getting the second half right

Hey folks,

Jon here. I hope you are all well. I am at a Forming Men retreat in Texas, and currently sick, but rather than sending nothing, I thought I would resend one of my most commented-on emails of all time. This email list has grown considerably since I sent this, so if you are new I hope it stirs you. If it’s a reread, I hope it hits home all over again.

Cheers.

Jon. 

"Success has little to teach us during the second half of life. It continues to feel good, but now it is often more an obstacle to maturity than a positive stimulus toward it."

Ronald Rolheiser

Last summer I did a deep dive into midlife psychology. 
I was dropping my daughter off at college and on the verge of becoming an empty nester. I was going through a passage of life as dramatic as any as I had faced in a decade.

I was looking for guides who had navigated this complex territory and could walk me through the valley of these middle years. A guide to help me traverse the middle passage. Somewhere on 95 South, in the hills of Virginia, I heard an explanation from a psychologist names James Hollis that stunned me. It was around the concept of the first and second adulthood. Hollis is a Jungian analyst, and one of Rohr and Rolheisers secret sources. His framing of the midlife transition hit me like a straight right.

THE FIRST ADULTHOOD: HEROIC THINKING

In our later teens and earlier twenties, we live with a kind of heroic thinking. We are confident and determined to get life right, make a difference, be successful. Fresh out of college and becoming aware of how life actually works we resolve to work hard, find love, build a beautiful life.

We are also aware of the failures of the previous generation and those who raised us. We cannot understand how they made the mistakes they did, gave into the temptations of sex, money, power, over consumption, and the ideologies of their day. We resolve in our hearts to do better than they did, to do the work of righting their wrongs--living with integrity, navigating with wisdom, refusing to compromise. We resolve not to make the same mistakes they did, and are sure we never will.

This kind of heroic thinking is necessary to move the world forward. The energy and effort of people in their twenties is a true gift, with a kind of idealism the world needs for the stubborn forces of history to yield to the concerns of the emerging generation.

Heroic thinking thrusts people through their twenties and thirties. 

Accomplishment, recognition, measurable progress, making the world a better place. Determination, energy, vision, ambition. These are in large supply.

But somewhere in our late thirties we become aware of one glaring oversight. As much as the world needs to change, we become aware that we need to change. The problems aren’t just "out there" in the systems and structures, we realize they are in us, that brokenness stems from the soul and the spirit. As Tolstoy said, "Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself."

Coming to terms with this slow realization can cause a descent into disillusionment. Upon forced reflection we see the things we condemned in others we have justified in ourselves. That which we swore to never do becomes what we have done. In shock we realize we have compromised in the same ways as the previous generation. Without our permission, we are forced into a confrontation with ourselves. In this confrontation, heroics are futile.

THE SECOND ADULTHOOD, MEANING AND WONDER

The beginning of the second adulthood is about ruthless honesty with ourselves and deep introspection. We need to come to terms with who we actually are, not who we wish we could be. We have to acknowledge our weakness, break our addiction to the immediate and spectacular, and cultivate a new kind of life. We have to learn to tend to the things we have neglected and dismissed in our pursuit of mission, impact, and change.

But what makes this so hard is that we are facing things in ourselves we don’t know how to confront. We find that though we may be experts in impact, we can be infants in insight. We are forced to confront that which has been buried in the soil of our ambition, the dark stuff of the soul that if not tended to will poison the public fruit of our lives.

But this is painful, and thus the beginning of the midlife crisis.

If we refuse to enter the second adulthood we will try and relive the first one. We will relapse into a frenetic energy that makes us think that more accomplishment, more success, more change, more recognition will fix the midlife malaise, but alas, we are simply delaying the inevitable.

That’s why people divorce their spouse for a younger person, one who is more enamored by the success of our heroic effort and less aware of our inner brokenness. 
Those more impressed by what we have, and what we have achieved than who we are inside. Those drawn to our success, but not our souls.

Believing we can push off this confrontation with ourselves, a kind of midlife wanderlust and nostalgia for our adolescence kicks in, a drive to reclaim a nostalgic past, or grasp that which we fear we may never have.

But to choose to relive the first adulthood, and fail to enter the second one is to commit to immaturity.

There is a kind of glorious freedom in acknowledging our weaknesses and limitations as we age. A joy in not having to be everywhere, do everything, fix everyone, show up as the expert, solve all the problems. There is a new confidence and humility that emerges through a sober assessment about what we are good at, what we are called to, and what actually fills the heart.

This is a shift to meaning. Viktor Frankl wrote about the concept of Logotherapy, the role meaning plays in healing our souls. In the second adulthood we shift from accomplishment to meaning. Frankl says at this moment "we stop asking what we want from life, and start asking what life wants from us." At this point Jesus words sound truer than ever. We know it is useless to gain the world but lose our soul. We are slowly learning that there is nothing worth exchanging for the soul.

Then a shift to wonder. Wonder is different than amazement, different that the sensational, different than excitement. It’s about rediscovering the glory that’s been overlooked due to our accomplishment bias. Rabbi Lawrence Kushner wrote, "The 'burning bush' was not a miracle. It was a test. God wanted to find out whether or not Moses could pay attention to something for more than a few minutes. When Moses did, God spoke. The trick is to pay attention to what is going on around you long enough to behold the miracle without falling asleep. There is another world, right here within this one, whenever we pay attention."

Wonder is about depth, notice, simplicity, and joy. Its learning to delight in the ordinary miracles happening all around us waiting for us to behold.

LEANING IN

I feel the gravity and cultural pressure to try and relive the first adulthood a second time. There can be a fear in a personality like mine of squandering ambition, not making enough of an impact, of wasting the rare gift of energy. But I am choosing to put away childish things for a second time. To enter the second adulthood with a mellowed intensity, to look more closely, slow down, bring my whole self, wounds and gifts, and learn to walk at a sacred pace.

I can tell you God is teaching me to pay a different kind of attention. And behold, the bush is burning in places I never noticed, and I’m in the middle of a war to fight off the sleep.

YOUR JOURNEY

If you are in your first adulthood, fueled by longing, dreams urgency and vision, enjoy this season as it is. Live fully to the hilt. It’s your desire for change and holy discontent that brings the reformation we desperately need. It’s your insistence that things can be better that confronts much of the brokenness in our world. Stay humble, but feed your frustration and fuel your passion. Reformative energy is a gift to us all.

Maybe you are in entering this middle passage, you are trying to make sense of your changing ambition, narrowing vision, and growing frustration. Stay the course. Lean into what God is doing in you, not just through you. There will be fruit from this pruning, painful though it may be.

Perhaps you are well into your second adulthood. A sage in the making, a guide for those behind. We need you. We need mentors who can help us age with hope, deepen without fear, and leave a godly legacy for the generations to come.

May God give you grace in whatever season you are in to pass the test, behold the burning bush, and take off your shoes in the holy place that is your life.

Cheers.

Jon

Also, folks, some exciting news. Jefferson and I have been working hard to launch our brand new Forming Men Podcast. We hope to make this a place where we can discuss and process the cultural moment we are in as men. The podcast is available anywhere you listen (Spotify, Apple Podcasts, etc.). You can also watch the full episodes on YouTube here.

a man like you in a time like this

"It seems to me that I have greater peace and am close to God when I am not ‘trying to be a contemplative,’ or trying to be anything special, but simply orienting my life fully and completely towards what seems to be required of a man like me at a time like this."

Thomas Merton

"He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you

but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?"

Micah 6:8 

We are all trying to figure out what kind of men we are meant to be in the world today.

In the past, many identity issues for men were resolved when a man went to work. For the most part, his job and a couple of hobbies went on to define him. A small collection of brand choices let you know who he was. You could tell a man by the place he worked, the team he supported, what he drank at a BBQ, and his favorite band. You knew his faith by the denomination he was a part of and the translation he read. Of course, there were insecurities and longings below the surface, but most men didn’t fixate on them, delay responsibilities, and orient their lives on a quest for self-expression. They accepted their lot, did their jobs, and tried to find joy in the smaller moments of life. 

These days, most men struggle with who they are meant to be for most of their lives. Identity is performative, fluid, weaponized, and criticized. Our careers change, profiles and resumes matter, and as time creeps on we can have a gnawing sense that we haven’t amounted to the kind of man we are meant to be. We are still trying to be something special, something to live up to.

For many men today, they are ever achieving but never becoming. 

This can cause us to hustle and chase trends to fit in and fill the void. We can follow one leader, or teaching, or idea to another because we have a sense that this is who we are meant to be.

Why are you trying to be?

I think that’s why so many men feel exhausted. Living up to some cultural standard or ideal either inside the church or outside in the world creates performance, pride, shame, and fatigue. Most of the anxiety, sadness, and frustration I see in the hearts of men today comes from failing to become the thing they are meant to be.

That’s why I love Merton’s insight so much. 

It seems to me that I have greater peace and am close to God when I am not "trying to be a contemplative," or trying to be anything special, but simply orienting my life fully and completely towards what seems to be required of a man like me at a time like this.

The truth is we never find God’s peace and presence by trying to "be someone" or be "something." We get it by simply doing what is required of us in the moments we have.

You don’t become a servant leader by going on a mega quest of humility. You get it by listening to people, being inconvenienced, and sacrificing your time and energy when people need it from you.  

You don’t become godly by going to a ministry school, seminary, or international trip. You become godly by walking with God in the everyday stuff of life. By being kind to your annoying coworker, patient with your wife when she forgets things, and joyful when your kids are driving you crazy. You get it in the early morning quiet and fight for devotional time when the schedules seem maxed out.

And you get it by doing what life asks of you. 

Facing cancer or illness with strength and dignity. 

Walking with a friend through depression and anxiety or wrestling with your own.

Dealing with family tensions and generational cycles so that you extend blessing and not dysfunction to those around you. 

Viktor Frankly wrestled deeply with this when he was in the Nazi death camps. 

Stripped of his vocation, preferences, identity, and work, he learned a deeper truth.

A man is not defined by what he wants from life, but by how he responds to what life wants from him.

In Man’s Search for Meaning, he wrote:

It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life—daily and hourly. Our answer must consist, not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual.

Stop trying to be someone, and start being present to those around you. 

What is being asked of you?

Who needs something from you?

What challenges are yours and yours alone to handle?

What is needed from you here, now, today?

That’s where the peace is. That’s where the true sense of dignity and accomplishment and meaning are found. Not in becoming something, but becoming someone, a man like Jesus who fully oriented himself to what was asked of him in his time. 

What haunting lines.

"Orienting my life fully and completely towards what seems to be required of a man like me at a time like this."

May God give you grace this week to reorient your life away from the quest of project-self and into a life of love. May he show you what’s required of a man like you in the times you find yourself in.

God has entrusted these troubled, anxious, divided, and contentious times to men like you.

Let’s meet them with presence and love.

Thanks for reading,

Cheers

Jon.

pardon or parole

"My deepest awareness of myself is that I am deeply loved by Jesus Christ and I have done nothing to earn it or deserve it."
Brennan Manning

"it is by grace you have been saved, through faith —and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast"
Ephesians 2:8-9

Many men struggle to accept their full forgiveness in Christ. Grace is such a humbling concept that it’s hard to get it into the marrow of our spiritual bones. It can be hard to enjoy the gift. This is never more true than when we struggle with sin after we come to faith.

It’s hard to believe that God’s grace is truly free. Hard to believe we don’t have to pay him back. Hard to believe that we stay in the kingdom by grace and not by works. Hard to believe his grace is for us.

So many men are stuck in the rehearsed speech of the prodigal son and still feel awkward at the table of grace.

"Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son."

Many men are still trying to pay the father back for their years of rebellion and sin. Many men are still trying to be worthy. Many see themselves as servants, not sons. 

In a recent prayer meeting, Sam Gibson said a one-liner that has haunted me all week.

"Thank you, God, that we are pardoned and not paroled."

He was referencing the invitation God gives in Isaiah 55. 

"Let them turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon."

Full pardon. Free pardon. What a concept.

I think a lot of men feel like they are on parole in the kingdom of God. They have to be good or they will be sentenced back to shame and sin and condemnation. They have to stay out of trouble long enough to show they have truly changed; they have to stay within close proximity to morality to prove they are fit to live in a kingdom of love. 

Men like this will live from half their hearts. They will never be free. Free to love, free to risk, free to give themselves away. 

Richard Lovelace reminds us that, "Christians who are no longer sure that God loves and accepts them in Jesus, apart from their present spiritual achievements, are subconsciously radically insecure persons."

Just as your salvation was secured by grace, your sanctification is powered by grace. Your security is in him. You don’t have to earn your way to him. You don’t have to pay God back. You don’t have to live with shame in the servants’ quarters of your father’s house.

I want to remind you today of the beauty and power of the gospel. I want to remind you of what has been accomplished for you. I want to remind you of who you truly are.

Jesus has made a full atonement for your sin; not cosigned a loan that you pay back.

