Coworkers Are Not Your Friends Quotes

Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, who plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex, and jams hot dogs and hamburgers into her mouth like she’s hosting the world’s biggest culinary gang bang while somehow maintaining a size 2, because Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot and understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their men do whatever they want. Go ahead, shit on me, I don’t mind, I’m the Cool Girl. Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men – friends, coworkers, strangers – giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them. I’d want to grab the poor guy by his lapels or messenger bag and say: The bitch doesn’t really love chili dogs that much – no one loves chili dogs that much! And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. Oh, and if you’re not a Cool Girl, I beg you not to believe that your man doesn’t want the Cool Girl. It may be a slightly different version – maybe he’s a vegetarian, so Cool Girl loves seitan and is great with dogs; or maybe he’s a hipster artist, so Cool Girl is a tattooed, bespectacled nerd who loves comics. There are variations to the window dressing, but believe me, he wants Cool Girl, who is basically the girl who likes every fucking thing he likes and doesn’t ever complain. (How do you know you’re not Cool Girl? Because he says things like: “I like strong women.” If he says that to you, he will at some point fuck someone else. Because “I like strong women” is code for “I hate strong women.”)

When you come out of the grips of a depression there is an incredible relief, but not one you feel allowed to celebrate. Instead, the feeling of victory is replaced with anxiety that it will happen again, and with shame and vulnerability when you see how your illness affected your family, your work, everything left untouched while you struggled to survive. We come back to life thinner, paler, weaker … but as survivors. Survivors who don’t get pats on the back from coworkers who congratulate them on making it. Survivors who wake to more work than before because their friends and family are exhausted from helping them fight a battle they may not even understand. I hope to one day see a sea of people all wearing silver ribbons as a sign that they understand the secret battle, and as a celebration of the victories made each day as we individually pull ourselves up out of our foxholes to see our scars heal, and to remember what the sun looks like.

The ones who are not soul-mated – the ones who have settled – are even more dismissive of my singleness: It’s not that hard to find someone to marry, they say. No relationship is perfect, they say – they, who make do with dutiful sex and gassy bedtime rituals, who settle for TV as conversation, who believe that husbandly capitulation – yes, honey, okay, honey – is the same as concord. He’s doing what you tell him to do because he doesn’t care enough to argue, I think. Your petty demands simply make him feel superior, or resentful, and someday he will fuck his pretty, young coworker who asks nothing of him, and you will actually be shocked. Give me a man with a little fight in him, a man who calls me on my bullshit. (But who also kind of likes my bullshit.) And yet: Don’t land me in one of those relationships where we’re always pecking at each other, disguising insults as jokes, rolling our eyes and ‘playfully’ scrapping in front of our friends, hoping to lure them to our side of an argument they could not care less about. Those awful if only relationships: This marriage would be great if only… and you sense the if only list is a lot longer than either of them realizes. So I know I am right not to settle, but it doesn’t make me feel better as my friends pair off and I stay home on Friday night with a bottle of wine and make myself an extravagant meal and tell myself, This is perfect, as if I’m the one dating me. As I go to endless rounds of parties and bar nights, perfumed and sprayed and hopeful, rotating myself around the room like some dubious dessert. I go on dates with men who are nice and good-looking and smart – perfect-on-paper men who make me feel like I’m in a foreign land, trying to explain myself, trying to make myself known. Because isn’t that the point of every relationship: to be known by someone else, to be understood? He gets me. She gets me. Isn’t that the simple magic phrase? So you suffer through the night with the perfect-on-paper man – the stutter of jokes misunderstood, the witty remarks lobbed and missed. Or maybe he understands that you’ve made a witty remark but, unsure of what to do with it, he holds it in his hand like some bit of conversational phlegm he will wipe away later. You spend another hour trying to find each other, to recognise each other, and you drink a little too much and try a little too hard. And you go home to a cold bed and think, That was fine. And your life is a long line of fine.

Let the jerks of the world serve as the perfect example of what you don't want to be. You'll be a heck of a lot happier, and in the long run, there's a chance that other person at work will end up asking what your secret is. Why are you the happy one? In other words, don't let your thoughts think you. Besides, if you're really gonna get pissed, don't waste it on your family, friends, or coworkers, save it for something that really matters.

I know that you and your girls have been told for years on end that you just don’t pass up any opportunities when a man walks your way—he could be The One. But I’m here to tell you that this philosophy is just plain dumb. Women are smart—you all can tell when your friends are lying, you know when your kids are up to no good, co-workers can’t get anything past you at the job. You’re quick to let each one of them know that you’re not stupid, that you see them coming a mile away, and you’re not going to let them play that game with you. But when it comes to your relationships with the opposite sex, all of that goes out the window; you relinquish your power and lose all control over the situation—cede it to any old man who looks at you twice. Just because he happened to look at you twice.

When you invite people to share in your miracle, you create future allies during rough weather.

Every time you check your phone in company, what you gain is a hit of stimulation, a neurochemical shot, and what you lose is what a friend, teacher, parent, lover, or co-worker just said, meant, felt.

What the hell does it all mean anyhow? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nothing comes to anything. And yet, there's no shortage of idiots to babble. Not me. I have a vision. I'm discussing you. Your friends. Your coworkers. Your newspapers. The TV. Everybody's happy to talk. Full of misinformation. Morality, science, religion, politics, sports, love, your portfolio, your children, health. Christ, if I have to eat nine servings of fruits and vegetables a day to live, I don't wanna live. I hate goddamn fruits and vegetables. And your omega 3's, and the treadmill, and the cardiogram, and the mammogram, and the pelvic sonogram, and oh my god the-the-the colonoscopy, and with it all the day still comes where they put you in a box, and its on to the next generation of idiots, who'll also tell you all about life and define for you what's appropriate. My father committed suicide because the morning newspapers depressed him. And could you blame him? With the horror, and corruption, and ignorance, and poverty, and genocide, and AIDS, and global warming, and terrorism, and-and the family value morons, and the gun morons. "The horror," Kurtz said at the end of Heart of Darkness, "the horror." Lucky Kurtz didn't have the Times delivered in the jungle. Ugh... then he'd see some horror. But what do you do? You read about some massacre in Darfur or some school bus gets blown up, and you go "Oh my God, the horror," and then you turn the page and finish your eggs from the free range chickens. Because what can you do. It's overwhelming!

It's not that you have lost touch with these people. You haven't. It's just that they have kept in such close touch with each other. When scrolling through your cell phone, you generally let their numbers be highlighted for a second, hovering, and then move along to people you have spoken to within the last month. It's not that you're a bad friend to these people. It's just that you're not a great one. They know the names of each other's coworkers and the blow-by-blow nature of each other's dramas; they go camping in the Berkshires together and have such sentences in their conversational arsenal as "you left your lip gloss in my bathroom." You have no such sentences. Your connection to your friends is half-baked and you are starting to forget their siblings' names, never mind their coworkers. But you're still in the play even if you're no longer a main character.

That's it: watch your moods. Don't let people see you fluctuate. Don't let yourself run your mouth. Never ever cry, even alone, because your cat or your kettle might tell. Always smile, but don't laugh loudly. Mania is an extrovert, but if you need to vent, tell your mattress or maybe your therapist, but put nothing in writing and never tell a friend or coworker how you're really feeling. Downplay any problem or joy. Pay attention to any signs that your life is shitty or excellent, because either is an illusion. Be careful around men, especially ones with big arms or opinions. Stop talking.

Nall, there’s nothing but friendship between Jase and me,” Savanna explained. “He’s been such a huge help to me. When I first arrived in your big, beautiful city, it was his darling, handsome face I saw first, waiting for me. He’s such a good friend and co-worker,” she complimented.

The ones who are not soul-mated – the ones who have settled – are even more dismissive of my singleness: It’s not that hard to find someone to marry, they say. No relationship is perfect, they say – they, who make do with dutiful sex and gassy bedtime rituals, who settle for TV as conversation, who believe that husbandly capitulation – yes, honey, okay, honey – is the same as concord. He’s doing what you tell him to do because he doesn’t care enough to argue, I think. Your petty demands simply make him feel superior, or resentful, and someday he will fuck his pretty, young coworker who asks nothing of him, and you will actually be shocked. Give me a man with a little fight in him, a man who calls me on my bullshit. (But who also kind of likes my bullshit.) And yet: Don’t land me in one of those relationships where we’re always pecking at each other, disguising insults as jokes, rolling our eyes and ‘playfully’ scrapping in front of our friends, hoping to lure them to our side of an argument they could not care less about. Those awful if only relationships: This marriage would be great if only… and you sense the if only list is a lot longer than either of them realizes.

This [oatmeal] represents your soul in its pure state. Your soul on the day you were born. You were perfect. You were happy. You were good. Now, enter Concept Number Two: crap. Don't worry, folks. I don't use actual crap up here. Only imaginary crap. You'll have to supply the crap, using your mind. Now, if someone came up and crapped in your nice warm oatmeal, what would you say? Would you say: 'Wow, super, thanks, please continue crapping in my oatmeal'? Am I being silly? I'm being a little silly. But guess what, in real life people come up and crap in your oatmeal all the time--friends, co-workers, loved ones, even you kids, especially your kids!--and that's exactly what you do. You say, 'Thanks so much!' You say, 'Crap away!' You say, and here the metaphor breaks down a bit, 'Is there some way I can help you crap in my oatmeal?

