Tag: life
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What High School Really Taught Me
Describe something you learned in high school. When I think about what I learned at high school, I do not first think of subjects or classrooms. I think of people. I think of friendship, and of the strange way those early bonds can work themselves into your life so deeply that you do not fully…
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Learning to End the Day
Describe one positive change you have made in your life The most important changes are not always the ones that announce themselves. Some arrive quietly and only later do you realise how much good they have done. Learning to go to bed earlier was like that for me. It does not sound like much, but…
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The Exercise That Fits
What’s the most fun way to exercise? I’m surrounded by young adults, so I get to see some of the ways younger generations make exercise fun. One student heads into the city for a dance class at the Sydney Dance Company. That sounds like fun. Others are into bouldering, joining niche gyms built around that…
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Making a Text Live
If you could be a character from a book or film, who would you be? Why? About ten years ago we did a dramatised reading of Marilynne Robinson’s Gilead. I invited a university lecturer who had written his PhD on Milton’s Paradise Lost to come as a literary expert, and a friend who was a…
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What I Was Called to Do All Along
What job would you do for free? Some work pays the bills. Other work tells the truth about your life. I have been thinking for a while about what I would do for free. The answer, I think, is the work I was called to do all along. For all my adult life, in one…
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Why Swimming Is My Olympic Sport
What Olympic sports do you enjoy watching the most? Swimming is the Olympic sport I most enjoy watching. Part of that is cultural. As an Australian, I have grown up in a country where water is woven into ordinary life. We are surrounded by beaches, pools and waterways. Hundreds of thousands of people volunteer as…
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Telling the Truth Well
How would you improve your community? One way to improve our community is to help people tell the truth more gently and more clearly. That may sound like a small thing, but it matters a great deal. In any close community, people will talk. They will notice tensions, mistakes, weaknesses and struggles. Some information does…
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The First Hour of the Day
What are your morning rituals? What does the first hour of your day look like? A good morning does not need to be spectacular; it simply needs to begin with what gives life order, attention, and energy. My day starts early, usually a couple of hours before sunrise. I begin by feeding the animals. We…
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The Comedy of Everyday Life
What makes you laugh? What makes me laugh is usually not a joke. It is more often the comedy of everyday life. A friend once remarked that young people are beautiful, and I think that is true. There is something wonderful about that stage of life. Teenagers and young adults are playfully establishing themselves in…
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What I Wanted at Five
When you were five, what did you want to be when you grew up? When I was five, I do not remember wanting to be anything in particular. No fireman, no astronaut, no train driver. What I do remember is wanting to be out of school. I can still remember walking to school with a…
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Going Deeper by Saying No
How often do you say “no” to things that would interfere with your goals? Probably not often enough. My mother’s summation of my life is that I take on too much. I have come to think she is right. I have spent much of my life assuming that I can fit one more thing in,…
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The Teacher Who Let Me Learn
Who was your most influential teacher? Why? My most influential teacher was Mrs McLean. She was young, recently back from Canada with her husband, and drove a Mustang they had imported. To a high school student, that alone gave her a certain mystique. But that is not why she mattered to me. She mattered because…
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A Gift Finding Form
What was the best compliment you’ve received? The best compliment I received was not praise for something I had done, but recognition of something I was becoming. I went to theological college because I wanted to study the Bible. I was hungry to learn, but I never imagined candidating for ministry. I am a fairly…
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Modes of Encounter
You’re going on a cross-country trip. Airplane, train, bus, car, or bike? Every trip says something about the person taking it. That’s what I think. Not in a grand psychological sense. Just in the small way choices reveal us. The pragmatist books the plane. The romantic takes the train. The free spirit wants the car…
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The Things I Come Back To
What strategies do you use to cope with negative feelings? I don’t have a toolkit for coping with negative feelings, at least not in any formal sense, but I do know what fits the way I am wired. Over time I have learned to return to a few simple things. Prayer is one of them.…
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A Kind of Flow
What activities do you lose yourself in? I lose myself in writing, walking, and sport, and each of them impacts me in a different way. Writing often gets hold of me. It can be an idea, a life story, a poem, a short story. Something catches, and once it does I can lose all track…
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Beyond Signs and Rituals
Are you superstitious? A few years ago, in Beijing, I noticed signs in public places warning against superstition. At first I assumed they meant religion, because that is often the Western reflex: if someone believes in something you do not, just label it superstition and carry on. But that was not what these signs meant.…
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Alert to the Edges
Which animal would you compare yourself to and why? I am like a border collie in the sense that I am attentive, relational, and usually aware of what is happening around me. I tend to notice the dynamics in a room, sense when there is tension, and think about how people might be brought onto…
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The Question on Repeat
What is one question you hate to be asked? Explain. My current most-hated question is, “So—when are you going to retire?” My father asks it every time I see him. He’s ninety-six, and he asks it with the casual confidence of a man who thinks this is a normal question, like commenting on the weather.…
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The Loss That Changed Me
What experiences in life helped you grow the most? I grew a lot the day I realised I had been scammed. I was older when I bought an apartment as an investment, and I trusted advice that seemed sensible at the time. A friend had recommended a financial adviser, and he showed me a number…
The Afterword 