Christ died to bring you to God, not give you the chance to earn your way home.

Jesus became sin so we can become righteousness, not "give us a chance to change." 

Prayer is not checking in with your parole officer to tell him how good you have been this week.

Prayer is not proof that you are staying out of trouble. 

Prayer is not a reminder of what you have to do.

Prayer is where we go to get grace, not earn it.

Hebrews 4:16 reminds us,

"Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need."

You are united with Christ.

Your pardon is full and free because of what he has done.

Grace is better than you think.

Go to him for more. 

You are not on parole; you are pardoned.

You can live from a free heart and enjoy your forgiveness.

You have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous one. He has made the full atonement for your sin.

Brothers, the fattened calf is ready; there is a place at the table with your name on it.

I don’t know about you, but I am having seconds.

I am going to enjoy celebrating in the Father’s house.

You are not on parole; you are forgiven and loved.

It’s time to feast.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

the best way to fight is to avoid the war

 "Lead us not into temptation." 

Jesus

"The greatest victory isn't found in overcoming your opponent through strength, cleverness, or force of will. It's in avoiding the battle altogether."

Sun Tzu

This week I want to help you avoid temptation so you don’t even have to wrestle with it.

This is important because so much of the shame men feel in their lives comes from giving in to temptation. It makes sense then that so much has been written about men and temptation.

• "Know when you are susceptible! (BHALT. Bored, hungry, angry, lonely, tired)"

• "Claim promises! James 4:7 - Resist the devil, and he will flee from you."

• "Quote the Bible and talk back to the Devil. Jesus did. (Matthew 4)"

James Clear’s stuff on "Identity resistance" is strong, and James 1:14-15 tells us the process of temptation: Desire, Decision, Disobedience, Death.

Much good has been written on these ideas, but I want to address something that happens before these moments. Before we are caught up fighting the integrity war. I want to talk about recognizing and resisting temptation before it even happens. 

When I was a new believer, I wrestled deeply to kill sin. I was working in a butcher shop that was not a native environment for a holy life. I would come into work and the other guys would pin up porn in front of my workspace at the start of my day. It was a daily battle. During a catch-up with one of my mentors to process how to deal with the thoughts that kept creeping into my head, he dropped a Martin Luther quote I have reflected on for over 30 years:

"You cannot keep birds from flying over your head, but you can keep them from building a nest in your hair."

So much of what we are talking about with temptation is getting nests out of our hair. That is essential to understand, but I am trying to get upstream on that. I’m working on not letting the bird land in the first place. But that is easier said than done. Jesus told us not to pray for strength in temptation (though we should); he prayed that we wouldn’t even go down its path. Is it possible to deal with temptation before it begins?

This had me thinking about metacognitive therapy and intrusive thoughts. The way we see temptation is as much a key as how we fight it. Temptation seems to sneak in and intrude on us without our permission. It just arrives and demands a response. So I was thinking about some ways to frame these thoughts so I don’t even start the conversation with temptation. While reading "If Only," I came across these frames for resisting tempting thoughts before you engage them. I hope they stir some fresh ways of thinking so that you don’t have to fight the integrity battle because you refuse to engage in the first place.

Here are a few ways to fight the battle by avoiding it.

THE SPAM CALL

Most of us receive at least a few spam calls a week. Somehow we make it onto someone’s list and they come at us. I had a guy call several times a week asking me to contribute to a police department somewhere upstate. I answered once when I didn’t recognize the number, listened to his spiel, and never answered again. I put on some iPhone focus settings and downloaded an app that makes it impossible for someone to leave a voicemail on my phone. 

I try and view temptation like that. My internal processing goes something like this when I see a temptation coming at me: "Oh, I know who this is. This is going to be some tempting thing trying to sucker me into giving my integrity away. Ignore." 

It's important that you ignore temptation, and not just politely decline. True story - once in my early twenties I politely declined my way into a magazine subscription for my favorite magazines that lasted 3 years from a random phone call. 

Straight to voice mail. No engagement. 

THE SCAM EMAIL

I have had several friends get scammed by email. Phishing techniques are getting more and more credible, but some of them are obvious. 

Remember the Nigerian Prince email Scam? The kind man trying to sneak 53 million dollars out of his country who would cut you in on a third of it if he could run it through your account. If you would just send your numbers over…

These days you don’t open emails like that because you know it’s a scam. You just delete it and don’t give it another thought. We need to learn to see temptation that way. When thoughts like these come into your head:

"Why don’t you try and get back at her; revenge is worth it."

"You deserve this."

"God will understand and forgive; he’s kind like that."

"It's just this one time."

"You can start again tomorrow."

Don’t open. Delete. This is all just the same lie designed to lure you into sin.

Recognize. Renounce. Move on.

THE WRONG TRAIN

When I first moved to New York City in 2005, I didn’t know how the subways worked. There were no apps back then, and I didn’t know the difference between the 1, 2, or 3 trains. They were all red-colored, and I thought they would take me on the "red" line. I will never forget the first time I got lost. I was trying to get to the Upper West Side where we lived and thought any of the red trains would take me there. I needed the 1 train but jumped on the 2 train. But at some point, the 2 train turned into the express train and took me 30 blocks away from where I was headed. I got a free tour of Harlem that day. (Double Dutch Espresso is strong)

Paying careful attention to the train you want to get on is important. Paying attention to where your thoughts will take you is even more so. For example,

Imagine yourself standing on the platform of a busy train station in New York City, waiting for subway number 1, which will take you to your Air BNB. The number 2 and 3 trains come into the station, but you don’t get on them. Those are the rumination trains, but you are only getting on train 1. It’s not here yet, so let the other trains go by.

THE FIRST STEP ON THE PATH.

Psalm 1 talks about the importance of choosing the right path.

Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked

or stand in the way that sinners take

or sit in the company of mockers.

Walk. Stand. Sit.

This slow progression will kill you. It's better not to even get on the path.

If you are on the right road, you can avoid the wicked, the temptation of sinners, and the mockers who are more popular than ever.

Keep walking. It's not worth even taking a step on that path.

SETTING THE LORD BEFORE YOU

Psalms 16:7-9 is one of the most potent sections of scripture in the bible. It reads:

I will praise the LORD, who counsels me; even at night my heart instructs me.

I keep my eyes always on the LORD. With him at my right hand, I will not be shaken.

Therefore my heart is glad and my tongue rejoices; my body also will rest secure.

Council, instruction, stability, a glad heart, and rest. This is what comes when we welcome his presence. This is what happens when we resist temptation. 

Set the Lord before you; you will not be shaken.

I know temptation is lurking everywhere as a man these days. It comes out of nowhere, and it comes fast. It comes in a sweet voice, and it seems to make logical sense.

But my prayer for you is that you will increase in discernment this year.

That you will get upstream on temptation and get on with your life.

That the energy deployed in the struggle against the same old sins will be reallocated to love.

The best battles are the ones you never have to fight.

Avoid well brothers.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

your attention is being held hostage; here’s how to get it back

“It is no coincidence that ours is a time afflicted by a widespread sense of attentional crisis, at least in the West - one captured by the phrase 'homo distractus,' a species of ever shorter attention span known for compulsively checking his devices."
Tim Wu

“In our interconnected society, perpetually online and bombarded with stimuli, digital technology has taken our focus hostage…”
Darren Whitehead

Last year I sensed my attention being stolen away in small increments. I actually felt my focus being taken hostage. When I got my weekly “screen time” updates on how much time I was looking at the small glowing screen, it simply amazed me.

We talk about tech all the time and the way it robs us of our passion and presence, but I noticed it this past year. I actually felt my attention span shrinking.  

• I couldn’t watch a documentary all the way through without taking a break.

• I couldn’t sit at dinner with my wife without picking my phone up to “just check a few things.”

• I’d be in the prayer room and get distracted by an alert, only to lift my eyes 10 minutes later and realize I was in a wormhole, unable to remember why I originally even looked at my phone. 

Have you felt small things like that? 

Small things that if left unattended may become big things. 

Small things that are slowly eroding how you show up in the world?

So with Lent coming up, I am doing something I have never done before. I am doing a digital fast. People have talked about this in the past. Lots of people “fast social media for Lent,” but I am hoping this will lead to something more permanent and transformative than that.

You see, this past year I fell in love with intermittent fasting. Somehow the thing I did for Lent made its way into my life. The practice became permanent. Not in a crazy way, but in a way that has stuck. 16/8 may not mean anything to you, but it has changed my intentionality and relationship with food. The Lent season became a lifestyle transformation, and I am hoping the same thing sticks with tech on this digital fast.

I got this idea from my mate Darren Whitehead, who took his whole church through a “Digital Fast.” He has a large church and somehow managed to get thousands of people to reorient their attention away from their devices and back on Jesus. It was a kind of move of God. Teenagers with dumb phones playing outside are a sign and wonder in the modern world. I was so intrigued by the sociological and spiritual dynamics; I knew this was what I was going to do for Lent this year.

(BTW He wrote a book about this experience that you can check out here. And he has a way for churches to do this as a communal experience if you are interested. Click here for more details.)

A digital fast can take many forms. Some go full send and don’t touch any tech. That approach isn’t going to work for me. But I am going to reduce and restrict my tech and media consumption in ways I never have before. And I am doing this because I am trying to make some shifts in my life.

MOVING FROM THE SHALLOWS TO THE DEPTHS

John Eldredge talks about the 3 layers of the heart. The shallows, the midlands, and the depths. My take on that is the shallows are about cultural chatter, the midlands personal struggles, and the depths are the things we are afraid to mention.

Devices keep us caught up in cultural chatter and trivia, which we often use to medicate the challenges of the midlands of our lives. But I want to get to the depths this year. I want to get below the surface of my life to what the Spirit may be whispering to me. And that is going to require space and boredom. 

We are terrified of being bored today, but it turns out boredom is a portal to the depths. 

According to Dr. Felicia Wu Song, boredom has many benefits. When we are bored, part of our brain awakens. This is the part of our brain that activates self-reflection, empathizes with others, and galvanizes creativity. Research has found when we remove boredom from our lives, there is certain brain activity that remains unstimulated. Self-reflection. Empathy and creativity.

Distraction is robbing us of our sense of self, empathy for others, and creative contribution from our hearts. I am doing a digital fast to get to the depths. 

I want to feel more deeply, listen to more life with more attention, and recover some of the creativity that has been crowded out with all the chatter. 

CONSUMER TO CREATOR

Tim Wu has pointed out, "When an online service is free, you're not the customer. You're the product."

I’m sick of being the product. I’m sick of customized ads getting more precise with every click and like I make.  

"One man, after receiving a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, found himself followed everywhere with ‘insensitive and tasteless’ ads for funeral services.” 

What a moment of clarity of what is really happening in all of our lives. 

I’m sick of the illusion that consuming things is the same thing as caring about things. That watching something is the same thing as working for something.

I want to reset the consumption-to-creation ratio and create more space for what God has put in my heart and try and get out to bless the world. 

DISTANCE TO INTIMACY

Wu goes on to talk about how tech has changed the nature of our relationships. 

In 1956, two psychologists, Donald Horton and Richard Wohl, would conclude that television's representation of celebrities was carefully constructed to create an "illusion of intimacy" —to make viewers believe that they actually were developing a relationship with the famous people on TV. Certain techniques…  produced this effect: recourse to small talk, the use of first names, and close-ups, among others, acted to close the gap between the audience and the guests, engendering the sense in the viewer of being "part of a circle of friends."

The two coined the term “para-social interaction” to describe this "intimacy at a distance."

I don’t want a life of para-social interaction. I don’t want to know more about what brand athletes are wearing than the classes my daughter is taking. I don’t want to know where a celebrity likes to eat if I am too busy to take my wife out for a meal.

I want true social interaction. I want intimacy up close. I want to be a better husband and father by knowing the depths of my family’s hearts, not the details of strangers’ lives. 

A FASTED LIFESTYLE

Just like intermittent fasting stuck around after Lent last year, I’m hoping digital fasting will too. I’m hoping it will make me more conscious about tech consumption and help me reclaim my attention. As Mary Oliver notes, attention is the beginning of devotion.

Devotion to God.

Devotion to family.

Devotion to friends.

I hope you’ll join me on my digital fast.

Thanks for reading.

Here for the depths.

Cheers.

Jon.

how to fight well in 2024

"Then war broke out in heaven."

Revelation 12:7

"God has everyone and everything that's surrounding you surrounded."

Louie Giglio

"The nature of the enemy's warfare in your life is to cause you to become discouraged and to cast away your confidence. Not that you would necessarily discard your salvation, but you could give up your hope of God's deliverance. The enemy wants to numb you into a coping kind of Christianity that has given up hope of seeing God's resurrection power."

Bob Sorge

Happy New Year folks.

One of my major goals in 2024 is to learn to fight well. And I hope you will join me.

Most of you know I am a Charismatic by theological background.

