Debi Simons

Author of Intentional Happiness

How Did We Get Here?

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Book cover of Subverted, which shows a woman in sunglasses

Subverted:  How I Helped the Sexual Revolution Hijack the Women’s Movement by Sue Ellen Browder, Ignatius Press, 2015.

Has it ever occurred to you that there are two distinct and contradictory streams of thought about women in our modern culture?  That thought has been nagging at me for awhile now, but lately it’s come into sharp focus, and this book helped with that process.

Imagine this scene:  A conference room at some high-powered law office.  The announcement is being made of who has made partner.  It’s been a long and somewhat bitter process, but now it has been decided:  out of two women and three men the choice has come down to one of the women.  She is poised, articulate, and superbly dressed in her power suit.  She is known for her abilities in the courtroom.  From now on she will be paid, in money and respect, for the position she has earned.  Meanwhile, just outside the window of this conference room is a billboard advertising

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It Is Not Enough to Be Right.

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figure bending an arrow upwardYou must prevail.

I have not been able to find the source for this quotation.  Similar ideas show up for Abraham Lincoln, William Paley, and Henry David Thoreau.I’ve been reminded of this idea on a number of occasions lately when I’ve expressed an opinion, been disagreed with, and then basically said by my words and/or my reactions:  “Oh, well, have it your way.”

Here’s the thing:  If my opinion doesn’t really matter, then I probably should just keep my mouth shut in to begin with, in the spirit of my New Year’s resolution about not offering unsolicited advice.  Why should I bother?

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A Good-Hearted Attempt to Reconcile

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book cover of mother, daughter, me, showing pile of teacups and tea saucers

Mother Daughter Me:  A Memoir by Katie Hafner, Random House, 2013, available in several formats.

The planned book for this week didn’t come in on time, and as I was looking through my Evernote “blog ideas” notebook I came across a couple of voice recordings about this book that I listened to on Hoopla several weeks ago.  I was reminded of how much I enjoyed it and learned from it, so here it is.  Originally it came to my attention because I was doing some research on how to record audiobooks, and Hafner showed up somewhere describing her experiences in recording this one.  She sounded funny and genuine, and so when the library had her book available I borrowed it and listened to it through many a gardening chore. I am somewhat of a memoir junkie; this is an exceptional one.

 

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Some Helpful Mottoes

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Stained glass window reading fortiter, feliciter, fideliterphoto credit: Pixabay.com Translation: Strength, Happiness, Faithfulness

You know what I like about Wednesday?  That’s the day each week when the Gretchen Rubin podcast comes out.  (Don’t worry–I have quite a few podcasts I look forward to, but this one is probably the top.  I typically listen to it at least twice.) Gretchen and Liz always have something useful and thoughtful to say, clothed in lots of laughter and lighthearted banter.  So yesterday’s podcast had as one of its main points “Write your manifesto.”  In other words, figure out a few brief sentences that sum up your attitudes or goals in a certain area of your life.  They specifically mentioned marriage as one area.  Maybe I’ll work on that.

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Do You Manage Yourself, Or Try to Manage Others?

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outline of head with wordlcloud containing: Direct, Evaluate, Measure, Admire, Detract, Promote, Blame, Excuse, Supervise, Control, Analyze“The only person I can change is myself.”

Here I sit, having wasted hours of my time reading about the election campaign.  I haven’t done a very good job of managing myself today, so maybe I can at least get a blogpost out of my self-indulgence.

Without at all getting into the weeds of the actual politics (that’s for my Personal and Political page), I’ll say that it’s absolutely fascinating to watch the campaigns play out with all their many moving parts.  You may recall that the books I recommended from a couple of weeks ago were by Mary Matalin and George Carville, with the earlier one, Love and War, being about the 1992 election, during which Matalin and Carville met and fell in love.  Just one little problem:  they were working on opposite sides, Matalin for the re-election of George H. W. Bush, Carville for Bill Clinton.  On election night James calls Mary (I’ll call them that since this is a personal part of the story) and she says to him, “I cannot believe you could live on this earth and know that you were responsible for electing a slime, a scum, a philandering, pot-smoking, draft-dodging pig of a man . . . You make me sick.  I hate your guts.”  After she cusses him out (she doesn’t quote that part), she hangs up.  As she says, “I don’t remember him saying anything.”  (And they got married–and still are to this day!  Miracles do happen.)

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A Change Is as Good as a Rest.

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tennis player working on a laptopWell, I just wasted half an hour or so (and 99 cents) trying to find an episode of the old Bob Newhart show that illustrates the above principle.  I thought I’d found the correct episode and paid Amazon to watch it, but it was the wrong one.  I think I’d better quit looking and just talk about what I can remember.

Here’s what happens:  Howard, the Hartley’s next-door neighbor, comes over at breakfast time.  Bob tells him, “Let’s be careful not to disturb Emily.  This is her first day of summer vacation, and she’s had such a stressful year that I know she

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Are you an over-promiser . . . 

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Making notes on a clipboard

” and an under-fulfiller?

I tend to be that way and have gotten myself into trouble on any number of occasions by not doing what this person in the picture is doing and keeping track of what I’ve said I’d do.  Then suddenly I’m being asked, “Did you do the so-and-so?”  Gulp.

So I need to keep in mind three biblical instructions:

First, have the attitude of Psalm 141:3:  “Set a watch, O Lord, before my mouth; keep the door of my lips”  (KJV)

Second, follow the words of Jesus:  “Just say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ When you manipulate words to get your own way, you go wrong” (Matthew 5:37 The Message).

And remember that there will come a day when all will be revealed and judged:  “But I tell you that everyone will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken” (Matthew 12:36 NIV).

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But the Greatest of These Is Love.

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Book cover of A Loving Life in a world of broken relationships

A Loving Life In a World of Broken Relationships by Paul E. Miller, available in several formats (including audio, my new fave) from Amazon.  Also available through Crossway Books.  He is on the staff of seeJesus.net, a Bible study ministry, and you can view his video teaching blog at Paul’s Weekly Teaching.

I have been privileged to go through Miller’s previous book, A Praying Life, with study groups on at least two occasions but had never read this one.  I vaguely remember starting it at some point and thinking it was just too negative; it seemed to emphasize that love always involves suffering.  Not what I wanted to hear!  So I put it back on the shelf.  But then this summer I was looking over our stock of Christian books for something to read in my morning quiet time and decided to give it another try.

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You Can’t Hit a Home Run . . . 

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Baseball player taking off from home after hitting the ballphoto credit: Pixabay.com

. . . unless you swing.

Great quotation that I have scribbled down in my notebook.  I don’t have a specific source for it, but it ties in with something from Babe Ruth, the so-called Sultan of Swat:

“Never let the fear of striking out get in your way.”

Did you know that Ruth held the record not only for the most home runs but also for the most strikeouts?

I often tell myself that I need to pull my socks up and step up to the plate.  Hmmm.  For someone who never watches baseball I seem to have an affinity for its metaphors.  Probably a heritage from my dear father, who loved baseball and as he neared the end of his life could still remember statistics from decades back even as his short-term memory failed.

So a swing and a miss is better than no swing at all.  Not a matter of absolute truth but a good guiding principle.  What do you think?