You are the sum total of the people you meet and interact with in the world. Whether it’s your family, peers, or co-workers, the opportunities you have and the things that you learn all come through doors that other people open for you.

You've been my teachers, clergy, my fellow students, coworkers, bosses, principals, sometimes you were a former friend or even family I once trusted. You've taken things I told you in utter confidence, & twisted them into lies to be used against me. Without cause, you have told lies against me. You have refused to see me as a human being. You have kicked me when I was up & you have kicked me when I was down. But today, you will kick me no more, I will no longer be your verbal or physical punching bag, Today, I discovered the secret that will never allow you or friends, who will one day turn on you too, to hurt me again. Today as I lay broken & bleeding in that dark place I crawl into when I think I can't take it anymore, I found something extraordinary. My humanity. As my soul screamed in bleeding agony & I wanted to die rather than live one more day in a world where you exist, I realized that my tears & ability to feel pain without lashing out to return that hurt to someone else makes me human.

After a while, meaning and implication detach themselves from everything. One can be a father and assume no obligations, it follows that one can be a boyfriend and do nothing at all. Pretty soon you can add friend, acquaintance, co-worker, and just about anyone else to the long list of people who seem to be part of your life, though there is no code of conduct that they must adhere to. Pretty soon, it seems unreasonable to be bothered or outraged by much of anything because, well, what did you expect? In a world where the core social unit - the family - is so dispensable, how much can anything else mean?

I can’t quite shake this feeling that we live in a world gone wrong, that there are all these feelings you’re not supposed to have because there’s no reason to anymore. But still they’re there, stuck somewhere, a flaw that evolution hasn’t managed to eliminate yet. I want so badly to feel bad about getting pregnant. But I can’t, don’t dare to. Just like I didn’t dare tell Jack that I was falling in love with him, wanting to be a modern woman who’s supposed to be able to handle the casual nature of these kinds of relationships. I’m never supposed to say, to Jack or anyone else, ‘What makes you think I’m so rich that you can steal my heart and it won’t mean a thing?’ Sometimes I think that I was forced to withdraw into depression, because it was the only rightful protest I could throw in the face of a world that said it was all right for people to come and go as they please, that there were simply no real obligations left. Deceit and treachery in both romantic and political relationships is nothing new, but at one time, it was bad, callous, and cold to hurt somebody. Now it’s just the way things go, part of the growth process. Really nothing is surprising. After a while, meaning and implication detach themselves from everything. If one can be a father and assume no obligations, it follows that one can be a boyfriend and do nothing at all. Pretty soon you can add friend, acquaintance, co-worker, and just about anyone else to the long list of people who seem to be part of your life, though there is no code of conduct that they must adhere to. Pretty soon, it seems unreasonable to be bothered or outraged by much of anything because, well, what did you expect?

Dear Hunger Games : Screw you for helping cowards pretend you have to be great with a bow to fight evil. You don't need to be drafted into a monkey-infested jungle to fight evil. You don't need your father's light sabre, or to be bitten by a radioactive spider. You don't need to be stalked by a creepy ancient vampire who is basically a pedophile if you're younger than a redwood. Screw you mainstream media for making it look like moral courage requires hair gel, thousands of sit ups and millions of dollars of fake ass CGI. Moral courage is the gritty, scary and mostly anonymous process of challenging friends, co-workers and family on issues like spanking, taxation, debt, circumcision and war. Moral courage is standing up to bullies when the audience is not cheering, but jeering. It is helping broken people out of abusive relationships, and promoting the inner peace of self knowledge in a shallow and empty pseudo-culture. Moral courage does not ask for - or receive - permission or the praise of the masses. If the masses praise you, it is because you are helping distract them from their own moral cowardice and conformity. Those who provoke discomfort create change - no one else. So forget your politics and vampires and magic wands and photon torpedoes. Forget passively waiting for the world to provoke and corner you into being virtuous. It never will. Stop watching fictional courage and go live some; it is harder and better than anything you will ever see on a screen. Let's make the world change the classification of courage from 'fantasy' to 'documentary.' You know there are people in your life who are doing wrong. Go talk to them, and encourage them to pursue philosophy, self-knowledge and virtue. Be your own hero; you are the One that your world has been waiting for.

the extrovert assumption is so woven into the fabric of our culture that an employee may suffer reprimands for keeping his door closed (that is, if he is one of the lucky ones who has a door), for not lunching with other staff members, or for missing the weekend golf game or any number of supposedly morale-boosting celebrations. Half. More than half of us don’t want to play. We don’t see the point. For us, an office potluck will not provide satisfying human contact—we’d much rather meet a friend for an intimate conversation (even if that friend is a coworker). For us, the gathering will not boost morale — and will probably leave us resentful that we stayed an extra hour to eat stale cookies and make small talk. For us, talking with coworkers does not benefit our work—it sidetracks us.

You should always be prepared to defend your choices, whether just to yourself (sometimes this is the hardest) or to your coworkers, your friends, or your family. The quickest way for people to lose confidence in your ability to ever make a decision is for you to pass the buck, shrug your shoulders, or otherwise wuss out. Learning how to become a decision maker, and how you ultimately justify your choices, can define who you are.

...friendship stands as a small affront to the total control of all things by mass entertainment and mass media and mass education and mass politics. For wherever such friendships persist, there persists the possibility of imaginative leaps that threaten the comfort of the banal. For you look at the friend and you remember the past, and treasure it. You love the friend, and suddenly you understand that this life of ours cannot fully be described by the motion of particulate matter in empty space. You see instantly that politics fades into unimportance, with all its noisy glamour and empty promises. You feel that others before you have known what it is to have the true friend, the one before whom you can, as Cicero put it, think out loud. You feel that, and it is like an earnest of eternity, of being grounded in a a love and beauty and goodness that is at the heart of all ages, and that transcends them all. Pals we may have, in the flatlands of contemporary life. Political allies, sure. Coworkers, aplenty. But not friends.

I’M SORRY I am developing a new board game. It’s called “I’m Sorry.” It’s also a form of “Self-Help Psychological Therapy!” You take turns moving around the board like Monopoly. But if you land on a Yellow or Green “I’m Sorry Space”… you have to make a Phone call. Both green and yellow cards are labeled- the same with things like: Your Ex, Parental figure, friend, co-worker, boss, children, etc. You get the point… If you land on the yellow space, the game stops, everyone gets quiet and you have to call that person up – on speakerphone. You apologize for something you’ve done in your past. Come on you know you are not perfect and you probably screwed up, hurt or disappointed everyone in your past at one time or another. So you call and you apologize. You explain what you did to them wrong if they forgive you, you move forward 10 places and everyone cheers! No forgiveness back- you move back to the beginning. If you land on the green space- it’s similar. But you call the person up and you try to explain to them how, in someway, they hurt you in the past. If they apologize… cheers and you move forward 10 spaces. No apology… move backward ten spaces. They curse at you- game over. In the original packaging of the yellow and green cards, are mixed in a set of “I’m Sorry Cards.” If you are lucky enough to get to pick up an “I’m Sorry Card,” it’s like a Get Out of Jail Free Card, and you don’t have to make the call. The only catch is that the cards come hermetically sealed. After opening up the package, and the cards are exposed to air, all of the “I’m Sorry Cards,” magically turn into “Deal With it Cards!” And so, you really never get a free ride. In reality, every time you pick up a yellow or green card, you have to- Deal with It! Of course you can always order a new factory set of sealed of “I’m Sorry Cards.” But they only last about 30 minutes and are very expensive, so you’ll have to play fast. Cute Game? Hey, don’t steal my idea!!!

Never lose sight of the fact that the most important yardstick of your success will be how you treat other people - your family, friends, and coworkers, and even strangers you meet along the way.

We Are Lovable Even if the most important person in your world rejects you, you are still real, and you are still okay. —Codependent No More Do you ever find yourself thinking: How could anyone possibly love me? For many of us, this is a deeply ingrained belief that can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Thinking we are unlovable can sabotage our relationships with co-workers, friends, family members, and other loved ones. This belief can cause us to choose, or stay in, relationships that are less than we deserve because we don’t believe we deserve better. We may become desperate and cling as if a particular person was our last chance at love. We may become defensive and push people away. We may withdraw or constantly overreact. While growing up, many of us did not receive the unconditional love we deserved. Many of us were abandoned or neglected by important people in our life. We may have concluded that the reason we weren’t loved was because we were unlovable. Blaming ourselves is an understandable reaction, but an inappropriate one. If others couldn’t love us, or love us in ways that worked, that’s not our fault. In recovery, we’re learning to separate ourselves from the behavior of others. And we’re learning to take responsibility for our healing, regardless of the people around us. Just as we may have believed that we’re unlovable, we can become skilled at practicing the belief that we are lovable. This new belief will improve the quality of our relationships. It will improve our most important relationship: our relationship with our self. We will be able to let others love us and become open to the love and friendship we deserve. Today, help me be aware of and release any self-defeating beliefs I have about being unlovable. Help me begin, today, to tell myself that I am lovable. Help me practice this belief until it gets into my core and manifests itself in my relationships.