I became a Christian in the AOG and have never been able to shake, dismiss, or deconstruct the power of God I encountered in my formative years.

Yet it’s tragic how much damage has been done to people and churches because of bad charismatic teaching on spiritual warfare.

Many narcissistic leaders call accountability "spiritual attack."

Challenging toxic cultures is labeled as "spiritual attack." 

Normal hardships are labeled as "spiritual attack."  

The tragedy of much of this is that it has made us cynical about genuine spiritual warfare.

Yet when you look at the way Satan is described in the bible, you can see his devastating impact on the lives of so many men today. Satan is still at war; he’s at war with you.

Satan is called the tempter.

He has had thousands of years to study the human condition and knows exactly what works. In Luke 4 he came when Jesus was weak and left for a "more opportune time."

Satan is called the accuser of the brethren.

When we do fall into temptation, he rubs our face in it, trying to get us to hide and wallow in a cycle of shame. 

Satan roams around looking to devour men.

When we are isolated and hiding, he piles it on and begins to devour our lives piece by piece. Vision goes, intimacy with God goes, integrity goes, relationships go, and then our lives feel irreparably broken.

Satan comes to steal, kill, and destroy.

He wants to take what’s yours, kill life where he can find it, and wreak havoc on the work God has done in you.

There is such a thing as legitimate, devastating, spiritual attack. 

JESUS CAME TO FIGHT

We have to learn to resist naïve spiritual passivity. I’ve written about this before (violent with the spirit and gentle with the person). Fighting was central and not incidental to the mission of Jesus. He wasn’t just a teacher walking around with a new take on the scriptures. He was in a war, and the stakes were high.  

1 John 3:8 says, "The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work." 

Jesus came to give life and Jesus came to destroy. Jesus came for a fight. 

BUT HOW?

Often this is the point where it gets weird quickly. People start making prophetic pronouncements about presidents. People start binding and loosing and making decrees.  

Or they map the demonic onto people and misdirect their spiritual energy. I have said before if you don’t believe in demons, you demonize people. If you don’t believe in spiritual war, you’ll give yourself to cultural war. 

Or we get so cynical about any of this stuff that we end up tolerating the things that kill us or take shrapnel along the way. 

So how do we respond? 

The best advice I’ve received on how to fight well is so simple yet so profound.

Spiritual warfare is living in the opposite spirit of the attack.

This is in so many ways Jesus’ approach to warfare.

Satan told Jesus to eat; he fasted.

Satan told Jesus to throw himself off the temple; Jesus washed feet.

Satan told Jesus he could have the world; Jesus chose the cross.

The Pharisees wanted purity; Jesus befriended sinners.

The Seduces wanted power; Jesus was a servant.

The Essenes wanted separation; Jesus shared his table.  

The Zealots offered violence; Jesus turned the other cheek.

When we are tempted, we should live in the opposite spirit of the attack. 

This is the way of Jesus and warfare.

If you feel lonely and isolated, don’t turn inward. Reach out to 3 or 4 people and check in. 

Feeling beat down? Text 5 people a word of encouragement immediately.

Feeling greedy? Go online and give to a ministry you care about right then.

Feeling angry. Do something kind to the next person you see.

Struggling with lust? Pray for the women in your church to flourish in their faith.

And do this with holy defiance.

Spiritual warfare is living in the opposite spirit of the attack.

Satan wants to destroy you by getting you to live in the opposite of your calling.

-Ravi Zacarias was an apologist who ended up discrediting the faith. 

-Driscoll yelled at men to take responsibility, and then he bailed on Mars Hill.

-Carl Lentz reached celebrities for Jesus, and he became famous for his sin.

I only mention this as a warning of the way the enemy works. 

He wants you to live the opposite of your call.

You need to live in the opposite spirit of his attack. 

THE FIGHT AHEAD

Matthew Perry was a man who knew about fighting his shadows. Behind the veneer of success, he wrestled with addiction, shame, and despair. Yet he was woken up to the importance of his war in a comment by Martin Sheen. In his memoir, Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, he writes, 

Martin Sheen turned to me and said, "Do you know what Saint Peter says to everyone who tries to get into heaven?" When I looked blankly, the man who was once president said, "Peter says, 'Don't you have any scars?' And when most would respond proudly, 'Well no, no I don't,' Peter says, 'Why not? Was there nothing worth fighting for?'"

There is so much worth fighting for this year.

Fight for intimacy with God. Fight for your marriage. Fight for your kids. Fight for your community. Fight for integrity. Fight despair.

1 Peter 5:8-9 says this:

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith.

I pray that you will learn to fight in the way of Jesus this year. 

The way of love, courage, sacrifice, and joy.

And remember, you don’t just have the opposite spirit; you have the Holy Spirit.

The Spirit that raised Jesus from the dead, the Spirit that empowered Jesus’ ministry, the Spirit of truth.

Let’s walk in that Spirit, in 2024.

Here to fight alongside you.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon. 

P.S. If you are looking for a book on Jesus’ way of warfare to start 2024, you can check out Beautiful Resistance. I cover how to fight exhaustion, apathy, fear, hate, cynicism, and more.

called versus driven men

"When death, the great Reconciler, has come, it is never our tenderness that we repent of, but our severity."
George Eliot, Adam

"I am gentle and humble of heart."
Jesus

I have been a driven man for as long as I can remember.

Though easygoing on the surface, there is an internal drive I have wrestled with since I was a kid. I am intensely competitive, require very little external motivation, and can give myself to my work in ways that are borderline unhealthy.

But something happened this year, here in the middle years of my life, that I did not see coming. I lost my drive. The deep well within me, the one of ambition and accomplishment, simply dried up. It’s hard to articulate, yet it's as clear as this: I am no longer a driven man. 

I am not driven to accomplish things for God to earn his favor.

I am not driven by external metrics to make sure "I am doing enough."

I am not driven by the expectations of others or the needs of the crowd. 

I am not a driven man, and this is disorienting to me. 

Something new has sprung up from a deep place within. Something better than a well. A sense of call. God has shown me who I am and who I am not, and there is a tremendous sense of freedom to live as he has made me to be and nothing else. I don’t feel like I have lost a competitive advantage. I don’t feel I’ve gotten lazy or soft. I just feel… joy.

Driven men can get a lot done, but do a lot of damage along the way.

Driven men can draw a crowd, but rarely see the humanity among them.

Driven men can make an impact, but they can also neglect those closest to them.

Driven men can change the world, but often this comes at the expense of change that needs to happen in them.

I can only reference this because it’s something I read about many years ago in my early thirties; although, it’s something that’s taken me another 15 years to experience first-hand. 

In his classic book Ordering Your Private World, Gordon MacDonald talks about the difference between being a called versus driven man. I have written his thoughts in italics and then put a couple of diagnostic questions underneath so you can see if you are a called or driven man.

1. A driven man is most often gratified only by accomplishment. 

Am I measuring my value as a person based on my latest project, meeting,

outcomes, or differences I perceive myself to be making?

2. A driven man is preoccupied with the symbols of accomplishment. 

Do I continually obsess over my social media presence? Do I feel a need to be recognized by my peers in my workplace or industry?

3. A driven man is usually caught in the uncontrolled pursuit of expansion. 

Am I moving things forward so I can say that we are moving things forward, or

because this is the Spirit-led, wise, healthy, next step for my life, family, and mission?

4. Driven men tend to have a limited regard for integrity.

Am I cutting corners under the guise of effectiveness and impact? Am I exaggerating, lying, or telling partial truths to paint a better picture than what is actually happening? Am I emotionally attaching myself to things or people to medicate loneliness, fatigue, or sadness?

5. Driven men are not likely to bother themselves with the honing of people skills. 

Am I using people to build myself, or am I serving to build people up? Am I defensive, inaccessible, or standoffish to those who cannot help build my "thing" in a tangible way?

6. Driven men tend to be highly competitive. 

Am I constantly visiting other people’s profiles or websites to compare how I am doing against them? When other people speak well of others, am I sliding in comments that undermine their credibility? Am I judging others’ motives in ways that are based on jealousy of their recognition and success?

7. A driven person often possesses a volcanic force of anger, which can erupt anytime he senses opposition or disloyalty. 

Am I kind to people who work with and for me but venting or exploding to my spouse or children? Do I handle criticism with humility, searching for the kernel of truth, or do I push back in hostility?

8. Driven people are usually abnormally busy, and averse to play, and usually avoid spiritual worship. 

Am I sabotaging Sabbath to accomplish more? Do my spouse, children, and friends find me enjoyable to be around, or snappy and irritable?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be a driven man.

CALLED MEN

Jesus wasn’t driven; he was called. Called to the work the Father gave him, called to be a beloved son, called to glorify the Lord, and called to die a seemingly untimely death where the majority of what he gave himself for would not be realized in his time on earth. Yet Jesus lived with kindness, passion, conviction, and love.

I want to be a called man. 

1. Called people value obedience over results.

1 Corinthians 3 says we have each been given a task but it is God who makes things grow. Growth is the result of God’s sovereignty. There is no formula, conference talk, life hack, or podcast that can make God bless you. Called people delight in the affirmation of the Father, not the response of the crowd.

2. Called people focus on who they are becoming not only what they are achieving. 

The primary call in our lives is to become more like Jesus. Often in work, we can live in rhythms and patterns that draw us away from the love of God into an obsession with external results. But who we become is more important than what we achieve. We have all had disappointing encounters with people who are impressive from the outside but selfish and driven up close. Called people worry about becoming more like Jesus, not simply doing things for him.

3. Called people focus on the Day of Judgment rather than judging other people’s lives.

We are called to make sure our motives and leadership are pure and leave space for God to sort out the rest. 1 Corinthians 4:5 says, "Therefore judge nothing before the appointed time; wait until the Lord comes. He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness and will expose the motives of the heart. At that time each will receive their praise from God."

4. Called people celebrate God’s work in others without comparing or criticizing them. 

Comparison is the cancer of our public age. Called people rejoice when Jesus is lifted up and the Kingdom of God is advancing, even if they don’t get the recognition or credit.

5. Called leaders worry about the health of their people, not their platform or profile.

At the end of the day, we will all be pushed off the stage of history by the generation that comes behind us. I can even feel their hand on my back right now. Zinzendorf had it right: Preach the gospel, die, be forgotten. But be reunited with Christ in heaven with the saints in all their glory, readied for the New Heaven and Earth, transformed to rule and reign as a king and a priest forever. That’s a call big enough for the heart of any man alive and better than any ambition.

I'm praying as you begin to reflect on 2023 and turn your eyes to 2024, you look to his calling and not your drive. We need a generation of called men more than ever before.

Hoping you hear his voice with more clarity and kindness this week.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

Also folks, with it being the end of the year, Jefferson and I reworked some things and launched a nonprofit this year called Reforming Men. Our heart is to reach, disciple, and reform men across the world for the glory of Jesus. If you would like to support the organization with a tax-deductible donation, you can email jeff@formingmen.com for more details. Just let him know the amount on the email, and he’ll get you setup!

the most challenging question i have ever been asked about my marriage

"Love without sacrifice is like theft."
Nassim Nicholas Taleb

"Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her."
Ephesians 5:25 

This week I celebrated my twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. They call this the Silver Anniversary. But for all we have been through, it feels platinum for me. People don’t often stay married for a quarter of a century these days. 

It has been noted that celebrating an anniversary is more significant than celebrating a wedding. Weddings are magical and wondrous times. The bride in white, the groom in a tux, heart-rending music, and joy-filled receptions. Whole industries have sprung up around "the big day." Drone footage, sparklers, Instagram honeymoons, it's honestly kind of magic. But learning to celebrate the sustaining of a marriage is just as important as marking the start of one.  

Though it may not move you to tears, the tired couple straining to fit a nice dinner into an exhausting schedule may be an even deeper form of love. Saying vows in the middle of a celebration is one thing, keeping them in the middle of a weary life is another. Keeping our commitments should be celebrated as much as making our commitments. 

So to mark our 25 years, I took Christy back to where we met and fell in love, Toccoa Falls College. TFC sits on a magical campus in the middle of the North Georgia Mountains. It has a waterfall higher than Niagara Falls and is a breathtaking setting for needy and naive freshmen to fall in love. I took her there because I wanted to rekindle whatever flame we had lost through the long and difficult years. I wanted to go back on our silver anniversary to get the silver linings we needed to move ahead.

While walking the campus, I began to reflect on the hundreds of pieces of advice I have heard over the years about how to thrive in marriage. I’ve been given book recommendations, listened to sermons and been to weekends away. Much of it has been helpful, but it wasn’t any of these things that kept coming back to me on that trip. The thing that kept coming up is a question a mentor asked me in our early years of planting our church in New York. These were years in which I worked too much, was gone too often, and let languish the things that once gave me life. The question was simple but potent.

"Is your wife thriving BECAUSE of you or IN SPITE of you?"

