a phrase offered like a Band-Aid for a broken bone. Well meaning, but inadequate for the depth of what we’re facing.
For those who have lost a daughter, a son, a spouse, a parent, a sibling, a dear friend, the truth is something different. Time doesn’t heal. It changes things, yes. It allows us to move, to function, to smile even, but it does not erase their absence. That lives inside us, a permanent resident.
When I searched for quotes and stories from others who had walked this path before me (writers, psychologists, fellow travelers through loss), I discovered that my feelings aren’t unique or abnormal.
The bereaved across time echo the same truths I’m living.
I’ve heard that grief follows a pattern of denial, anger, bargaining, withdrawal, and finally, acceptance. That may all be true. It sounds like a clean process. Just a series of steps we must go through to get to the other side.
But that path has no clean endpoint. It can stall, restart at the beginning, skip and repeat steps while never reaching a conclusion. The grieving process never ends. We merely learn to function with our grief, and we do so in our own way, as imperfectly as we do everything else in life.
Author Jamie Anderson found words for what many of us feel but struggle to express: “Grief, I’ve learned, is really just love. It’s all the love you want to give but cannot. All that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat, and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go.”
This captures exactly what happens when we reach for the phone to call them or save up a story we can’t wait to tell them. Only to remember a second later that they’re gone.
Grief isn’t a single event but a series of small realizations, each one a fresh cut.
C.S. Lewis, after losing his wife Joy, wrote about the persistence of absence: “Her absence is like the sky, spread over everything.” In his book “A Grief Observed,” Lewis documented what it feels like to live inside loss. “No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing. At other times it feels like being mildly drunk, or concussed.”
This is the lived experience of a body trying to process what the mind struggles to accept.
Joan Didion echoed this truth when she lost her husband, John Gregory Dunne. In “The Year of Magical Thinking,” she wrote, “Grief turns out to be a place none of us know until we reach it. It’s a foreign country with its own customs, its own weather, its own bewildering geography.”
There is no timeline. No tidy arc where pain transforms into peace according to some predetermined set of rules.
Dr. Lois Tonkin, working as a grief counselor in the 1990s, discovered a different truth about what healing actually looks like. A client whose child had died years earlier drew her a picture showing how her grief had initially filled her entire life. A small circle almost completely consumed by loss.
But over time, something unexpected happened. The grief didn’t shrink. Instead, her life grew larger around it. There was now space for new experiences, relationships, and meaning alongside the loss. This became known as Tonkin’s Model of Grief.
Like a tree growing around a piece of metal embedded in its trunk. We don’t absorb or eliminate the foreign object. We grow around it, incorporating it into our new shape.
This model shows us that time doesn’t diminish our grief. But it expands our capacity to hold other things along with it. Some days our grief surprises us with its suddenness. A song, a scent, a birthday or anniversary, seeing a classic car they used to drive. Other days we’re living fully in the expanded space around our grief, discovering we can hold both the wound and the wonder.
We must learn to carry the sharp pain of their absence while having gratitude for the gift of having known them at all. Our capacity to feel gratitude for the life we shared can provide much needed comfort, even though we’ll never stop missing them.
Some of the most tender truths come from those who’ve lost children. Elizabeth Edwards, who lost her 16-year-old son Wade in a car accident, offered this reminder, “If you know someone who has lost a child, and you’re afraid to mention them because you think you might make them sad by reminding them that they died, you’re not reminding them. They didn’t forget they died. What you’re reminding them of is that you remembered that they lived, and that is a great gift.”
Writer Megan O’Rourke, in her memoir “The Long Goodbye” about losing her mother, captured the peculiar contrasts of grief. “You look fine. You act fine. But inside, you are not fine. And you know it will never be the same.”
This is the hard reality of grief. The simultaneous existence of functioning and not-functioning, of healing and not-healing, of being okay and not-okay. We learn to carry both states, often within the same moments.
So no, time does not heal all wounds.
Time teaches us that we can be broken and whole simultaneously. That we can miss someone terribly and still find reasons to laugh. That love doesn’t end with death. It merely changes form, expressed as the very grief we wish we could escape.
In learning to live with our wounds, we hopefully discover something about ourselves. Our capacity to grieve deeply is evidence of our capacity to love more deeply than we ever thought possible.
And maybe that’s the real truth about time and grief.
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.” – Mathew 5:4
“The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.” – Psalm 34:18
Grandpa Bob Encouraging Leadership 
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