Knowing our personal financial identity allows for healing, empathy, and further strengthening of relationships when we apply it in the context of family or other relationships with friends, a spouse, and co-workers. It is also a very helpful framework for healing our money mindset and money blocks (including ancestral money blocks), so we can re-write our own personal money stories, that are rooted in our own personal financial identity.

In one way, at least, our lives really are like movies. The main cast consists of your family and friends. The supporting cast is made up of neighbors, co-workers, teachers, and daily acquaintances. There are also bit players: the supermarket checkout girl with the pretty smile, the friendly bartender at the local watering hole, the guys you work out with at the gym three days a week. And there are thousands of extras --those people who flow through every life like water through a sieve, seen once and never again. The teenager browsing a graphic novel at Barnes & Noble, the one you had to slip past (murmuring "Excuse me") in order to get to the magazines. The woman in the next lane at a stoplight, taking a moment to freshen her lipstick. The mother wiping ice cream off her toddler's face in a roadside restaurant where you stopped for a quick bite. The vendor who sold you a bag of peanuts at a baseball game. But sometimes a person who fits none of these categories comes into your life. This is the joker who pops out of the deck at odd intervals over the years, often during a moment of crisis. In the movies this sort of character is known as the fifth business, or the chase agent. When he turns up in a film, you know he's there because the screenwriter put him there. But who is screenwriting our lives? Fate or coincidence? I want to believe it's the latter. I want that with all my heart and soul.

Tell the trafic jams to no open their roads to you. Tell the eyes that meet you on the road, that I’m no longer jealous. Tell the souls that share with you the details of your day, that I no longer wich to be them. Tell to the one I advised to take care of you, to forget my advice, and to neglect you as she wants. Tell your pillow to not be gentle with your head. Tell your tooth brush to not be gentle with your gums. Tell your hair brush to not care about your head skin. Tell your blanket to not give you warmth. Tell your winter clothes to not protect you from the cold. Tell the streets’ dogs to frighten you. Tell your car’s other seat that I no longer dream of sitting on it. Tell your country that I no longer dream of flying to it. Tell your friends, your coworkers, your best friend, your neighbours, the world, the universe, your ground, your sky, I broke your chains, and I no longer care about you. So leave on the story’s seat a dry flower, and leave my memory.

When depression sufferers fight, recover, and go into remission we seldom even know, simply because so many suffer in the dark … ashamed to admit something they see as a personal weakness … afraid that people will worry, and more afraid that they won’t. We find ourselves unable to do anything but cling to the couch and force ourselves to breathe. When you come out of the grips of a depression there is an incredible relief, but not one you feel allowed to celebrate. Instead, the feeling of victory is replaced with anxiety that it will happen again, and with shame and vulnerability when you see how your illness affected your family, your work, everything left untouched while you struggled to survive. We come back to life thinner, paler, weaker … but as survivors. Survivors who don’t get pats on the back from coworkers who congratulate them on making it. Survivors who wake to more work than before because their friends and family are exhausted from helping them fight a battle they may not even understand. I hope to one day see a sea of people all wearing silver ribbons as a sign that they understand the secret battle, and as a celebration of the victories made each day as we individually pull ourselves up out of our foxholes to see our scars heal, and to remember what the sun looks like.

Story people are a bit like real people––no matter where their humble beginnings may lie, their journeys are shaped by family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, and all manner of acquaintances. Some encourage them, some guide them, some offer them unconditional love, some teach them, some challenge them to be their best. This story, like most stories, owes its existence to a village of unique and generous individuals.

We live in a world of want ads. Some of them are printed on pages; many more are unspoken. Wanted: A woman who is a perfect friend, mom, wife, coworker, housekeeper, cook, driver, thinker, encourager, and more. Messy, real, in-progress people need not apply. God has a very different idea in mind. Wanted: A woman who is imperfect, in need of grace, gloriously gifted, flawed, and beautiful and who dares to believe she’s loved through it all by a God who has an amazing purpose for her life. No need to apply. You’ve already been chosen.

Sadhana Look around. Among your family, coworkers, and friends, can you see how everyone has different levels of perception? Just observe this closely. If you know a few people who seem to have a greater clarity of perception than others, watch how they conduct their body. They often have a certain poise without practice. But just a little practice can make an enormous difference. If you sit for just a few hours a day with your spine erect, you will see that it will have an unmistakable effect on your life. You will now begin to understand what I mean by the geometry of your existence. Just the way you hold your body determines almost everything about you. Another way of listening to life is paying attention to it experientially, not intellectually or emotionally. Choose any one thing about yourself: your breath, your heartbeat, your pulse, your little finger. Just pay attention to it for eleven minutes at a time. Do this at least three times a day. Keep your attention on any sensation, but feel free to continue doing whatever you are doing. If you lose attention, it doesn’t matter. Simply refocus your attention. This practice will allow you to move from mental alertness to awareness. You will find the quality of your life experience will begin to change.

It’s not always easy to follow the subtle energetic information the universe broadcasts, especially when your friends, family, coworkers, or those with a business interest in your creativity are offering seemingly rational advice that challenges your intuitive knowing. To the best of my ability, I’ve followed my intuition to make career turns, and been recommended against doing so every time. It helps to realize that it’s better to follow the universe than those around you. Interference may also come from the voices within. The ones in your head that murmur you’re not talented enough, your idea isn’t good enough, art isn’t a worthwhile investment of your time, the result won’t be well-received, you’re a failure if the creation isn’t successful. It’s helpful to turn those voices down so you can hear the chimes of the cosmic clock ring, reminding you it’s time. Your time to participate.

Always know that you are being held accountable for your actions, by your friends, family, coworkers, and most importantly, by God. Lead by example and build a team of successful people around you. By being the dependable person, success is naturally attracted to you.

When you are scanning for lies and you can't decide if a person is telling the truth or lying, it's in your best interests to always go with your gut feeling.  

Also, I entreat you: do not show your work in progress to any outsider. I mean Bradley or Kahane, or anyone who is not working with you, following your thought, entering into it. It is confusing. These men are not your co-workers or even friends. These men are outsiders. Keep to yourself. You need a deep cohesion, a strong forward continuity. Admit no opinions until you are through.

Sometimes the greatest friends in life emerge out of thin air the moment you need them. They may not be the longest-lasting, like a childhood friend who knows you from diapers to retirement, or even the ones you see most, like roommates or coworkers, but they fill a hole in your life that you never knew was human-shaped until they walked right in, uninvited, and fit there, perfectly.

You stay in your place, and I stay in mine, then I get to claim you as my friend, you’re my coworker, see how I’m not racist? But [only] as long as you don’t challenge my identity and my position.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN we pray? Have you ever really thought about that? When you bow your knee and fold your hands or walk the floor with your eyes closed, opening your heart to heaven, what exactly happens? There are very few references in the Bible about the proper procedures for how to pray, and I believe that is because prayer is more about the heart’s attitude and focus than it is about whether we stand, sit, close our eyes, or any other practice we normally associate with prayer. The truth be told, if we are supposed to pray without ceasing, we should also be able to work on an engine, write an e-mail, give a presentation, change a diaper, write a report, have coffee with a friend, encourage a coworker, pay our bills, and any of the other myriad of things we do in a day while still keeping the communication lines open with heaven. I believe that every day we need focused times of prayer, but at all other times we should be in an attitude of prayer with our spiritual ears open to the thoughts of heaven. There should be seasons of intense, concentrated prayer and fasting with specified hours set aside for intercession, and there should be times when prayer is simply a regular part of our daily routine. A great interest has arisen in the last decade around 24-7 prayer rooms where different church members pray in hour-long blocks so that unbroken intercession is raised up for their city and our world. Other churches dedicate evenings solely to prayer and worship and gather believers to lift their voices in song and petition to the Lord. While all of these are wonderful things to do, at its essence prayer is simply conversation with God. Because we have changed passports from the kingdom of this world to the kingdom of heaven, we are members of God’s family and therefore have the right to talk with our Father anytime we want because He is not limited by time and space. Yet while it isn’t difficult to speak to Him, even as a babe in faith, it does take some maturity to discern His voice from the voice of our own thoughts, dreams, and desires. This is why, when I speak about prayer, I get more questions about hearing the voice of God than anything else.

Hundreds of our old neighbors, friends, coworkers, and teachers are new insomniacs. They file for dream bankruptcy, appeal for Slumber Corps aid, wait to be approved for a sleep donor. It is a special kind of homelessness, says our mayor, to be evicted from your dreams. I believe our mayor is both genuinely concerned for his insomniac constituency, and also pandering to a powerfully desperate new voting block.

They’re baffled by my singleness. A smart, pretty, nice girl like me, a girl with so many interests and enthusiasms, a cool job, a loving family. And let’s say it: money. They knit their eyebrows and pretend to think of men they can set me up with, but we all know there’s no one left, no one good left, and I know that they secretly think there’s something wrong with me, something hidden away that makes me unsatisfiable, unsatisfying. The ones who are not soul-mated – the ones who have settled – are even more dismissive of my singleness: It’s not that hard to find someone to marry, they say. No relationship is perfect, they say – they, who make do with dutiful sex and gassy bedtime rituals, who settle for TV as conversation, who believe that husbandly capitulation – yes, honey, okay, honey – is the same as concord. He’s doing what you tell him to do because he doesn’t care enough to argue, I think. Your petty demands simply make him feel superior, or resentful, and someday he will fuck his pretty, young coworker who asks nothing of him, and you will actually be shocked. Give me a man with a little fight in him, a man who calls me on my bullshit. (But who also kind of likes my bullshit.) And yet: Don’t land me in one of those relationships where we’re always pecking at each other, disguising insults as jokes, rolling our eyes and ‘playfully’ scrapping in front of our friends, hoping to lure them to our side of an argument they could not care less about. Those awful if only relationships: This marriage would be great if only … and you sense the if only list is a lot longer than either of them realizes.