God has used this one question more than any other to challenge and confront me over these many years. When we get married, we assume that we will be a deep source of love and joy for each other, but as time goes by, expectations go unmet, selfishness settles in, and we start to realize that the people who know us the best become the ones that can wound us the worst. 

As a result, we can be tempted to stop fighting for each other’s hearts and start fighting for our rights. And these can tempt us to route our needs and desires around those we are called to love the most. 

To be clear, I’m not talking about having an affair here (though tragically this often happens), but I am just talking about the slow realization that to get our needs met we have to route them around our partner, not through them. 

So how do we help our wives thrive? 

Ephesians 5 is remarkably clear: Nourish. Cherish. Wash. Sacrifice.

Nourish. All of us need an ongoing source of encouragement and care in our lives. Someone who will pay attention to the inner longings of our heart, nurture our calling, tend to our wounds, and feed our dreams. Be this for your wife. 

Cherish. I was at a men’s retreat several weeks back and I heard a man say this potent line. "Because women are so rarely cherished, they often settle for being occasionally desired." The more women age, the more they can feel insecure. There are impossible beauty standards to keep up with, a society obsessed with youth, the pornification of everything, and the pressure of both work and home. So it's important that your wife knows that you love her for who she is, not just who she was. Cultivate joy and gratitude for the woman she has become and the thousands of choices she has made to do life by your side. 

Wash. We live in a world of lies. Jesus said the truth will set us free. Gently remind your wife of who she is in Christ. Wash the lies of performance and shame away with the comfort of the gospel and the affirmation of your love. We live in a culture of accusation and critique. Speak with a voice of affirmation and hope.

Sacrifice. Jesus died for his church. That’s the standard for us. He never demanded; he always modeled. The word used for love in this passage is derived from agape. This is not the raw sexual attraction our culture assumes, but the steady, sacrificial giving of yourself for the thriving of another. We should constantly be asking what we can give up on behalf of our wives, not what we can get from them. To be honest, as husbands, we should be judged by how sacrificial we are in private, not how well we perform in public.

REPENTANCE AND REPAIR 

The reason I have never written a book on marriage is because I still have so far to go. Still so much to learn, still so much repentance and repair. There are huge sections of our years together when I was driven, selfish, and, to be honest, sacrificed my wife’s heart for myself. But I am grateful for her patience, the mercy found in the gospel, and the kindness of my wife’s heart. 

So, I want the next 25 years to be different. I want them to be full of wisdom and wonder, patience and tenderness, and more sacrifice and love and care. I am resolved to love and serve my wife so that she thrives because of me, physically, spiritually, mentally, and emotionally, not in spite of me. There is no external ministry more important than that.

Madeleine L’Engle once wrote, 

"The best I can ask for is that this love, which has been built on countless failures, will continue to grow. I can say no more than that this is mystery, and gift, and that somehow or other, through grace, our failures can be redeemed and blessed."

Redemption and blessing, mystery and gift. That sounds a lot like the love of Jesus. That sounds like the kind of thing a wife will flourish because of, not in spite of.

Hoping for a vision of sacrificial love to be stirred in your heart this week.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

P.S. I have a fuller expansion of this idea in a sermon here.

the danger of ungrieved grief

"What could be worse for our children’s children than the inheritance of ungrieved grief?"

Joshua Luke Smith, Finding Hope in a Fractured World

"Grief is like a long valley, a winding valley where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape."

C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

I have been to more schools and come out with fewer degrees than anyone I know. When I add it up, I have attended 8 institutions and come away with only 1 degree. It’s not that I don’t like learning, and it’s not that there was a problem with the programs. It’s just that I kept getting distracted by doing the things I was learning and the theory started to lag behind the practice.  

But through all the Colleges and Seminaries I have attended, there is one class that has stood out to me for years. One class that truly changed me. One that actually delivered on the promise of transformation that was proposed in the syllabus. 

It was a section called "Grieving the Seasons of Your Life" taught by Legendary New York Leaders Dr. Ron and Wanda Walborn. The big idea of the class was about the spiritual foundation and formation of a leader, but the angle on grief was new to me. 

Nowadays, we talk a lot about lament. We lament racial injustice in America, gun violence in our schools, and sexual confusion that makes God's good vision unrecognizable. This cultural lament is helpful and biblical, yet very few people have a framework for grief and lament in their own lives.

When you grow up in a broken family, it takes time to really learn the damage that has been done. It may be years before you realize that what you thought was normal was actually dysfunctional, and it may take even longer to come to terms with the damage done in your heart. 

And so much of what I learned about ministry was about theology and technique rather than healing and change. It was about doctrine, apologetics, leadership, and culture. Most of these things were aimed at informing your mind but not forming your heart. Grief didn’t seem to fit into this, so it just got glossed over.  

To be fair, the class I am referring to was not a typical seminary class. I watched demons cast out of students in one session and people slain under the power of God in others, but these honestly seemed small compared to the work of healing that happened in my own life.

The homework assignment we were given after a lecture on grief was to write a grief journal. Yes, a grief journal. Not a gratitude journal of all the good that had happened, but a grief journal of all the pain, tragedy, rejection, heartache, and abuse we had encountered in the story of our lives. 

Somehow this felt too personal, almost inappropriate for an academic setting. Writing a paper on the Old Testament theology of grief, no problem. Writing a journal about my own grief, deeply problematic.

But I settled in and wrote out a list of all the things that hurt or wounded me over the course of my life. I tried to go year by year and let God bring things to the surface. Some things I had forgotten, others I had put behind me, others I had sworn to never mention again. And as I began to write, I began to weep. Something in the depths of my soul opened up and a flood of emotions I could not control surfaced in an almost violent way. The most terrifying part of this was that I had to then hand this in as homework. My tears and pain and trauma as a seminary assignment. 

To be honest, I was embarrassed at some of the things that had hurt me, ashamed at some of the things that had happened to me, and terrified of some of the things that controlled me. I felt weak, exposed, and vulnerable. My instinct was to hide.

I think many other men may try and hide their grief too. We bypass it because we don’t know what to do with it. Robert August Master was the first to bring the idea of spiritual bypassing to my attention. He describes it as a way of pretending everything is good because of our faith, while ignoring, dismissing, or denying the sadness, pain, and anger we are living with. He writes,

What spiritual bypassing would have us rise above is precisely what we need to enter, and enter deeply, with as little self-numbing as possible. To this end, it is crucial that we see through whatever practices we have, spiritual or otherwise, that tranquilize rather than illuminate and awaken us.

Often the church elicits a sort of toxic positivity. It’s a kind of collective tranquilizing under the guise of the goodness of God. This functions like a spiritual cortisone shot that numbs the pain for a while so we can function but doesn’t address the underlying issues of our heart. Brokenness rarely fits into our neat programs and tightly scheduled services. Where does Jesus fit into all this? He was a man of sorrows acquainted with grief. There are times I wonder if he would even be allowed to share his faith in the modern church that often demands things turn out well in the here and now.  

It's important that a man finds healing for his wounds and addresses the pain in his heart. A man must learn to grieve. If he doesn’t find healing for his pain, he will often use others to medicate it. Henri Nouwen addressed this when he said, 

The main question is "Do you own your pain?" As long as you do not own your pain—that is, integrate your pain into your way of being in the world—the danger exists that you will use the other to seek healing for yourself. When you speak to others about your pain without fully owning it, you expect something from them that they cannot give. As a result, you will feel frustrated, and those you wanted to help will feel confused, disappointed, or even further burdened.

So many men use women to numb their grief. 
So many men use achievement to numb their pain.
So many men use power to try and keep their sadness at bay.

Learning to grieve gave me a way to own my pain and find a new kind of fellowship with Christ. I never fully understood that walking with Jesus would mean he would walk me into my grief and that there was a kind of intimacy I wouldn’t know with him until I let him lead me there. I knew a lot about the power of his resurrection; now, he was inviting me into the fellowship of his suffering. 

And then something remarkable happened. I got my homework back. My "grief journal" was covered with red marks, but it was also covered with compassion. For Ron and Wanda, this was no mere academic exercise. It was spiritual parenting. It’s one thing to have a professor teach you, another to have one weep with you. And that’s what Ron did. He told me,

"I am sorry these things happened to you."
"These things were not fair."
"I am angry at how you have been treated in your past"
"I am heartbroken by what you have had to go through"

The word compassion has the idea of suffering alongside someone. And that’s what I experienced that day. A seminary of shared suffering. One that took Jesus from the pages of scripture and brought him close through another. One that showed me pain could be redeemed and grief could be a gift.

Nouwen went on to say, "The Christian leader of the future is called to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing to offer but his or her own vulnerable self."

Our vulnerable self. Our heartbroken and healed, grieving and glad selves. The selves God created us to be and not the ones we pretend to be.

You most likely won’t get a chance to take the class that I did yourself. I’m not sure if it’s even still being offered today. But I know this, Jesus is still offering to meet you in your grief. To meet you in your sadness and your sorrow. To bless you so you don’t need to bypass. To change your wounds into scars and help you live from the whole of your heart.

Do you need to do a grief journal? Have you sat with your pain long enough to own it?
Maybe this week you can take some time to do just that. To be introduced to the man of sorrows so willing to be acquainted with your grief too.

There is a ton of solid research on the power of doing this well. 

And you can see Dr. Ron Walborn teach on the power of learning to grieve wellhere, which he taught at our church.

We need a generation of strong men.
We need a generation of kind men.
But these men will appear only as they go through their grief, not around it.

I'm hoping this week you learn to grieve well.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon. 

the danger of unwanted men…

Hey friends. Before we jump into this week's email, I wanted to just say 2 quick things.

One. I try and make this email worth your time. I put real thought and care into writing these each week to try and encourage your heart. So I wanted to make a small suggestion. Instead of reading these in the middle of the work day when you are jamming through 30 other emails, would you consider reading them at the end or beginning of your day when you have a little more space to reflect and process? Hopefully, this will make the message resonate more deeply. Attention is a rare commodity these days, and I want to steward yours well.

Two. If these emails have been forwarded to you by a friend, and you’d like to subscribe, you can click here. Joining this email list really helps me as an author speak directly to the people I am trying to serve. 

I’m so grateful for those of you who take the time to read this each week, and those of you who spread the word. 

Grace and peace friends. Now, on to this week's email. 

"Not being welcome is your greatest fear. It connects with your birth fear, your fear of not being welcome in this life, and your death fear, your fear of not being welcome in the life after this. It is the deep-seated fear that it would have been better if you had not lived."

Henri Nouwen

"I sought for a man among them who should build up the wall and stand in the breach before me for the land…"

Ezekiel 22:30

I have a friend named Phil who is a man in full. 
A true Texan, he is the only man I know who has been bitten by a rattlesnake and struck by lightning. He owns a thousand-acre ranch named Selah Springs in Brady, Texas where he raises his two daughters with his wife, who is a better bible teacher than most seminary grads I know.

I met Phil because he hosts our Forming Men retreats on his property. He’s an author, ecologist, church planter, and gentleman. He quotes Dostoyevsky and scripture and wears a wide-brimmed hat when the moment calls for it.

At our Forming Men retreats, we take the first session to connect the men to the reason they are there. And we let Phil say a few words of welcome and wisdom to those gathered in the room. While sharing a few stories about the history of his ranch and vision for his life, he shared a line from Steinbeck’s book The Long Valley that resonated deeply with the men in the room. 

A boy gets to be a man when a man is needed. 

Remember this thing.

I have known boys forty years old because there was no need for a man.

In our events, we try and get to the depths of the issues and wounds that men are carrying around. And one theme always comes to the surface. A sense of rejection.
It may come as a surprise to some, but many men feel that they are not needed in the world today.

--Automation is telling men their skills are not needed.
--AI is telling men their wisdom is not needed.
--Activists are telling men their gender is not needed.

One man confessed to me his father-in-law pulled him aside before his marriage and told him he wasn’t wanted in their family because he was African American. He struggles to show up with a full heart, wounded with unwantedness.

Another man shared he struggles to be a man because he felt like he could never live up to his father’s expectations. He got stuck in adolescence because he never believed he had what it took to make it in the adult world.

Another man regressed to college-age behaviors when his wife left him. Without responsibility and restraint, he drifted back to partying and pleasure because he felt there was nothing calling greatness out of him anymore.

This rejection runs deep and is one of the major reasons there is such extended adolescence in our world today. Men wonder when they make it through the gauntlet of a rite of passage if there will be anyone there to welcome them into manhood. Anyone who will recognize the struggle and journey to emerge out of a self-centered adolescence into a loving and godly man. 

Remember this. Boys become men when they are needed.

NEEDED

To be clear, I’m not talking about propping up the egos of insecure men.
I’m not talking about fragility in light of societal changes.  
I am talking about calling out the best in the men languishing in our secular malaise, wanting to be a part of something greater but never having been summoned to a cause. 

