Tag: love
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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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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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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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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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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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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…
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Kingdom Life in a Broken World – Matthew 5:33-48
When Jesus spoke of oathsI think he was speakingto that part of usthat likes to stand near truthwithout stepping inside it,that part that saysby heaven,by earth,by anything bright enoughto make our words look holy,while the heartkeeps one handon the latch. He had already saidhe came not to abolishbut to fulfil,and the old worldwas still humming…
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The Gift I Didn’t Expect
Share one of the best gifts you’ve ever received. My grandfather died when I was seventeen. It was an industrial accident, and it came out of the blue. One minute he was there, the next minute he wasn’t. He died the day before I stared university, so the next few weeks were hard. Grieving on…
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Tall, Dark, and Silent
If there were a biography about you, what would the title be? The first thing that comes to mind is something someone said about me years ago: “Tall, dark and silent.” It was meant playfully, not cruelly, but it probably caught something true about how I occupy a room. I’m naturally reserved. I don’t speak…
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The Shape of a Conventional Life
What were your parents doing at your age? At my age, my father had been retired for about eight years. He’d spent decades as a civilian in the Australian Navy—dockyard work, public service, a steady and conventional path. But he didn’t retire because he ran out of things to do. He retired because he ran…
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Dream Home
Write about your dream home. I have never really dreamed about a home. Maybe that’s because I value other things. Maybe it’s because I’ve been out of the market for most of my life. More likely it’s because a home, for me, isn’t meant to carry the weight of aspiration. A home embodies values. It…
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The Day Radio Beat Homework
You get some great, amazingly fantastic news. What’s the first thing you do? I tell the right person first. Not by email. Not by text. No social media announcements. If it’s truly great news, it deserves a voice. It deserves someone on the other end who can hear it properly — and share the moment…
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The Hinge
Describe your most ideal day from beginning to end I’m a person with simple tastes. I don’t need much to have a good day. My ideal day is made of a handful of small scenes that, put together, feel like enough. I’m up at 4:30 or 5:00am. The house is quiet. I feed the animals…
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What Each Decade Taught Me
How do significant life events or the passage of timeinfluence your perspective on life? When I was 17, I thought focus was a virtue. Cut out distractions, study hard, give yourself to the things you valued. I did that. I achieved. But I also felt empty. In my twenties I worked at a major bank.…
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My Complaint
What do you complain about the most? I complain about people who are caught up in themselves — people consumed by their own wants, always receiving, always wanting to know what’s in it for them. It feels self-indulgent, and it makes life harder than it needs to be. If I’m honest, I think I complain…
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Five Kinds of Fun
List five things you do for fun. Body fun: I’m an active person. Sport is fun for me, especially football — not just the contest, but the camaraderie of being part of a cohesive team. The best moments are when everything just clicks and you start playing attractive football without forcing it. Mind fun: I…
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Friday Night Makeover
If you could make your pet understand one thing, what would it be? You look beautiful when you let us brush you. Some households do Friday night footy. We do Friday night brush the dog (I know — we live on the edge). Our dog has a beautiful coat — dark on top, but with…
The Afterword 