I’m not sure how the ponies happened, though I have an inkling: “Can I get you anything?” I’ll say, getting up from a dinner table, “Coffee, tea, a pony?” People rarely laugh at this, especially if they’ve heard it before. “This party’s ‘sposed to be fun,” a friend will say. “Really? Will there be pony rides?” It’s a nervous tic and a cheap joke, cheapened further by the frequency with which I use it. For that same reason, it’s hard to weed it out of my speech – most of the time I don’t even realize I’m saying it. There are little elements in a person’s life, minor fibers that become unintentionally tangled with your personality. Sometimes it’s a patent phrase, sometimes it’s a perfume, sometimes it’s a wristwatch. For me, it is the constant referencing of ponies. I don’t even like ponies. If I made one of my throwaway equine requests and someone produced an actual pony, Juan-Valdez-style, I would run very fast in the other direction. During a few summers at camp, I rode a chronically dehydrated pony named Brandy who would jolt down without notice to lick the grass outside the corral and I would careen forward, my helmet tipping to cover my eyes. I do, however, like ponies on the abstract. Who doesn’t? It’s like those movies with the animated insects. Sure, the baby cockroach seems cute with CGI eyelashes, but how would you feel about fifty of her real-life counterparts living in your oven? And that’s precisely the manner in which the ponies clomped their way into my regular speech: abstractly. “I have something for you,” a guy will say on our first date. “Is it a pony?” No. It’s usually a movie ticket or his cell phone number. But on our second date, if I ask again, I’m pretty sure I’m getting a pony. And thus the Pony drawer came to be. It’s uncomfortable to admit, but almost every guy I have ever dated has unwittingly made a contribution to the stable. The retro pony from the ‘50s was from the most thoughtful guy I have ever known. The one with the glitter horseshoes was from a boy who would later turn out to be straight somehow, not gay. The one with the rainbow haunches was from a librarian, whom I broke up with because I felt the chemistry just wasn’t right, and the one with the price tag stuck on the back was given to me by a narcissist who was so impressed with his gift he forgot to remover the sticker. Each one of them marks the beginning of a new relationship. I don’t mean to hint. It’s not a hint, actually, it’s a flat out demand: I. Want. A. Pony. I think what happens is that young relationships are eager to build up a romantic repertoire of private jokes, especially in the city where there’s not always a great “how we met” story behind every great love affair. People meet at bars, through mutual friends, on dating sites, or because they work in the same industry. Just once a coworker of mine, asked me out between two stops on the N train. We were holding the same pole and he said, “I know this sounds completely insane, bean sprout, but would you like to go to a very public place with me and have a drink or something...?” I looked into his seemingly non-psycho-killing, rent-paying, Sunday Times-subscribing eyes and said, “Sure, why the hell not?” He never bought me a pony. But he didn’t have to, if you know what I mean.

It is my hope that this book helps those who know and love people with DID: family members, lovers, coworkers, and friends. It is also my hope that those charged with intervening in families in which there is violence will take away a more nuanced approach to their important work, informed by a deeper understanding of trauma. Most of all, I hope that those of you who have DID know that the disorder itself is an incredible survival technique. You should feel proud to have survived. Trauma has had a major impact on my life, as it has on yours, but I’ve learned that my life extends beyond the pain and darkness. Survivors of trauma are full of life, creativity, courage, and love. We are more than the sum of our parts.

We all have unfair things happen to us. We can choose to cling to that hurt and let it destroy our day-to-day happiness and poison our futures, or we can choose to release the hurt and trust God to make it up to us. You may think you can’t forgive those who’ve hurt you, whether friends, a spouse, or co-workers. But you don’t have to forgive them for their sakes; you forgive for your own sake. When we forgive others, we take away their power to hurt us. The mistake we make so often is to hold on to hurt. We go around bitter and angry, but all we’re doing is allowing those who hurt us to control our lives. The abuser, bully, or critic isn’t hurt by our anger and bitterness. We’re just poisoning our own lives with it.

Selling your house, giving away possessions, working multiple jobs for a period of time, going back to school and moving in with friends or relatives, sharing a car with your partner and riding your bike more, investing all your savings in a new venture, living on the other side of the world for a year— your friends may not understand, your co-workers may not get it, your extended family may think you’ve lost your mind— that’s okay. Better to receive some odd looks and have a few people roll their eyes than spend your days wondering, What if I did that . . . ? Take that step. Make that leap. Try that new thing. If it helps clarify your ikigai, if it gets you up in the morning, if it’s good for you and the world, do it.

What do others see when they look at your life? What do those who know you best say about you—your spouse, your children, your friends, your coworkers? Do they see inconsistencies in any area of your life—money, relationships, speech, possessions?

Each of these people has an extreme version of what we call a high-conflict personality. Unlike most of us, who normally try to resolve or defuse conflicts, people with high-conflict personalities (HCPs) respond to conflicts by compulsively increasing them. They usually do this by focusing on Targets of Blame, whom they mercilessly attack—verbally, emotionally, financially, reputationally, litigiously, and sometimes violently—often for months or years, even if the initial conflict was minor. Their Targets of Blame are usually someone close (a coworker, neighbor, friend, partner, or family member) or someone in a position of authority (boss, department head, police, government agent). Sometimes, though, the Target of Blame can be completely random.

Often the circumstances in which we lost our self-esteem were relationships distinguished by a steeply unequal power balance. Our spellcasters were parents. Teachers. Bullies. So-called friends. Strangers. Romantic partners. Cliques. Coworkers. Your spellcaster was the mean first grader. Or the psycho in the dark. Or the town, school, Scout troop, spiritual community, family, neighborhood that did not understand your type, whatever that type was. Your spellcaster could even be society at large, that nameless, faceless "them" with boundless power and a thousand biases. And it became unbearable to be the bullied one, the hounded one, the outcast and excluded one. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em, the old saying goes. Others hated us, or appeared to. We joined 'em.

863 Try to put yourself in the position of your co-workers. Exchange points of view with them as a friend, treat them warmly, let them see that you are interested in them, and that you understand them. Such a kindly attitude will inspire them to love and trust you.

But what if you can’t find a colleague with a compatible schedule? When Taylor went away to speak at a conference for a week, I needed to re-create the experience of making an effort pact with another person. Thankfully, I found Focusmate. With a vision to help people around the world stay focused, they facilitate effort pacts via a one-to-one video conferencing service. While Taylor was away, I signed up at Focusmate.com and was paired with a Czech medical school student named Martin. Because I knew he would be waiting for me to co-work at our scheduled time, I didn’t want to let him down. While Martin was hard at work memorizing human anatomy, I stayed focused on my writing. To discourage people from skipping their meeting times, participants are encouraged to leave a review of their focus mate.5 Effort pacts make us less likely to abandon the task at hand. Whether we make them with friends and colleagues, or via tools like Forest, SelfControl, Focusmate, or kSafe, effort pacts are a simple yet highly effective way to keep us from getting distracted.

Take a ton of pictures, text your friends stupid things, check in with old friends as often as possible, express admiration to coworkers, and every day, tell as many people as you can that you love them. A couple of minutes every day—the payoff is small at first, and then it’s immense.

If you change your priorities, people will notice. Your actions show others what’s important to you. When your friends, your coworkers, and your kids and family see you being intentional with your time, you’ll give them permission to question their own “always on” default and step away from their own Infinity Pools.

Who I Am in Christ I Am Accepted   John 1:12 I am God’s child. John 15:15 I am Christ’s friend. Romans 5:1 I have been justified. 1 Corinthians 6:17 I am united with the Lord, and I am one spirit with Him. 1 Corinthians 6:20 I have been bought with a price. I belong to God. 1 Corinthians 12:27 I am a member of Christ’s Body. Ephesians 1:1 I am a saint. Ephesians 1:5 I have been adopted as God’s child. Ephesians 2:18 I have direct access to God through the Holy Spirit. Colossians 1:14 I have been redeemed and forgiven of all my sins. Colossians 2:10 I am complete in Christ. I Am Secure   Romans 8:1-2 I am free from condemnation. Romans 8:28 I am assured all things work together for good. Romans 8:31-34 I am free from any condemning charges against me. Romans 8:35-39 I cannot be separated from the love of God. 2 Corinthians 1:21-22 I have been established, anointed and sealed by God. Philippians 1:6 I am confident that the good work God has begun in me will be perfected. Philippians 3:20 I am a citizen of heaven. Colossians 3:3 I am hidden with Christ in God. 2 Timothy 1:7 I have not been given a spirit of fear, but of power, love and a sound mind. Hebrews 4:16 I can find grace and mercy in time of need. 1 John 5:18 I am born of God and the evil one cannot touch me. I Am Significant   Matthew 5:13-14 I am the salt and light of the earth. John 15:1,5 I am a branch of the true vine, a channel of His life. John 15:16 I have been chosen and appointed to bear fruit. Acts 1:8 I am a personal witness of Christ. 1 Corinthians 3:16 I am God’s temple. 2 Corinthians 5:17-21 I am a minister of reconciliation for God. 2 Corinthians 6:1 I am God’s coworker (see 1 Corinthians 3:9). Ephesians 2:6 I am seated with Christ in the heavenly realm. Ephesians 2:10 I am God’s workmanship. Ephesians 3:12 I may approach God with freedom and confidence. Philippians 4:13 I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.