Our world is suffering because there is a generation of 40-year-old boys. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Men simply need to be called out of their selfishness into something greater than themselves. I believe men truly long to give themselves to something that matters, but they hesitate because we live in a world that doesn’t welcome them when they show up.

Criticism, contempt, complaint. These things stunt a man's growth. 
Encouragement, recognition, vision. These things stir a man’s soul.

THE CALL

Several years back, I was sick. Really sick. This surfaced a conversation with my wife about what we would do if each other died. During that time my wife said something that pierced my heart. Though not an exact quote, she said something to this effect.

You cannot die yet; your daughter needs you. She is going to need you to walk her down the aisle with fatherly love, and the man she marries is going to need you to look him in the eye and bless him.

You cannot die yet; your son needs you. Your son is going to need you to hold his grandchildren that carry the Tyson name and model generational blessing to him.

The church needs you. You have a unique voice that resonates in a true and clear way with this city and generation.

I need you. I will be so mad if you get to heaven before me and leave me to sort out all this mess when you are gone. ☺

I cannot put into words the level of vision and resolve this put in my spirit. This didn’t weigh me down like a burden; it lifted me like a vision. 

In the best of ways, I walk through the world with a sense of purpose and joy because I know I am wanted in my world. I have tried to emerge as a man because my world needs a man, and not a boy. 

Men, press forward.

A foolish generation needs wise men.
An anxious generation needs peaceful men.
A wounded generation needs healed men.
A secular generation needs goldy men.

Jesus grew from a boy into a man because the world needed a savior.
Your world needs you to show up as a man too. 

Fellas, this week, remember God has placed you at this moment of history because he wants to use you. He has something for you. 

We need you to find your place on the wall. 
We need you to reach your redemptive potential. 
We need you to put away childish things and become a man. 

As my friend Phil was walking away from the barn over to his house in the Texas hills, he was a momentary parable for me. 

This ranch needed a man. 
His wife needed a man. 
His daughters needed a man.
A lighting-struck, snake-bit, spirit-filled man.

You’re needed too.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon. 

P.S. Texas Phil wrote a coming-of-age story of two boys learning how to become men. It’s a truly epic tale. Steinbeckian in nature. You can check out his book here.

the only prayer you ever have to pray

Hey folks.

Want to wish you a Happy Thanksgiving. 

I'm taking some time off to be with my family this week.

And I realized that over the last year or so, quite a few new folks have signed up for this email, and the vast majority of you haven’t seen the emails from when I first started sending them.

So here is my first ever "refresh" email.

It feels more true than ever this season. We need gratitude more than ever.

Cheers.

Jon.

"If the only prayer you ever say in your entire life is thank you, it will be enough."

Meister Eckhart

It’s amazing how quickly gratitude can be sucked out of our hearts by the rhythm of modern life. This week, we will celebrate Thanksgiving, a moment where at least symbolically we paused to remember the gifts and grace we have received. But almost immediately after the prayer and turkey leave our lips, Black Friday and Cyber Monday overshadowed them. Though the days of wrestling with people for a cheap TV at Walmart seem to be over, we still have to wrestle with the spirits of entitlement and mammon that seek to make their way into our hearts. These idols rarely make a direct assault anymore; they are more subtle, more sophisticated, more aesthetically pleasing. James K.A. Smith notes, "Our idolatries are less like conscious decisions to believe a falsehood and more like learned dispositions to hope in what will disappoint."

We have to fight to maintain gratitude through this season. Everything in life, from curated ads, requests from our kids, a desire to be generous to our wives, obligations to in-laws and pressure to keep up with other dads will come for our hearts. They will seek to overshadow the wonder of what we truly have in Christ. Though the desire to be generous is a godly one, we must not equate trinkets with virtue or consumerism with contentment. One day of toys a year won’t build a family culture, but gratitude in an entire season can. That is what you need to fight for this week. Paul reminded Timothy, "But godliness with contentment is great gain." Great gain comes from great gratitude.

So how can we cultivate a gratitude strong enough to resist over-consumption?

ADJUSTING TO THE PACE OF GRATITUDE

In the modern world, we live at a violent pace.

There is no margin between moments to make sense of what is happening in our stories. Only accidents, sickness, setbacks or strain seem to shake us from our frenetic pace. We lose the rhythm of grace when we live at a violent pace. We lose the ability to appreciate, savor, reflect, linger, enjoy.

God sometimes manifests himself in dramatic ways, but he normally works in ways too ordinary for us to see. There was no room in the inn for the son of God’s birth. No recognition that God was working in the neighborhood doing construction for over 30 years. It was too ordinary, too impossible to believe that God is found in the everyday. So we must learn to slow down enough to see. Frederick Buechner reminds us to: "Listen to your life. See it for the fathomless mystery that it is. In the boredom and pain of it no less than in the excitement and gladness: touch, taste, smell your way to the holy and hidden heart of it because in the last analysis all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace."

The ping off the bat as your son hits his first ball in a game. That is grace.

Laughter from your wife in the other room as she does homework with the kids. That is grace.

Your favorite song from college hitting the playlist as the sun sets and you pull in the driveway. That is grace.

Kindness from a coworker where there has been strain on the job. That is grace.

Winter light over morning coffee. That is grace.

Creation, providence, redemption. Our lives are drenched in grace!

G. K. Chesterton once wrote, "You say grace before meals. All right. But I say grace before the concert and the opera, and grace before the play and pantomime, and grace before I open a book, and grace before sketching, painting, swimming, fencing, boxing, walking, playing, dancing and grace before I dip the pen in the ink."

Grace to see how much we have.

Grace to resist what we do not need.

Grace to love and serve.

Grace to slow down and reflect.

Grace to give ourselves away.

May you cultivate a gratitude that overshadows the cheapening of the sacred this season. May you revel in a grace you cannot buy or earn. May the only prayer that truly matters rise from your lips at last, "God, source of it all, thank you."

Peace.

Jon.

keeping the darkness at bay

"I have found that it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folks that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love." 
J.R.R. Tolkien (The Hobbit)

Be courageous; be strong. Do everything in love.
1 Corinthians 16:13-14

New York City recently had some of the worst flooding in the city’s history. It was surreal to see once gridlocked streets waist-deep in water. The rain transformed the landscape in an almost unrecognizable way. There were parts of Brooklyn that looked like Venice. 

I spend most of my time in the city in a neighborhood called Hell’s Kitchen. It has a famous cross street (42nd street) which almost cuts the island of Manhattan in half. 42nd and 9th Avenue is one of those places that tends to flood badly when it rains. It’s a disaster. And what happens on Ninth Avenue never helps. Ninth Avenue has been in a state of perpetual construction for as long as I can remember. I do not have a memory from the last 18 years where some sort of construction was not happening on that street.

As the rains were coming down, I looked out the window to see the intersection completely flooded with water. Cars were at a crawl, pedestrians were getting drenched, and the traffic was a nightmare. The police were trying to direct the traffic, but 42nd and 9th were havoc. 

Then I saw something remarkable.

A man took off his shoes, rolled up his jeans, and walked into the middle of the intersection, blocking the traffic. He had some sort of rake or broom in his hands. People started losing their minds. Cars were honking, police were yelling, and yet he gestured in such a way as to say, "Give me a minute here." Now I have seen tons of folks block traffic before, but this was different. He seemed completely rational and non-threatening to the people driving past. 

I noticed that the water went way past the point at which he had rolled up his jeans, well above his knees. He began to maneuver the stick and work at something below the surface of the water. And then after what appeared to be 5 minutes, a kind of miracle happened. The water began to recede. Like a giant bath emptying slowly, the water began to seep away. As it turns out, trash from overflowing bins had clogged the drains in the intersection. While cars honked, people cursed, and police screamed, this man cleared the trash away in the middle of the storm. 

I ran down to the street to find him and thank him, but he was gone. Traffic was flowing at a much-improved pace by then. The commute of thousands of people was changed by this anonymous, selfless man.

I reflect on that every time I walk past that intersection. 

In the storm, meteorologists offered warnings and opinions. 

Climate activists pointed to the need for policy changes.

It was yet another reason for some to leave New York.

But for one man, it was an opportunity to do something about the way things were. 

It wasn’t heroic, and he didn’t go viral on TikTok. He just waded into the middle of the mess. But on one of the worst days in the city’s history, one man’s small act of sacrifice and kindness changed what happened in one of the busiest intersections in the world.

When I think about the men we need in the world today, I think about that man. A man who saw a need and met it. A man who did something while everyone else complained and looked on. I can't help but imagine how different things would be if there were men like this everywhere today. Men formed to respond. Men who rise up and don’t shrink back. Men who keep the darkness at bay, one intersection at a time.

The truth is, most of the things that will change our lives are not that dramatic. They are just small moments to act when others don’t, to wade in at the least convenient point, to remember when others forget.

Desmond Tutu said, "Do your little bit of good where you are; it's those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world." 

Small acts of kindness and love, little bits of good woven together over time. This is how a generation of men will overwhelm the brokenness of the world.

Every man longs to keep the darkness at bay, yet it turns out it's easier than you think.

Kind, normal, loving men meeting the needs in front of them.

This is how the light comes in.

I'll see you in the middle of the intersection fellas.

Cheers.

Jon.

3 words that have changed my marriage

"Because women are so rarely cherished, they often settle for being occasionally desired."

Unknown

"Whether we are husband or wife, we are not to live for ourselves but for the other. And that is the hardest yet single most important function of being a husband or a wife in marriage."

Tim and Kathy Keller

My son recently got engaged. It’s been a joy to watch the whole process. He is marrying a wonderful woman from Brazil and we could not be more thrilled for them. Young love that matures to full commitment is one of the greatest realities in life. Watching that happen with those you care about most is a profound gift.

This year, I will celebrate my 25th wedding anniversary. My marriage has been the most formative, sanctifying, and life-giving part of my story. And with my son's approaching wedding and 25 years of covenant life on the horizon, I can’t help but reflect on the things I wish I had known in the early years of my own marriage. The things that would have made living out our vows less turbulent. 

Both Christy and I entered our marriage with very few tools to handle the challenges ahead. We read a couple of books, did 1.5 sessions of premarital counseling, and threw ourselves into life together. We believed at the core of our being that we were special and that love would be enough. It wasn’t. We were completely unprepared for how to love each other well. We didn’t have a secure sense of self yet, didn’t know how to communicate, and didn’t know how to meet each other's needs in a godly and life-giving way.

Whenever a conflict would arise, we didn’t have a framework for how to respond, even though in our hearts we wanted to get things right. We often acted in ways that produced defensiveness, criticism, and dismissal of each other’s needs. There was a gap between our desire to love well and our ability to help each other feel it. 

As time went on, kids arrived, work got more complex, and unhealthy patterns became normal. We began to believe the lie that we could never change, and that the growing distance between us was permanent. The way things could be simply become the way things were. Our patterns made the distance feel immense. If I could map out the conflict cycle we were in, it would be as follows: 

Dismiss. Critique. Avoid.

Dismiss. Refuse to acknowledge the other person’s perspective or the legitimacy of what the other person was feeling. View conflict as a personal attack.

Critique. Make my own opinion, needs, or perspective primary, while criticizing the other person for not thinking and feeling more like me.

Avoid. Don’t delve into these areas of deep pain or unspoken needs for fear of rejection, so learn to live with holes in your heart and walls in your relationship. 

Learning to do conflict well is part of a true relationship, but failing to learn can lead to disillusionment and despair. You can hold parts of yourself back and over time, drift apart and settle for faithfulness in your vows without passion in your heart. 

Several years ago I came across 3 words that have profoundly shifted the way Christy and I relate to each other. Though not a magic bullet, they have transformed the way we approach each other and navigate the complexities of love. They are:

Validate. Comfort. Repair.

Validate. Legitimize what the other person is feeling, experiencing, and saying, even if you are the source of their pain. Don’t get defensive, but honor what they are going through and their perspective on what has happened.

Comfort. Move towards the other person in empathy for what they have been through, seeking to offer care, compassion, and understanding.

Repair. Acknowledge any wrong and ask for forgiveness. Inquire about any changes that need to be made and commit to react differently in the future with deeper awareness and love.

The order is important because men by nature, often reverse this.

"Let me try and fix this."

"I’m sorry I did this."

And then lastly, "I guess I was a jerk."

(A note, the worst thing that can happen in trying to establish a new cycle is that you demand the other person respond to your new behavior. Repairing relational damage takes time. Sometimes repairing something is simply scuffing off scratches. Other times it’s a full gut renovation of what you have built. Commit to change over the long haul.)

When we start with validation, it reduces defensiveness and opens a door to connection that would have previously been closed. We begin to honor each other as individuals and then move toward one another with understanding, safety, and love.

Changing deep patterns has been hard for us. At times it has felt like 2 steps forward and 1 step back. But in the last few years, we have fought and forgiven our way through some impossible walls, and the distance that once felt like the Grand Canyon is slowly becoming healthy boundaries of belonging and differentiation, connection and respect.

So this week, when a conflict or misunderstanding arises,

• Take a moment to collect yourself.

• Avoid a defensive posture.

• Give room for the other person to share their heart.

• Validate their perspective and move forward from there.

The conflict may even create an opportunity for deeper connection and understanding, rather than defensiveness, isolation, and pain. It’s never too late to start a new relational cycle that can bring trust and healing over time.  

I’m not sure if you who are reading this are married or the state of your marriage if you are. But I know that in the modern world where marriage is optional, divorce is normal, and selfishness moral, it can feel like things cannot turn around. To be honest, I have felt this too. But I want to urge you not to give up. "Longitudinal studies demonstrate that two-thirds of those unhappy marriages out there will become happy within five years if people stay married and do not get divorced."

The Keller’s note,

"There is an illusion that if we find our one true soul mate, everything wrong with us will be healed; but that makes the lover into God, and no human being can live up to that."

After 25 years of marriage, I live with few illusions about Christy’s ability to save me or my ability to heal the deepest parts of her soul. But I do live with hope that if we approach one another with humility, compassion, and love, we may model the kind of relationship that can point others to the one who can.

And as it turns out, that is more than enough.

Hoping for more validation, comfort, and restoration in your core relationships this week.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon. 

the men I feel most sorry for…

"Concepts create idols, only wonder understands." 
Gregory of Nyssa

You are the God of great wonders! 
Psalm 77:14

Several years back I was with friends who gather every year to confess sin, strengthen our spirits, and listen to God. Every morning a man is put in the middle of the room in a kind of prophetic hot seat, where he gets prayed over by the rest of the group. The group shares what they sense God saying to him for a time of exhortation and encouragement. When it was my time in the middle, one of my friends shared something that has stuck with me over the years, something that I have clung to in the midst of anxiety and despair. The words he spoke were along these lines…

Jon, you may think that people follow you because you’re smart, or people follow you because you’re strong, but those are not the most important things. People follow you because your heart is strangely alive. In spite of all you have been through, you haven’t let the pain of cynicism rob you of joy. 

I think God is telling you that you need to lead from wonder.

Leading from wonder? I have studied leadership theory at a Doctoral level. I’ve looked at charts and books and paradigms but in all my years I have never heard of the "leading from wonder" paradigm.

How would leading from wonder even work?

Isn’t leadership about outcomes and results and progress?

Isn’t leadership about goals and metrics and movement?

Isn’t leadership about integrity and character and drive?

But upon reflection, maybe there is value in trying to introduce a new paradigm. Maybe the leaders we need in a time of anxiety, fear, and despair are those whose hearts are strangely alive. Maybe we need leaders who can lead us out of cynicism and back into joy. I want to be a leader like that. 

A LOSS OF WONDER

The author Douglas Coupland has a unique way of articulating the brokenness of the human condition. One quote that has haunted me over the years is about the loss of wonder in modern life. He writes,

Sometimes I think the people to feel saddest for are people who once knew what profoundness was, but who lost or became numb to the sensation of wonder - people who closed the doors that lead us into the secret world - or who had the doors closed for them by time and neglect and decisions made in times of weakness.

This is a profoundly articulate sense of how so many of us feel in our disenchanted world.

• Wandering through life without direction or passion.

• Numb to sensation due to the availability of illusionary pleasure.

• Closing off the door because we cannot take any more disappointment. 

• Loss of hope through tragedy, suffering, and the grind of life.

• Neglecting the beautiful parts of life because they feel like a luxury in the midst of so much responsibility and need. 

• Choosing survival in times of weakness rather than fullness of heart.

I see men like this everywhere. Men with a kind of sadness and frustration at the thought of another 30 years of working, paying bills, and slowly losing intimacy while numbing themselves with small pleasures to take the edge off. We need more.

The old English term wundor may be related to the German wunde or ‘wound’. From that perspective, "it would thus suggest a breach in the membrane of awareness, a sudden opening in a man’s system of established and expected meanings, a blow as if one were struck or stunned." That is, "to be wonderstruck is to be wounded by the sword of the strange event, to be stabbed awake by the striking." 

Wounded by wonder, maybe this is what we need for our numb hearts. 

WHERE ARE THE WONDERS?

God begins to open our hearts to the gift of wonder when we become aware of its absence. It is the longing for more that opens the door for more. In Gideon's story, it was his questioning of the decline and despair around him that opened him to the possibility of awakening and deliverance. 

"Pardon me, my lord," Gideon replied, "but if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about?"

Judges 6:13

REGAINING WONDER THROUGH FEAR AND AWE

According to Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, the principle religious virtue of wonder is contained in the Hebrew word yirah. He says this word has two meanings: "fear and awe." 

The difference is this: "fear is the anticipation and expectation of evil or pain, as contrasted with hope which is the anticipation of good." In contrast, awe "is the sense of wonder and humility inspired by the sublime or felt in the presence of mystery." Further, "awe, unlike fear, does not make us shrink from the awe-inspiring object, but on the contrary, draws us near to it. This is why awe is compatible with both love and joy."

Upon reflection, much of what has kept my heart alive has been the pursuit of fear and awe. I try and position my life to face the things that scare me and position my heart to experience awe that overwhelms me. Sometimes this is in epic planned moments, and other times, small gifts in the flow of normal life. I cherish these times of… 

FEAR

• Standing near the edge of the cliffs of Moher in Ireland with my mate "Irish Rob" feeling like I was going to be blown off by the wind.

• The first time I encountered a bear in the woods early one morning while sipping coffee realizing he could end me if he chose.

• Watching a demon come out of someone as a new believer and feeling the force of it rush by me as it left.

• Moving to a new community out of a sense of mission without the resources we needed.

• My kids struggling with their faith while growing up in a hostile city.

AWE

• Traveling Ring Road around Iceland with my daughter during Covid while drowning in Icelandic glory.

• Surfing with dolphins on my own when I was 16.

• Sharing the gospel with Morgan Freeman at the airport and chatting with him about Jesus.

• Feeling tangible waves of the liquid love of God during the Asbury Revival.

• Finishing the Camino with my son Nate after 500 miles and 5 years on the Primal Path.

Moving toward fear and awe are choices we have to make. Often, we settle for comfort and pleasure instead. We may not think we have lost much in the moment, but over time, the door to the other world will slowly close, and we will find ourselves locked out of the joy God freely offers.

WANTING MORE

Moses was filled with yireh when he asked to see God's glory. It was a combination of fear and awe at the thought of seeing the God who was. And we should seek to encounter the God of wonders too. Experiencing his wonder has the power to resurrect our dead hearts and shift our perspective of who we are in the world. 

Research has shown the power of wonder to change the heart.

In one study, after experiencing an "awe event," a group was asked to draw pictures of themselves and the event they had just experienced. They literally drew themselves smaller in size. Such an effect has been termed ‘unselfing’. Unselfing is "the experience of loss of self, of letting go of ego-dominated rationality." Decentering the self, and dispositions that flow from such decentering, can have important ethical value in a heart, including "openness, availability, epistemological humility in the face of the mystery of being, and the ability to admire and be grateful."

And it doesn’t stop there. Interestingly, "recent research using fMRI has also shown that experiences of awe, such as watching awe-inspiring videos (compared to neutral or pleasant videos) decreases activity in the brain’s default mode network (DMN)." This network is "associated with self-focus and rumination. The result is decreased mental chatter."

Moses was changed by God's glory. Saul was thrown to the ground. Peter was overcome by the transfiguration and "didn’t know what he was saying." John fell on his face as though dead, and Mary wept at Jesus’ feet. We should never settle for mere religion when glory is offered instead.

CHOOSING YOUR WOUNDS

All of us will be wounded as we walk through this life. We will be wounded by rejection, betrayal, abuse, or neglect. These wounds can go deep and poison a man’s heart. They can rob us of wonder and cripple our expectation for more. Yet I want different wounds. I want the wounds of wonder.

- I want to be wounded with love. I want all that Jesus promised without giving in to theologies devised to cover for lack of experience. 

- I want to be wounded with gratitude. I want entitlement to die and thankfulness to come forth for all that God has done.

- I want to be wounded with joy. I want to savor the taste of the age to come, while hungering for more. I want to drink from the river of God's delights without apology.

And by the grace of God, I have been "struck" and "stunned" by the wonder of what God has done these past years. I have seen hardened atheists melt under the love of God, people endure debilitating sickness with patience and grace, and impossible love that has sacrificed and served in ways that seem like a bonus chapter of the book of Acts. Where cynicism had closed the door of wonder, Jesus has opened it again, and I have a door jam firmly in place with resolve to never let it close.

THIS WEEK.

I don’t know if you want to join me in leading from wonder or if you have another paradigm that is working fine. But I know for myself that more effort, teeth grinding, and technique are not going to re-enchant our secular age. I’m heading toward fear and awe. I’m asking to see more glory. I’m letting go of "ego-dominated rationality" to create space for God's tangible presence. I hope you will join me.

I believe the world needs your heart to be strangely alive too.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

i want to clarify some expectations

"He was swimming in a sea of other people’s expectations.

Men had drowned in seas like that."

Robert Jordan

"We had hoped he was the Messiah who had come to rescue Israel."

Luke 24

We all bring so many things into our relationships. No person can possibly live up to the things we project on them. Ronald Rolheiser talks about the futility of trying to find the "magical other," the one who will fix our flaws and fill the void inside. But there is no human being alive who can do that, yet sadly you cannot know this when you fall in love.

So much of the pain that comes with maturing in our relationships is about understanding and navigating expectations. Sometimes we have unrealistic expectations and live with an idealism rooted in childhood deficits or cultural distortions. Other times we have selfish expectations that push the relational burden onto others in an unfair way. But mainly we have unspoken expectations. We have an inner world of hopes and desires and longings that we assume the other person knows, but we rarely clarify. This can lead to frustration, hurt, disappointment, and distance between us and those we love. So how can we learn to clarify our expectations?

HOW TO CLARIFY YOUR EXPECTATIONS

In Emotionally Healthy Relationships, Pete Scazzero has a simple but powerful framework for strengthening our relationships through clarity. He notes there are 4 main primary ways expectations go wrong. He writes,

• Your expectation is unconscious. You didn’t even know you had an expectation until it was violated.

• Your expectation is unrealistic. It is not reasonable given the person or circumstance.

• Your expectation is unspoken. You did not clearly articulate your expectation to another person.

• Your expectation is un-agreed upon. The other person never agreed to follow through with your expectation.

This shows up in almost every area of our life.

It affects our friendships. We can get angry when others don’t show the same level of interest, inclusion, or vulnerability.
It affects our romantic relationships. We can become defensive, possessive, or needy in our demands of our partner.
It affects our parenting. We can live from our past, our own vision or desires without our kids ever understanding where the pressure on them is coming from.
It affects our work. We can put too much weight on the position or employer to fulfill our vocational goals.
It affects our faith. We can project onto God our family issues or assumptions based on consumer spirituality, idolatry, or bad theology.
It affects our church experience. We can come to church with unclarified and unspoken needs and desires without taking into account the community’s stage, season, and health.

So what can we do to bring healthy expectations to our relationships? Scazzero says the following things should be focused on to bring clear, fair, and life-giving expectations:

CONSCIOUS EXPECTATIONS: I am aware of my expectation, and in touch with my real need.

REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS: This means there is evidence to support that the expectation is reasonable. Either it has been done in the past or the person has the capacity and willingness to do it. It can happen in the time, pace and flow of the circumstances and season.

SPOKEN EXPECTATIONS: I have expressed the expectation clearly in such a way that it has been heard and understood.

AGREED UPON EXPECTATIONS: The other person has agreed to the expectation by saying ‘yes’ and there is a shared framework in place for what will happen.

THE POWER AND GRACE OF CLARIFIED EXPECTATIONS

Learning to clarify expectations has transformed my life. It has helped me understand broken relationships from my past, enabled me to love more freely those closest to me, and relieved unnecessary ministry pressure I tend to put on myself. I am not perfect at this, but I am growing, and it is helping me love people with more insight and skill.

If you are feeling pressure or disappointment in an area of your life, it may be helpful to do an expectation audit this week. Are there expectations that have been unconscious, unrealistic, unspoken, or un-agreed upon? And how can you become more conscious, realistic, clear, and work toward agreement in them?

Brene Brown says, "Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind." Here’s to building relationships on clarity and kindness.

Thanks for reading,

Cheers.

Jon.

the 3 most important things to focus on as a Dad, and 2 of them are not what you think

"A father is the man who can change a world he will not be part of by building the tiny human that is part of him."

Craig D. Lounsbrough

"As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust."

Psalms 103:13-14

Being a Dad these days can be overwhelming. There is so much conflicting advice about how to show up well that it can be both paralyzing and exhausting. Amazon.com has tens of thousands of books on parenting, often saying the opposite things from each other. Google is even worse. What is deemed essential in one philosophy is dismissed in another. This can create a deep anxiety and fear that you aren’t doing enough and you aren’t doing it right.