That night at the Brooklyn party, I was playing the girl who was in style, the girl a man like Nick wants: the Cool Girl. Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, who plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex, and jams hot dogs and hamburgers into her mouth like she’s hosting the world’s biggest culinary gang bang while somehow maintaining a size 2, because Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot and understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their men do whatever they want. Go ahead, shit on me, I don’t mind, I’m the Cool Girl. Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men—friends, coworkers, strangers—giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them. I’d want to grab the poor guy by his lapels or messenger bag and say: The bitch doesn’t really love chili dogs that much—no one loves chili dogs that much! And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. Oh, and if you’re not a Cool Girl, I beg you not to believe that your man doesn’t want the Cool Girl. It may be a slightly different version—maybe he’s a vegetarian, so Cool Girl loves seitan and is great with dogs; or maybe he’s a hipster artist, so Cool Girl is a tattooed, bespectacled nerd who loves comics. There are variations to the window dressing, but believe me, he wants Cool Girl, who is basically the girl who likes every fucking thing he likes and doesn’t ever complain. (How do you know you’re not Cool Girl? Because he says things like: “I like strong women.” If he says that to you, he will at some point fuck someone else. Because “I like strong women” is code for “I hate strong women.”) I waited patiently—years—for the pendulum to swing the other way, for men to start reading Jane Austen, learn how to knit, pretend to love cosmos, organize scrapbook parties, and make out with each other while we leer. And then we’d say, Yeah, he’s a Cool Guy. But it never happened. Instead, women across the nation colluded in our degradation! Pretty soon Cool Girl became the standard girl. Men believed she existed—she wasn’t just a dreamgirl one in a million. Every girl was supposed to be this girl, and if you weren’t, then there was something wrong with you. But it’s tempting to be Cool Girl. For someone like me, who likes to win, it’s tempting to want to be the girl every guy wants. When I met Nick, I knew immediately that was what he wanted, and for him, I guess I was willing to try. I will accept my portion of blame. The thing is, I was crazy about him at first. I found him perversely exotic, a good ole Missouri boy. He was so damn nice to be around. He teased things out in me that I didn’t know existed: a lightness, a humor, an ease. It was as if he hollowed me out and filled me with feathers. He helped me be Cool

Coming out is something you never stop doing. You start by telling your friends and family. Then you tell new acquaintances or coworkers who invite you out for a drink. Even the telemarketers who call and ask if my wife is home. You don't have to tell everyone you meet, of course, but coming out is something that accompanies your entire life.

Showing up is what turns the people you know into your people. It’s at the core of creating and maintaining strong, meaningful bonds with friends, family, coworkers, and internet pals. Showing up is the act of bearing witness to people’s joy, pain, and true selves; validating their experiences; easing their load; and communicating that they are not alone in this life.

We all have our coming-out story, or why-we-haven't-come-out story. More precisely, we have two. There's the official version, paragraph-sized for conversation, for when it comes, usually on level-two get-to-know-you with friends and dates and curious coworkers. That one covers the basics; when, where, how, the end. You will tell it again and again over the course of your life, polishing it to a fine sheen, until it's as close to frictionless as you can get it. Then there's the real story, the full version, which you tell only a handful of people ever - even if you're one of the lucky ones with a good family, with loving parents who eventually accept you. Because, as Lawrence once said, when the only time you've seen your dad cry is at a funeral, what does that mean about you?

How many times have you bailed on yourself to watch TV? How many times have you given up before you’ve even started? How many times have you made real progress, only to face a setback and then give up completely? How many times have your family or friends or coworkers watched you quit? How many times have your children watched you give up on yourself over and over and over? This is not okay.

For instance, your low self-esteem attracts people who criticize you, and the criticizer attracts people they can belittle. Be careful not to perpetuate wound-mate relationships. Instead, let these people — whether they are friends, coworkers, spouses, or whomever — spur you to develop self-awareness and heal the initial wound. Then you can grow out of these relationships and find more fulfilling ones.

You are just as worthy, deserving, and capable of creating and sustaining extraordinary health, wealth, happiness, love, and success in your life, as any other person on earth. It is absolutely crucial—not only for the quality of your life, but for the impact you make on your family, friends, clients, co-workers, children, community, and anyone whose life you touch—that you start living in alignment with that truth.

In one way, at least, our lives really are like movies. The main cast consists of your family and friends. The supporting cast is made up of neighbors, co-workers, teachers, and daily acquaintances. There are also bit players: the supermarket checkout girl with the pretty smile, the friendly bartender at the local watering hole, the guys you work out with at the gym three days a week. And there are thousands of extras

You have to conclude that your country has run amuck, that the people responsible are insane, that you can not trust your leaders, your President, your general, your parents, your friends, your neighbors, your co-workers, your police, your town, your state, your country, anymore because it is liable to turn upon you for no reason at all, except that for its own security it needs a scapegoat, any scapegoat including you, and there is no appeal possible.

Your legs, hands, eyes etc. have come together in ONE PLACE to create a system which is called a “Body”. It helps you fulfill your desires. Your friends, family, co-workers, leaders etc. have come together in ONE TIME to create a system which is called “life”. The day you start feeling that you are the brain of this system, the day you start feeling that you are the origin of everything around you, everyone will seem to be working to fulfill your desires.

Scientists now believe it’s even possible that our genetic expression fluctuates on a moment-to-moment basis. The research is revealing that our thoughts and feelings, as well as our activities—that is, our choices, behaviors, and experiences—have profound healing and regenerative effects on our bodies, as the men in the monastery study discovered. Thus your genes are being affected by your interactions with your family, friends, co-workers, and spiritual practices, as well as your sexual habits, your exercise levels, and the types of detergents you use. The latest research shows that approximately 90 percent of genes are engaged in cooperation with signals from the environment.8 And if our experience is what activates a good number of our genes, then our nature is influenced by nurturing. So why not harness the power of these ideas so that we can do everything possible to maximize our health and minimize our dependence on the prescription pad?

All in all, everything seems to be back to the way it was before, but with one important exception. You've changed. You're wary now. You walk into work as if entering a minefield. In every conversation, in every meeting, you're careful to watch your every word. Every casual encounter in the hallway becomes a potential confrontation. Every time you meet a co-worker's eyes, you wonder if they are well-disposed or a secret enemy seeking to destroy your job, your career, and your life. You walk on eggshells, and you learn to stop sharing your opinion with anyone about anything, unless it is about something safely innocuous, like sports. What you don't realize is that you've just survived your first SJW attack. And you're luckier than most. You still have your job, you still have your reputation, and you still have your friends and family. Tens of thousands of people are not so lucky. In the universities, in the churches, in the corporations, in the professional associations, in the editorial offices, in the game studios, and just about everywhere else you can imagine, free speech and free thought are under siege by a group of fanatics as self-righteous as Savonarola, as ruthless as Stalin, as ambitious as Napoleon, and as crazy as Caligula. They are the Social Justice Warriors, the SJWs, the self-appointed thought police who have been running amok throughout the West since the dawn of the politically correct era in the 1990s.

Tell the trafic jams to no open their roads to you. Tell the eyes that meet you on the road, that I’m no longer jealous. Tell the souls that share with you the details of your day, that I no longer wish to be them. Tell to the one I advised to take care of you, to forget my advice, and to neglect you as she wants. Tell your pillow to not be gentle with your head. Tell your tooth brush to not be gentle with your gums. Tell your hair brush to not care about your head skin. Tell your blanket to not give you warmth. Tell your winter clothes to not protect you from the cold. Tell the streets’ dogs to frighten you. Tell your car’s other seat that I no longer dream of sitting on it. Tell your country that I no longer dream of flying to it. Tell your friends, your coworkers, your best friend, your neighbours, the world, the universe, your ground, your sky, I broke your chains, and I no longer care about you. So leave on the story’s seat a dry flower, and leave my memory.

The first tip I would offer to those wishing to give Stoicism a try is to practice what I have referred to as stealth Stoicism: You would do well, I think, to keep it a secret that you are a practicing Stoic. (This would have been my own strategy, had I not taken it upon myself to become a teacher of Stoicism.) By practicing Stoicism stealthily, you can gain its benefits while avoiding one significant cost: the teasing and outright mockery of your friends, relatives, neighbors, and coworkers.

I knew Chaz was a good guy, if misguided and gullible. He’d swallowed Buck’s side of what happened between us, had argued with Erin that maybe I was drunk that night and didn’t remember everything clearly. He was probably one of those boys to whom rapists were ugly men who jumped out of bushes, assaulting random girls. Rapists weren’t your nice-guy coworker, or your frat brother, or your best friend. Maybe it never occurred to him that his best friend was capable of ripping a girl’s self-confidence away in the span of five minutes.