And this complexity is compounded by the intensity of the cultural moment our kids are growing up in. Childhood and adolescence have always been turbulent years, but the stakes seem so much higher now. We feel pressure to help them build a biblical identity, fight secularism, find their vocational call, have a healthy and godly sexuality, and deal with anxiety. It’s so much all at once.

Don’t you wish there were a few, clear principles you could focus on as a Dad to love your kids well? A few things you can do instead of being overwhelmed by what you can’t? As it turns out, there are. Scientific American reported a study with a list of the top 10 parenting factors that produce healthy and confident kids based on extensive research on parenting. You can read the whole list for yourself here, but I want to highlight the top 3 because I think they are areas men tend to struggle with. They are:

1-Love and affection. 2- Stress management. 3- Relationship skills. 

Let’s unpack these for a moment. 

1-LOVE AND AFFECTION

Showing affection when our children are small can tend to be much easier than when they grow. They are often warm towards us, celebrate our return, and return affection freely. As they get older and begin to rebel, we can move into confronting and criticizing all kinds of behavior. Parenting becomes a power struggle for control, not a relationship we nurture. But it’s in exactly these times that we have to show unconditional love and affection. Here are a few practical ways to do this.

Words of Affirmation
It has often been said that "the way you speak to your child becomes their inner voice." I meet so many men whose lives have been defined by harsh words spoken over them in anger or critique in a moment of frustration. A man's deep sense of self is often defined by what they hear about themselves as they grow. Try and keep the "5:1" encouragement to criticism ratio others have written about. Try instilling confidence by catching them doing things right. Try validating their preferences and interests rather than criticizing them for not being yours. Try and make your voice an echo of our heavenly father’s, so their inner voice is shaped by God's affirmation and not the enemy's accusation.  

Physical Affection
Growing up as a "typical Aussie bloke," I wasn’t a part of a culture that valued physical affection. But over the years, I have come to learn the power of a safe, welcoming, and loving touch. I regularly try and hug my adult son (who’s bigger than me) to simply let him know I am for him and that he matters to me. I want him to feel physical affection from a man who often lives in his head. I always want my daughter to know both the protective and tender side of me. Physical affection can foster emotional connection.

Emotional Attentiveness
Often in our busyness, we are not as attentive to our kids as they need us to be. We can be dismissive, too quick to prescribe solutions, and project out of our own experiences at their age. But learning how to enter into their world, honor what they are going through, and help them make sense of their feelings is a key part of fatherhood. Our job is not to tell them to "get over it" but to help walk them through it. This is where bonds are built for the long haul. 

Hug your kids. Play with your kids. Affirm your kids. Validate their feelings. Speak love over them. And every now and then, spoil them. 

2- STRESS MANAGEMENT

As a society, we have done a poor job of honoring and preserving childhood. Kids are being sexualized at increasingly younger ages, exposed to traumatic events through our media, and pressured to perform in an increasingly competitive world. It’s no wonder they are dealing with record rates of anxiety. But it’s our job to shield them from as much of our own stress as possible. We don’t want to compound what they are already carrying.

Kids are often emotionally attuned to the anxiety of their parents. So we can unintentionally distribute stress to them that belongs to us. And this can be SO HARD not to do. But it's essential that we try.

• We have to guard our anger and temper so that we don’t explode on our kids what we have accumulated at work.

• We have to make sure our kids don’t feel like a burden to us when we are facing financial pressure. 

• We have to make sure that our own inner struggles of anxiety, loneliness, and fear are not projected onto our kids, or that we don’t use them in unhealthy ways to deal with adult issues that don’t belong to them.

Secondhand stress has robbed many kids of innocence and joy. Our kids tend to borrow our nervous system. We want to give them the gift of managing stress well by modeling life-giving practices and a godly pace of life, rest, and joy. Our homes should be a place of rest and retreat, not another place to experience adult anxiety.

• You may need a ritual at the door to reset yourself emotionally before you come home.

• You may need a life-giving hobby to fill the tank.

• You may need to hold back details on work or family issues that they don’t need to know about. 

• You may need to cast your cares on the Lord more intentionally to live out of a sense of peace and trust.

We live in a sin-stained world. Stress and anxiety will come for our kids. Let’s hold it off for as long as possible so they can get the childhood they deserve. 

3-RELATIONSHIP SKILLS

Whether we like it or not, we are the model of marriage for our kids’ future relationships. We set the relational "norms" for what they expect of others and accept for themselves. One of the best things we can do to help our kids thrive is love our wives. We need to ask for grace to affirm and not criticize our wives, model healthy conflict, show appropriate physical affection, and enjoy spending time together. This doesn’t mean you fake things, pretend, or never fight, but it means you show your affection and commitment. 

Don’t put your wife down in front of your kids. Don’t triangulate them into your fights. Don’t dismiss their mother behind her back. Treat your wife the way you hope a man would treat your daughter, with consideration, kindness, and respect. 

• Get counseling if you need it.

• Prioritize date nights and fun trips.

• Pursue her heart.

• Write little notes of kindness and love.

• Save emotional energy for her to process her day.

• Listen well.

THIS IS ENOUGH

1-Love and affection. 2- Stress management. 3- Relationship skills. 

The truth is, these 3 simple things will be enough to focus on without drowning in all the other ideas. Building this kind of relational bond will create a foundation where we can form our kids’ faith, shape their character, and discipline them in love without driving them away.

So this week:

Why not hug your kids and tell them how much you love them?
Why not splurge on something fun, even if finances are tight?
And affirm your wife in front of your kids, and kiss her till they complain.

If you focus on everything, you will accomplish nothing; but if you focus on these, something beautiful will emerge. Loving attention, anxiety protection, and marital affection. This is enough.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

grace is terrible math

"Grace is terrible math."

Josh Howerton

"Grace is enough. He is enough. Jesus is enough."

Brennan Manning

The Kingdom of Heaven doesn’t map neatly onto the values of the modern world.

There are so many things that define Jesus’ life that just don’t seem to meet our cultural expectations. One of the most startling ones is how inefficient Jesus’ ministry seemed to be.

So much of what is valued in our world today is marked by size, scale, and attention. Importance seems to be measured by observable impact. But this kind of thinking didn’t even factor into the ministry of Jesus.

Jesus spent 30 years of his life in obscurity. Manual labor, attending synagogue, dealing with family drama, living a very normal life. God was in the village for 30 years and no one seemed to notice. He spent three years in public ministry but thirty years in obscurity. That’s a 90 percent obscurity rate for 10 percent public ministry. My friend Brad Cooper calls this "developing in the dark." Jesus seemed to be more concerned about potency than publicity.

In Jesus’ parables, this is only heightened.

In Luke 15, Jesus tells the story of the shepherd who is willing to leave the 99 sheep to go after the one. There is no cost-benefit analysis here. There is no collateral damage in the fields of Bethlehem. There is the love of the shepherd willing to risk it all for the lost. Love is not reasonable. Love does not fit into human equations. The math of heaven does not fit into the metrics of earth.

In Matthew 20, the scandal continues in the parable of the workers.

The laborers who work 1 hour get paid the same as those who work all day. This violates all HR regulations in the modern world. This reeks of unfairness. This screams of injustice. Yet Jesus’ response highlighting the shocking grace of God still confronts us centuries later. "Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?" Grace will always be a scandal to those trying to earn love.

Consider Jesus’ vision of giving.

In Luke 21, Jesus’ views verge differently from the world. When the rich were giving in full view of everyone else, a widow sneaks by and drops in two small coins, an insignificant measure in everyone’s eyes but his.

"This poor widow has put in more than all the others."

No special dinner for the widow. No building is named in her honor. No extra time with the senior pastor. Yet to Jesus, she is at the top of the generosity list in heaven.

Or consider Jesus’ resistance to the metrics of human possibility.

In John 6, a crowd has gathered to hear Jesus teach, but they run out of food.

Jesus calls the disciples to feed the crowd, but the math will not add up.

"There’s a young boy here with five barley loaves and two fish. But what good is that with this huge crowd?" 

For the disciples, 5 + 2 = a starving crowd

For Jesus, 5 + 2 = the feeding of 5000.

Jesus’ math is fueled by the possibilities of God's kingdom, not the limits of human resources.

HOW WILL YOU MEASURE YOUR LIFE?

Harvard Business School Professor Clayton M. Christensen wrote a thought-provoking book titled "How Will You Measure Your Life?" It's an important question everyone must answer. What metrics should we measure to make sure our life really matters? How should our time on earth add up?

I wonder how Jesus would answer that question.

I believe it would simply be obedient love.

He didn’t seem to worry about outcomes like we do. He didn’t measure what mattered to so many in his day. He just listened and loved until the day he died. He wasn’t concerned with success, metrics, outcomes, or the applause of the crowd. He seemed to be content living in the Father's love. Brennan Manning, the modern apostle of grace, seemed to understand this too. He wrote,

"All that is not the love of God has no meaning for me. I can truthfully say that I have no interest in anything but the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. If God wants it to, my life will be useful through my word and witness. If He wants it to, my life will bear fruit through my prayers and sacrifices. But the usefulness of my life is His concern, not mine. It would be indecent of me to worry about that."

JESUS AT DISNEY WORLD

In my mid-thirties, my in-laws took our family to Disney World for Christmas. The highlight for me was the Carols service in EPCOT. It was almost surreal to be in Walt Disney’s magic world, hearing songs about Jesus’ birth. The lessons and carols service is shockingly orthodoxy yet the highlight was the reading of a poem by the Rev. James Allan Francis. Here in the midst of funnel cakes and light parades, the timeless power of grace rang true. I looked around in awe at all Walt Disney had built in just a few decades but was reminded of the power of the broken math of grace.

He was born in an obscure village,

a child of a peasant woman.

He grew up in another obscure village

where he worked in a carpenter shop

until he was thirty.

Then for three years

he was an itinerant preacher.

He never had a family.

Or owned a home.

He never set foot inside a big city.

He never traveled two hundred miles

from the place he was born.

He never wrote a book

or held an office.

He did none of the things

that usually accompany greatness.

While he was still a young man,

the tide of popular opinion

turned against him.

His friends deserted him.

He was turned over to his enemies.

He went through the mockery of a trial.

He was nailed to a cross

between two thieves.

While he was dying

his executioners gambled

for the only piece of property he had,

his coat.

When he was dead,

he was taken down

and laid in a borrowed grave.

Nineteen centuries have come and gone

and today he is still the central figure

for much of the human race.

All the armies that ever marched,

All the navies that ever sailed

And all the parliaments that ever sat

And all the kings that ever reigned

Put together

have not affected the life of man

Upon this earth

As powerfully as this

One Solitary Life.

It's true, so true.

Jesus + nothing = everything. Grace is terrible math.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

how to save thousands of dollars on marriage therapy

"Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church."
Ephesians 5

"We are here to love. Not much else matters."
Francis Chan

“If you do this one single practice, it will save you thousands of dollars on marriage counseling later on.”

That’s what Dr. Josh Straub said at a recent men’s event I attended. Josh has a PhD with a focus on attachment theory and is an amazing family therapist. So when he dropped that one-liner toward the end of his talk, I leaned in. He continued,

“Marriage is a complex relationship, and there are so many elements that we need to attend to, but there is one foundational practice all others are built on. If you do this one simple practice, it will save you thousands of dollars on marriage counseling.”

So what is the practice? I’ll get to that in a bit.

The reason this felt urgent to me was the history of challenges I have had in marriage. Marriage has not been happily ever after for us. Marriage has been hard. It’s been glorious and sanctifying and full of adventure, but it has not been easy. I got married young. To be honest, my wife and I would both say we didn’t know what we were getting into. Everyone says that, but it's more true for some folks than others. We dragged so much baggage into the early years of our marriage. Our family of origin issues included sexual abuse, suicide, bankruptcy, incarceration, violence, cross-cultural dynamics, estranged family members, and the worst thing of all, secrecy. There were so many things hiding in the dark, and we wrestled for years to build the trust and framework to be truly vulnerable. We have fought and wept and repented and crawled our way into the beautiful marriage we have today.

The greatest challenge we have is our independence. Both of us are pretty introverted, we both know what we want to do, and we are both driven by a vision of the kingdom. We have tried so many things to stay connected, including some absolutely hilarious ideas therapists have recommended over the years that have just become memes and folklore. So what Dr. Straub shared was so hopeful.

THE PRACTICE

Here it is.

Take a 15-minute window a day to share with your wife what’s happening in your inner world and to listen to what’s happening in hers. 15 minutes a day. That’s the practice. It doesn’t have to be therapy, just honesty. It doesn’t have to be major, just meaningful. It doesn’t have to be huge, just helpful. And just 15 minutes. After years of struggling to consistently connect, I felt hopeful.