DAY 1   Scripture Meditation:   Proverbs 18:21 - "Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof."   Thought for today:   Your words can kill or give life. And there are consequences for both. Today make an effort to speak words that give life and hope for a new beginning to a coworker, friend or family member.   Inspirational Quote:   "A helping word to one in trouble is often like a switch on a railroad track an inch between wreck and smooth, rolling prosperity." -Henry Ward Beecher

My evolution had begun, but as my Navy SEAL future crystallized over the next several months, I learned that when you change, not everyone in your life will be on board. You will get some serious resistance, and it will be a pain in your ass. Everywhere I turned, I found family members, friends, and coworkers resistant to my evolution because they loved the Ecolab-spraying, chocolate-shake-slurping fat ass. At three hundred pounds, I made them feel much better about themselves, which is another way of saying, they were holding me back.

Measuring the strength of a workplace can be simplified to twelve questions. These twelve questions don’t capture everything you may want to know about your workplace, but they do capture the most information and the most important information. They measure the core elements needed to attract, focus, and keep the most talented employees. Here they are: Do I know what is expected of me at work? Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right? At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day? In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for doing good work? Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person? Is there someone at work who encourages my development? At work, do my opinions seem to count? Does the mission/purpose of my company make me feel my job is important? Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work? Do I have a best friend at work? In the last six months, has someone at work talked to me about my progress? This last year, have I had opportunities at work to learn and grow? These twelve questions are the simplest and most accurate way to measure the strength of a workplace.

When Victor was making Skype calls for work, I’d silently crawl up behind him and have Rory slowly and menacingly rise up over Victor’s shoulder until the person on the call froze because they noticed a mentally unbalanced raccoon was leaning in like a furry, eavesdropping serial killer. Then Victor would realize Rory was behind him and he’d sigh that sigh he does so well and remind himself to lock his office door. If anything, though, Victor should have thanked me, because the perfect test to see if your friends and coworkers really have your back is if they’re willing to say, “Hey, there’s a raccoon creeping on you.

Often the hardest struggles in life are not the big ones: death of a family member, loss of a job, or even sickness, because in these situations the problems are “big” enough where the world knows you are struggling and the collective sympathy of friends and family negate a good portion of the hardship. However, the small struggles or the cumulation of the small ones are never seen, you often struggle alone. And they are all so widespread that even if your coworker gets your work problems, your sibling understands your family problems, or your friend understands a social problem, rarely is there someone who can sympathize with the collective weight of them all.

Scientists now believe it’s even possible that our genetic expression fluctuates on a moment-to-moment basis. The research is revealing that our thoughts and feelings, as well as our activities—that is, our choices, behaviors, and experiences—have profound healing and regenerative effects on our bodies, as the men in the monastery study discovered. Thus your genes are being affected by your interactions with your family, friends, co-workers, and spiritual practices, as well as your sexual habits, your exercise levels, and the types of detergents you use. The latest research shows that approximately 90 percent of genes are engaged in cooperation with signals from the environment.

if you do not plan on speaking publicly, this communication secret can help ensure that others are hearing you clearly, and are listening to what you’re saying. It will also help you gain greater respect in your relationships with friends, coworkers, and life partners. In order to get comfortable with the volume of your voice and speaking with conviction, I highly recommend you find a private place to practice, whether in your car during your commute, in the shower, or sitting in your kitchen. Wherever you choose, make sure you are comfortable, and experiment with projecting your voice, concluding sentences with force, and finishing your statements with conviction. The more you practice, the more it will naturally emerge in conversations with others.

A FINAL DECISION How do you move further along on your own path toward a good life? First, by recognizing that the good life is not a destination. It is the path itself, and the people who are walking it with you. As you walk, second by second you can decide to whom and to what you give your attention. Week by week you can prioritize your relationships and choose to be with the people who matter. Year by year you can find purpose and meaning through the lives that you enrich and the relationships that you cultivate. By developing your curiosity and reaching out to others—family, loved ones, coworkers, friends, acquaintances, even strangers—with one thoughtful question at a time, one moment of devoted, authentic attention at a time, you strengthen the foundation of a good life.

The most important form of selfishness involves spending time on your fitness, eating right, pursuing your career, and still spending quality time with your family and friends. If you neglect your health or your career, you slip into the second category—stupid—which is a short slide to becoming a burden on society. I blame society for the sad state of adult fitness in the Western world. We’re raised to believe that giving of ourselves is noble and good. If you’re religious, you might have twice as much pressure to be unselfish. All our lives we are told it’s better to give than to receive. We’re programmed for unselfish behavior by society, our parents, and even our genes to some extent. The problem is that our obsession with generosity causes people to think in the short term. We skip exercise to spend an extra hour helping at home. We buy fast food to save time to help a coworker with a problem. At every turn, we cheat our own future to appear generous today. So how can you make the right long-term choices for yourself, thus being a benefit to others in the long run, without looking like a selfish turd in your daily choices? There’s no instant cure, but a step in the right direction involves the power of permission. I’m giving you permission to take care of yourself first, so you can do a better job of being generous in the long run. What? You might be wondering how a cartoonist’s permission to be selfish can help in any way. The surprising answer is that it can, in my opinion. If you’ve read this far, we have a relationship of sorts. It’s an author-reader relationship, but that’s good enough.

We live in a world of broken promises. We live in a time when people treat their words lightly. We tell a friend we will call her next week for lunch knowing full well we do not have the time to do so. We promise a co-worker we will bring in that new book we love so much knowing full well that we never lend out our books. And we promise ourselves this will be the year we will get back into shape, simplify our lives and have more fun without any real intention of making the deep life changes necessary to achieve these goals. Saying things we don’t really mean becomes a habit when we practice it long enough. The real problem is that when you don’t keep your word, you lose credibility. When you lose credibility, you break the bonds of trust. And breaking the bonds of trust ultimately leads to a string of broken relationships. To

they feel ignored, unappreciated, and unloved. That’s because their context-blind Aspie family members are so poor at empathic reciprocity. As we have learned, we come to know ourselves in relation to others. This doesn’t just apply when children are developing self-esteem. Throughout our lifespan, we continue to weave and re-weave the context of our lives, based on the interactions we have with our friends, coworkers, neighbors and loved ones. This is why it is so important for an NT parent/partner to get feedback from their spouse. A smile, a hug, a kind word, a note of encouragement: These are messages that reinforce the NT’s self-esteem and contribute to a healthy reciprocity in the relationship. Without these daily reminders from their loved ones, NTs can develop some odd defense mechanisms. One is to become psychologically invisible to others and even to themselves.

Tell the trafic jams to not open their roads to you. Tell the eyes that meet you on the road, that I’m no longer jealous. Tell the souls that share with you the details of your day, that I no longer wish to be them. Tell to the one I advised to take care of you, to forget my advice, and to neglect you as she wants. Tell your pillow to not be gentle with your head. Tell your tooth brush to not be gentle with your gums. Tell your hair brush to not care about your head skin. Tell your blanket to not give you warmth. Tell your winter clothes to not protect you from the cold. Tell the streets’ dogs to frighten you. Tell your car’s other seat that I no longer dream of sitting on it. Tell your country that I no longer dream of flying to it. Tell your friends, your coworkers, your best friend, your neighbours, the world, the universe, your ground, your sky, I broke your chains, and I no longer care about you. So leave on the story’s seat a dry flower, and leave my memory.

Everybody needs a place where they feel protected, secure, and welcome. Everybody yearns for a place where they can relax and be fully themselves. Ideally, the childhood home was one such place. For those of us who felt accepted and loved by our parents, our home provided this warmth. It was a heartwarming place—the very thing that everybody yearns for. And we internalize this feeling from childhood—that of being accepted and welcome—as a fundamental, positive attitude toward life that accompanies us through adulthood: we feel secure in the world and in our own life. We’re self-confident and trusting of others. There’s the notion of basic trust, which is like a home within ourselves, providing us with internal support and protection. Many people, however, associate their childhood with largely negative experiences, some even traumatic. Others had an unhappy childhood, but have repressed those memories. They can barely recall what happened. Then there are those who believe their childhood was “normal” or even “happy,” only to discover, upon closer examination, that they have been deluding themselves. And though people may attempt to repress or, as an adult, downplay childhood experiences of insecurity or rejection, there are moments in everyday life that will reveal how underdeveloped their basic trust remains. They have self-esteem issues and frequently doubt that they are welcome and that their coworkers, romantic partner, boss, or new friend truly likes them. They don’t really like themselves all that much, they have a range of insecurities, and they often struggle in relationships. Unable to develop basic trust, they therefore lack a sense of internal support. Instead, they hope that others will provide them with these feelings of security, protection, stability, and home. They search for home with their partner, their colleagues, in their softball league, or online, only to be disappointed: other people can provide this feeling of home sporadically at best. Those who lack a home on the inside will never find one on the outside. They can’t tell that they’re caught in a trap.

the Cool Girl. Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, who plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex, and jams hot dogs and hamburgers into her mouth like she’s hosting the world’s biggest culinary gang bang while somehow maintaining a size 2, because Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot and understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their men do whatever they want. Go ahead, shit on me, I don’t mind, I’m the Cool Girl. Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men – friends, coworkers, strangers – giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them. I’d want to grab the poor guy by his lapels or messenger bag and say: The bitch doesn’t really love chili dogs that much – no one loves chili dogs that much! And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. Oh, and if you’re not a Cool Girl, I beg you not to believe that your man doesn’t want the Cool Girl. It may be a slightly different version – maybe he’s a vegetarian, so Cool Girl loves seitan and is great with dogs; or maybe he’s a hipster artist, so Cool Girl is a tattooed, bespectacled nerd who loves comics. There are variations to the window dressing, but believe me, he wants Cool Girl, who is basically the girl who likes every fucking thing he likes and doesn’t ever complain. (How do you know you’re not Cool Girl? Because he says things like: ‘I like strong women.’ If he says that to you, he will at some point fuck someone else. Because ‘I like strong women’ is code for ‘I hate strong women.’)

Mow a neighbor's lawn. • Give your spouse a back rub. • Write a check for a local charity. • Compliment a coworker. • Bake a pie for someone. • Slip a $20 bill into the pocket of a needy friend. • Laugh out loud often and share your smile generously. • Buy gift certificates and give them away anonymously. hildren and gardens go naturally together. Children are observers, and they learn so much more when they can see what they're learning. And when Mom or Grandma and kids work together, gardening is a great way to build relationships. There's something about digging and weeding that makes sharing confidences so much easier. And it's a great lesson for kids that work can be meaningful. That it brings tangible rewards-fresh vegetables and beautiful flowers. Best of all, the children help you learn too. They freshen your wonder. And when they pass on the learning and wonder to their own children, you've helped start a lasting and living legacy. Sur simple ingredients can make a meal memorable. First, the care you take in setting the table establishes the tone or atmosphere. Second is the food. That always

I was here. I was fine. It was a beautiful day, and I was around people who gave me more love and happiness in a month than I’d had for seventeen years. I would never have to see those jerks again. And today was going to be a good day, damn it. So I got it together and finally looked back down at my best friend to ask, “Did I tell you I stole a bottle of Visine once because I wanted to put a few drops into my dad’s coffee, but I always chickened out?” Lenny snickered. “No. Psycho. Did I tell you that one time I asked Santa to bring my mom back?” I made a face. “That’s sad, Lenny.” I blinked. “I pretty much did the same thing.” “Uh-huh.” I raised my eyebrows at her. “Did I ever tell you that I wanted to have like ten kids when I was younger?” The laugh that came out of her wasn’t as strong as it usually was, but I was glad she let it out anyway. It sounded just like her, loud and direct and so full of happiness it was literally infectious. “Ten? Jesus, why?” I wrinkled my nose at her. “It sounded like a good number.” The scoff that came out of her right then was a little louder. “You’re fucking nuts, Luna. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten-ten?” “That’s what ten means.” I grinned at her. “I said that was back when I was younger, not any time recently. I can’t afford ten kids.” “Still. How about… none?” I glanced down the table again when I heard Thea’s sharp laugh. “Okay, Only Child.” I laughed. “I think four’s a good number now.” My friend beside me groaned before reaching forward to grab a chip, dipping it into the tiny bowl of guacamole beside it. “Look, Grandpa Gus was basically my brother, my dad, my uncle, and my grandpa all rolled into one, and I had a bunch of kids to play with,” she claimed. “Whatever makes you happy, but I think I’m fine with zero kids in my future.” I reached over and grabbed one of the pieces of fajita from her plate and plopped it into my mouth. “Watch, you’ll end up with two,” I told her, covering my mouth while I chewed the meat. “You’ve already got that ‘mom’ vibe going on better than anyone I know.” That had her rolling her eyes, but she didn’t argue that she didn’t, because we both knew it was true. She was a twenty-seven-year-old who dealt with full-grown man babies daily. She had it down. I was friends with my coworkers. Lenny was a babysitter for the ones she was surrounded with regularly. “Like you’re one to talk, bish,” she threw out in a grumpy voice that said she knew she couldn’t deny it. She had a point there. She picked up a piece of fajita and tossed it into her mouth before mumbling, “For the record, you should probably get started on lucky number four soon. You aren’t getting any younger.” I rolled my eyes, still chewing. “Bish.” “Bish.

Yep! I was twenty-six years old and an associate beauty editor at Lucky, one of the top fashion magazines in America, and that’s all that most people knew about me. But beneath the surface, I was full of secrets: I was an addict, for one. A pillhead! I was also an alcoholic-in-training who drank warm Veuve Clicquot after work, alone in my boss’s office with the door closed; a conniving uptown doctor shopper who haunted twenty-four-hour pharmacies while my coworkers were at home watching True Blood in bed with their boyfriends; a salami-and-provolone-puking bulimic who spent a hundred dollars a day on binge foods when things got bad (and they got bad often); a weepy, wobbly hallucination-prone insomniac who jumped six feet in the air à la LeBron James and gobbled Valium every time a floorboard squeaked in her apartment; a tweaky self-mutilator who sat in front of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, digging gory abscesses into her bikini line with Tweezerman Satin Edge Needle Nose Tweezers; a slutty and self-loathing downtown party girl fellatrix rushing to ruin; and—perhaps most of all—a lonely weirdo who felt like she was underwater all of the time. My brains were so scrambled you could’ve ordered them for brunch at Sarabeth’s; I let art-world guys choke me out during unprotected sex; I only had one friend, a Dash Snow–wannabe named Marco who tried to stick syringes in my neck and once slurped from my nostrils when I got a cocaine nosebleed;

Men always say that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. Being the Cool Girl means I am a hot, brilliant, funny woman who adores football, poker, dirty jokes, and burping, who plays video games, drinks cheap beer, loves threesomes and anal sex, and jams hot dogs and hamburgers into her mouth like she’s hosting the world’s biggest culinary gang bang while somehow maintaining a size 2, because Cool Girls are above all hot. Hot and understanding. Cool Girls never get angry; they only smile in a chagrined, loving manner and let their men do whatever they want. Go ahead, shit on me, I don’t mind, I’m the Cool Girl. Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men – friends, coworkers, strangers – giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them. I’d want to grab the poor guy by his lapels or messenger bag and say: The bitch doesn’t really love chili dogs that much – no one loves chili dogs that much! And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. Oh, and if you’re not a Cool Girl, I beg you not to believe that your man doesn’t want the Cool Girl. It may be a slightly different version – maybe he’s a vegetarian, so Cool Girl loves seitan and is great with dogs; or maybe he’s a hipster artist, so Cool Girl is a tattooed, bespectacled nerd who loves comics. There are variations to the window dressing, but believe me, he wants Cool Girl, who is basically the girl who likes every fucking thing he likes and doesn’t ever complain. (How do you know you’re not Cool Girl? Because he says things like: “I like strong women.” If he says that to you, he will at some point fuck someone else. Because “I like strong women” is code for “I hate strong women.

Do you want to be a better wife? Study your Bible. Do you want to be a better mother? Study your Bible. Do you want to be a better homemaker? Study your Bible. Do you want to be a better friend or coworker? Study your Bible.

If you’re having trouble figuring out how to invest in those around you, try this simple tool: Ask people how you can pray for them. When you’re building relationship with neighbors, coworkers, or friends, simply say, “Hey, this may seem weird to you, but I’m a Christian so I pray for people. Is there anything I can pray for you about?” Even non-Christians will oftentimes gladly accept prayer and respond to this question with genuine things that are going on in their lives. Many times this question leads to great conversations and a deeper relationship.

No relationship is perfect, they say – they, who make do with dutiful sex and gassy bedtime rituals, who settle for TV as conversation, who believe that husbandly capitulation – yes, honey, okay, honey – is the same as concord. He’s doing what you tell him to do because he doesn’t care enough to argue, I think. Your petty demands simply make him feel superior, or resentful, and someday he will fuck his pretty, young coworker who asks nothing of him, and you will actually be shocked. Give me a man with a little fight in him, a man who calls me on my bullshit. (But who also kind of likes my bullshit.) And yet: Don’t land me in one of those relationships where we’re always pecking at each other, disguising insults as jokes, rolling our eyes and ‘playfully’ scrapping in front of our friends, hoping to lure them to our side of an argument they could not care less about. Those awful if only relationships: This marriage would be great if only … and you sense the if only list is a lot longer than either of them realizes.

It’s a true saying that you reap what you sow. Even as it is written, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.” Galatians 6:7 Whatever you put in someone’s ear, you can expect to receive from that person’s mouth and hands. If you will love others, they will love you. If your words are contentious, expect theirs to be contentious in return. This goes likewise for every relationship, whether a spouse, children, friends, coworkers, or any family member. Remember the age-old saying “What would Jesus do?” Well, before speaking, ask yourself, “What would Jesus say?

I’m discovering that most of the time the power of the Spirit is subtle, not showy. The Spirit is present in our subtle inclinations to serve our spouses, do what’s right, read the Bible, love the marginalized, make disciples, and commune with God. He is that renewing presence that says: “Choose what is good, right, and true.” He is that tug toward self-sacrifice for the good of others. He is that challenge to boldly tell someone how Jesus is changing your life. He is the Person that brings Scripture to mind and coaxes you to believe it. He is the one who prompts you to pray for others. He is the one who restrains you from clicking on that image on the Internet, making that purchase, or silently judging someone. He prompts you to encourage a friend, to praise the good in a coworker, or to rejoice in God’s remarkable grace. If you are in Christ, you have the Spirit, and he prompts you all the time. We simply need to surrender to his prompting!