And then, I tried it. ☺

It turns out, it was hard for me to access the stuff in my heart and a touch harder to process it in real-time. And harder for my wife to sit and pour out her heart to me. So, I created a little framework for that time that has made things both practical and insightful. I am sure there are all sorts of models and methods for this, but this one has worked for me.

DAILY GRACE.

At the end of the day, as a part of my wind-down ritual, I take a few moments to reflect on the following categories:

GRATITUDE. What was I thankful for today?

REALIZATIONS. What did I learn today about life, myself, God?

ACTIONS. What initiative did I take toward the things that are meaningful to me and my calling?

CHALLENGES. What came up that I had to deal with, confront, or overcome?

ENJOYMENT. Where was there joy, delight, and meaning today?

I reflect on this as a kind of prayer of examen, and then share it with my wife. I jot down a thought or two under each category and that’s it. It may not sound like much, but when my wife knows what I am grateful for, learning, working on, wrestling with, and where I am finding life, she has access to some of the deepest parts of who I am. Others may see what I do; she is learning who I am becoming. And I can't help but think Josh could be right. The compound effect of this could save me thousands of dollars on marriage counseling in the years ahead.

Maybe your marriage is great. Maybe you have it all sorted out, or maybe you have wrestled like me. But the key thing is to find what works for both of you. If you feel stuck, I hope this may get you started on repairing the intimacy and distance that so easily sneaks in.

BUT WHAT ABOUT THE STUFF ON TOP OF THE FOUNDATION?

You have probably heard about the Gottman Institute; they are famous for their research on predicting divorce amongst couples with a staggeringly high percentage rate. Some of their most interesting research is around time. How much time does a married couple need to spend together each week to have a healthy marriage? Their research states that 6 hours a week is the magic number to maintain a healthy marriage per week. Here is how that time is broken down:

• A 2-minute meaningful goodbye in the morning.  

• A 20-minute reunion at night processing the day and being present.

• A hug and a six-second kiss every day.

• 5 minutes of appreciation and affirmation every day.

• A 2-hour date a week.

• A 1-hour state of the union a week, zooming out and looking at the big picture of your life and relationships. 

6 hours a week. That is something I can build on. To me, that seems like both a little and a lot, but it’s helpful and hopeful to know there is something to move toward. Something research-backed and not driven by a fad. A framework to learn to love like Christ loved the church.

Tim Keller said, “Friendship is a deep oneness that develops when two people, speaking the truth in love to one another, journey together to the same horizon.”

I’m hoping and praying this makes the journey to the same horizon more filled with grace this week. I hope it saves you thousands on therapy too ☺

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.

the need for elders

"Growing up and maturing is precisely a process of fermentation. It does not happen easily, without effort and without breakdown. But it happens almost despite us, because such is the effect of a conspiracy between God and nature to mellow the soul."

Ronald Rolheiser

"The beginning of wisdom is this: Get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding."

Proverbs 4:7

We live in a youth-obsessed culture. It’s important to focus on the next generation; they are 100 percent of our future. But in all our zeal for a better world, breaking generational cycles, and leaving a life-giving legacy, we must not neglect one essential thing: the wisdom of Elders.

It's important to note that age does not make one an Elder. Age can make you older but not wiser. I have met many old and bitter fools. I have also met remarkable young people with wisdom beyond their years. Time and age can be incredibly formative if a person is thoughtful, reflective, courageous, and compassionate. Age can temper ungodly ambition, stabilize a man’s identity, and break his narcissistic tendencies. With grace and patience, an old man may emerge into a sage.

I need sages in my life. I need the wisdom of Elders. As a man, I often face challenges in my life and leadership for which I just don’t feel equipped. There is a tradition and perspective of wisdom and experience I need from the generation that has gone before me. I love the reformative zeal of the young, the passion for exploration and justice and life, but there are times I need proven leadership. I need timeless wisdom in momently confusion. There are times I need the elders.

The truth is, our world is often driven by those who have figured out algorithms but haven’t figured out life.

Our world is driven by the technician, not the sage.

Our world is driven by the marketer, not the theologian.

Our world needs Elders.

Andrew Jamieson has a chapter on the need for Elders in his writings on the midlife journey. He highlights the urgency for wisdom in times of crisis. When the stakes are high, the Elders must appear.

AVOIDING THE ANNIHILATION OF OUR FUTURES

The following is an extended quote highlighting the difference between the wisdom of Elders versus reactive and pragmatic aggression.

Jamieson notes,

In October 1962, humanity faced what the historian Arthur Schlesinger called "tthe most dangerous moment in human history." On the morning of October 16, the director of the CIA presented President Kennedy with irrefutable evidence that the Soviet Union was installing nuclear missiles on the island of Cuba, ninety miles from the US mainland. By mid-morning Kennedy had convened a meeting with his military chiefs, by the end of which the President had all but decided upon an immediate air strike against Cuba followed by a full-scale invasion of the island. Kennedy then was scheduled to have lunch with his US Ambassador to the United Nations, the veteran American politician and diplomat Adlai Stevenson. Kennedy greatly prized Stevenson’s experience and wisdom and had publicly stated that ‘the integrity and credibility of Adlai Stevenson constitutes one of our greatest national assets.’ 

Kennedy invited Stevenson into the Oval Office, explained his predicament and told him that he was about to activate the full military option advised by his generals. Stevenson was deeply concerned to hear about the Soviet actions, but was even more horrified to hear about the massive military response that Kennedy was about to unleash and insisted that there should be no air strike or invasion until every possible peaceful solution had been explored. 

He also advised that the motives behind the Soviet’s reckless strategy should be carefully examined before responding with an equally reckless military approach. Kennedy then discussed the veteran Stevenson’s warning with his brother Bobby and thankfully the US military action was postponed. 

For the next thirteen days two conflicting views polarized around Stevenson’s diplomatic, less bellicose approach and the aggressive, belligerent views of the military leadership led by the head of the army, Maxwell Taylor, and the head of the air force, General Curtis LeMay.

LeMay was a particularly unpleasant individual who regarded his greatest achievement as ‘Operation Meetinghouse’, an air raid which took place in March 1945 when 325 B-29 bombers incinerated sixteen square miles of Tokyo, killing 100,000 civilians. It was the deadliest, most violent four hours in human history. The power of LeMay’s invective now seemed to be propelling the argument towards a nuclear strike against Cuba with consideration given to a pre-emptive strike against the Soviet Union itself. Yet as the debate continued, the doves, led by Stevenson, slowly began to prevail over the hawks, led by LeMay. 

Finally, it was Stevenson’s advice that Kennedy followed and the President chose a naval blockade of Cuba rather than the military strategy of bombing or invasion. 

The President also implemented Stevenson’s proposal that the US should offer to exchange their missiles based in Turkey for the Cuban-based Soviet missiles. The Generals were, of course, violently opposed to this plan and regarded it as a sign of weakness, but this gesture of reconciliation became US government policy which greatly reduced superpower tensions. Once the naval blockade was imposed Stevenson was also significantly involved in the formulation of all communications that Kennedy sent Russian premier Nikita Khrushchev until the crisis was resolved. 

At this critical moment in history – the nearest we have come to species extinction – a kind of natural selection was at work. Subsequent historical analyses suggest that had Kennedy taken the bombing and invasion option, there was a high probability that catastrophic nuclear conflict would have followed. 

The species was saved, however, by the prudent counsel of a wise elder which produced a measured, more compromise-orientated approach: a policy based upon communication and understanding in all matters regarding nuclear weapons.

BUILDING A COUNCIL OF ELDERS

When a young man rejects the wisdom of the Elders, disaster ensues. There is a tragic scene in 2 Chronicles 10:8 where David's son Rehoboam does just that. "But Rehoboam rejected the advice the elders gave him and consulted the young men who had grown up with him and were serving him." 

This cost him the kingdom and caused a divided kingdom.

You must seek out Elders in your life. You must find those who can speak from a place of peace, clarity, and depth. Those who act and not just react. Those who can see beyond the horizon of the immediate. Those who draw from a deep well that can quench your thirst in the desert of immaturity.

Pursue the wise in your community.

Pay a coach to help develop you.

Honor the generation who came before you and create spaces for them to share what they carry.

Honor the wise over the superficial.

Wisdom may end up being a new apologetic.

Wisdom may save your life.

Call for the Elders.

Thanks for reading,

Cheers.

Jon.

the power of a self-aware man

"All a man’s ways seem right to him, but the LORD weighs the heart."

Proverbs 21:2

"At 30 a man should know himself like the palm of his hand, know the exact number of his defects and qualities, know how far he can go, foretell his failures - be what he is. And, above all, accept these things."

Albert Camus

The older I get, the less interest I have in what I do and the more interest I have in who I become. I want my doing to flow from my being. But my perception of who I am versus others’ experience of who I am can be far apart. There can be a delta between my intent and my impact. I have been seeking feedback from close friends lately on what it’s like to be on the other side of me to close that gap. This is not as easy as it sounds.

Asking for feedback on how people experience you is not for the faint of heart. To be honest, the feedback has been somewhat of a revelation. Some has brought tears of joy, some defensiveness, some sadness. The thing that has stood out the most is some of my blind spots. It’s amazing how things can go unnoticed until pointed out.

Dr. Tasha Eurich spent more than 10 years surveying people about their levels of self-awareness. She’s found that while 95% of study participants think they’re self-aware, only about 10% to 15% of them fully are.

How self-aware do you think you are?

In one particularly painful conversation, someone shared how they felt the need to guard their heart around me for fear of being easily dismissed.

In a joyful conversation, someone said they experienced me as a source of safety, a person they go to for comfort, understanding, and joy.

I did not expect this feedback from either of the people who gave it.

When I asked my sweet wife what it was like to be on the other side of me, she gave me the best answer of all, "It depends." She said. "Depends on what?" I asked. "So many things" was her reply, as she cheekily smiled and refused to say more.

Several weeks into my efforts to grow in self-awareness, I came across some work by Ryan Leak on the power of becoming more self-aware. He argues that a self-aware person does three essential things well.

1-They are aware of their strengths. 

They know what they bring to the table to bless, contribute, and serve. There is no false humility here but an honest and confident use of their gifts.

2-They are aware of their shortcomings.

There is a humility and acknowledgment of what they don’t bring to the table. An honest sense of limitation in areas without wallowing, covering, or hiding.

3-They are aware of their impact on other people.

This one is harder. This requires an openness and a desire to hear feedback. This requires non-defensive listening and a willingness to change. This requires empathy, gentleness, and care.

My lack of awareness of my impact on other people shows up the most for me during conflict. When pressured or angry or afraid, I can fail to consider how my actions impact others. I can always frame things in such a way that what I said and did was right based on what I felt at the time. Leak highlights the idea of "biomythography," an idea originally coined by American poet Audre Lorde. This is a literary term indicating "a style of composition that weaves myth, history, and biography in epic narrative." 

In some sense, if we don’t get feedback from others, all we will ever do is biomythography. We will narrate our dealings with others in such a way that they are part fiction, myth, and history, but we will always find a way to psychologically position ourselves in the right. To frame things in such a way that what we said and did was justifiable in the circumstances.

Jesus said, "Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear." It’s hard to keep your ears open when your ego profits from keeping them closed. It's easier to close your ears and heart and move on with our increasingly busy lives. But hearing can lead to change. With humility and openness, new voices begin to appear. Voices that let us hear what we have missed. Voices that speak to us of others’ perceptions. Voices that silence the selfishness and let love have the final word.

Ryan Leak goes on to give a list of questions you can ask to begin to grow in self-awareness. Why not take a few of these this week and ask those whose opinion matters to you?

What is it like to be parented by me?

What is it like to get emails from me?

What is it like to get texts from me?

What is it like to be on the other side of my Instagram comments?

What is it like to be married to me?

What is it like to be related to me?

What is it like to be in meetings with me?

What is it like to work with me?

What is it like to work for me?

What is it like to be on the sidelines of my kid’s game with me?

What is it like to be coached by me?

What is it like to be on a team with me?

What is it like to travel with me?

What is it like to do holidays with me?

What is it like to be on a date with me?

What is it like to live next to me?

What is it like to be my friend?

What is it like when I correct you?

At the core of my heart, I want to become like Jesus. To be a fearless man of courage and love. But I am learning it rarely happens in the way that I want. Or in dynamics where I am in charge and control. It happens when I humble myself and open my heart in vulnerability to feedback from those around me.

This summer I was on holiday with a friend, and he said something to me that jarred me. Something that struck me for its humility and honesty.

"Jon, I invite you to speak into my life. I am giving you an open door to say anything to me. Any blind spots you see, any wisdom you have, any concerns you feel, I’m giving you permission to call them out."

I left that conversation almost shaken. Shaken that he would trust me with his inner life, and shaken by his desire to become more self-aware. I wonder what would happen if our world was shaken like that?

So I am asking for grace to become a more self-aware man.

Is this a quiet voice nudging you to ask for it too?

Here for the hard feedback, and the joyful stuff too.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers.

Jon.