Trust in Him Think of three specific friends, neighbors, or coworkers you see regularly. Commit to listen intentionally the next time you’re together, as you trust God to show you how to bless them.

The worst thing about working retail is that your friends get chosen for you by management. It's the scariest thing about working in the service industry: your coworkers reflect your own failure.

You have one identity,” Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg told journalist David Kirkpatrick for his book The Facebook Effect. “The days of you having a different image for your work friends or coworkers and for the other people you know are probably coming to an end pretty quickly.... Having two identities for yourself is an example of a lack of integrity.

Each second you spend commiserating with coworkers about how unfair your boss is, you are giving your boss more power. Every time you tell your friends how controlling your mother-in-law is, you give her a little more power over you. Resolve to stop giving people your time and energy if you don’t want them to play a big role in your life.

You can’t separate how you approach life as a family and how your child will approach life as a thinker and learner. Your home is your child’s first workplace, first studio, first school — and your family members are your child’s first friends, first coworkers, first audience, first collaborators. You are his first mentor, and his siblings are his first teammates. You can’t separate learning from living. If your daily habits and routines don’t support your learning goals, you need to get them back into alignment. You want to build a family culture that celebrates and supports meaningful work. This is much more than saying the right thing — this is creating a lifestyle, a set of articulated beliefs, and a daily routine that encourage and sustain the life you want for your family. Building a family culture means being purposeful with your choices. What you say you value pales in importance next to the way you live from day to day, the choices you make, big and small.

Taking this class is a very significant act, and it’s not just about you. You’re also learning physical anthropology for all those friends, coworkers, family members, children, and partners who don’t have this opportunity. For two reasons, your education here is vitally important for others. First, as part of anthropology, physical anthropology will help you learn more about who you are as a biological being—as an animal, a vertebrate, a mammal, a primate, and as a human being, just for starters. Second, physical anthropology is a science. As citizens of our contemporary world, we are absolutely dependent upon science and technology for our survival, and yet, the rate of scientific literacy is appallingly low. Said another way, many people lack a true understanding of the most basic scientific concepts and methods. Still fewer could talk about evolution, natural selection, and adaptation with any degree of accuracy. Your presence in a physical anthropology class can help change that.

made a discovery: Measuring the strength of a workplace can be simplified to twelve questions. These twelve questions don’t capture everything you may want to know about your workplace, but they do capture the most information and the most important information. They measure the core elements needed to attract, focus, and keep the most talented employees. Here they are: 1. Do I know what is expected of me at work? 2. Do I have the materials and equipment I need to do my work right? 3. At work, do I have the opportunity to do what I do best every day? 4. In the last seven days, have I received recognition or praise for doing good work? 5. Does my supervisor, or someone at work, seem to care about me as a person? 6. Is there someone at work who encourages my development? 7. At work, do my opinions seem to count? 8. Does the mission/purpose of my company make me feel my job is important? 9. Are my co-workers committed to doing quality work? 10. Do I have a best friend at work? 11. In the last six months, has someone at work talked to me about my progress? 12. This last year, have I had opportunities at work to learn and grow?

When He Needs Freedom from Destructive Behavior Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might. Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. EPHESIANS 6:10-11 IT’S DIFFICULT FOR A WIFE to see her husband exhibit any kind of destructive behavior. In watching him doing something repeatedly that hurts his health or jeopardizes their family, she sees her future going over a cliff. There can be such terrible consequences for his behavior that it could ruin them financially, as well as destroy him physically or mentally. Whether it is drinking alcohol, taking drugs, gambling, smoking, reckless eating habits, or whatever else she observes her husband doing that could destroy him or endanger her or their children, it can be so heartbreaking to her that she cannot live with it. Every woman has to decide what she can and cannot tolerate. Life is hard enough without your husband finding ways to make it worse. And she must decide how much she can allow her children to witness before it seriously affects them too. You may not see behavior as seriously destructive as that in your husband, but perhaps he is taking unnecessary chances with his safety, such as driving too fast, or riding a motorcycle without a helmet, or being careless with dangerous machinery or equipment, or refusing to see a doctor when he should, or not following the doctor’s orders and thereby jeopardizing his health. There is only so much you can say or do to try to motivate your husband to stop destructive behavior if he is intent on doing it. But God can do miracles when you fervently pray to Him about it. He hears your prayers, and He wants your husband to be free as much as you do. Your prayers can help your husband open his eyes to see the truth. Your prayers can help him to understand how to put on the whole armor of God so he can stand against these plans of the enemy for his destruction. My Prayer to God LORD, I pray You would set my husband free from any destructive behavior he has acquired. Wake him up to the folly of his ways and show him when he is being foolish. Break the chains that bind him and open his blind eyes. Strengthen him where his weakness controls him. Enable him to see when the enemy has erected a stronghold in his life. Help him to understand how his behavior affects me and our children, as well as other family members, coworkers, and friends. Tell me what I can do to help make this situation better. I know I cannot change him, and I am unable to make anything happen. Only You can open his eyes, deliver him, and set him free from destructive behavior. I know foolish actions are not Your will for his life, and there is a big price to pay for everything that is not Your will. I pray that neither I nor my children will have to pay any price for his careless behavior. Whatever the reason he appears to have little regard for me, our children, or himself by continuing any reckless behavior, I pray You would deliver him from it completely. You are greater and more powerful than whatever draws him away from Your best. I trust You to set him free to be all You made him to be. In Jesus’ name I pray.

Complaining     “I am not saying this because I am in need, for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances” (Philippians 4:11).     God hates complaining. In the Old Testament, God rescued the Israelites from 400 years of slavery in Egypt. They had a miraculous escape through the Red Sea and were on their way to the Promised Land. Yet only two of the original group actually arrived at the final destination. The rest perished in the desert. Why? One contributing factor was their complaining.   First, they complained that they had no food so God graciously provided manna. This was food that miraculously appeared each morning for them to collect for their families for the day. However, it wasn’t long before they complained about the manna. They even went so far as to say that they preferred their lives of slavery in Egypt to another day of eating manna.   I’m disgusted by their ungratefulness. They were a complaining, grumbling bunch that couldn’t see how good they actually had it. They were constantly looking for the bad in their situation instead of focusing on how God had favoured them, heard their cries, saved them from slavery, and provided for them on their way to the Promised Land.   However, it’s easy for me to pass judgment on them as I read about their story in the Bible. It’s obvious to me what they did wrong. But I was recently convicted of my own behaviour. Some days I am no better than those complainers.   I can think specifically of a job I received. This job was a miracle from God in itself. My two co-workers had been waiting over three years to get this job – I had just applied a month before. It was only part-time hours so it allowed me to continue to pursue my other interests and hobbies. It was close to my home, within the hours that my children were at school and doing what I love to do – teach.   However, when I was first offered the job I complained about the topic I would be teaching – accounting. It was not my first love. I would have preferred to teach creative writing or marketing – something fun. But accounting? I balked. Then I complained about the cost of parking. Then I complained that I had to share an office. Then I complained that my mailbox was too high, the water was too cold, the photocopier was too far away, the computer was too slow – well, you get the point. Instead of focusing on the answer to prayer, I focused on the little irritants about which to complain.   Finally, I started to complain about the students – one particular student. She would come to class with a snarl and sit in the back of the classroom with her arms crossed, feet up and a scowl that would scare crows away. It seemed to me that she not only hated the topic I was teaching, but she also hated the teacher.   Each day, I returned home and complained to my husband about this particular student. Things didn’t improve. She became more and more despondent and even poisoned the entire class with her sickly attitude. I complained more. I complained to other teachers and my friends; anyone who dared to ask the question, “How do you enjoy teaching?”  

February 19 Coping with Loneliness A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.—Proverbs 18:24 “I am so lonely. I’m around people all of the time, but I feel that I don’t belong.” These were the words of a lady with whom I was having coffee. She added, “I feel cut off from others. I feel isolated in a crowd of people.” My heart ached for this lady. In a large world it is easy to feel that we are nothing more than a speck in the midst of a multitude. Loneliness is painful. It means that we lack meaningful and close relationships with others. Our busy and impersonal world contributes to loneliness. Loneliness can also be self-inflicted. Some find it difficult to communicate with others. They may suffer from a poor self-image. Others demand privacy. This inhibits the development of meaningful relationships. I believe that the worst kind of loneliness comes from being alienated from God. A life steeped in sin is a lonely life. “How can I cope with this loneliness?” this lady asked as we began to talk. If you are not walking with God you must restore your fellowship with Him. You can find forgiveness through Christ. Being separated from God will cause you to feel that life has little meaning. Your first step out of the lonely pit is to realize how much Jesus loves you. He knows you better than anyone else does. He knows your past. He knows your future. As our Scripture tells us, He is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. If you want a friend, you must be a friend. It is God’s plan that we reach outside ourselves. God wants us to be the kind of friend who can strengthen others. Being a friend can help you cope with your loneliness. Why don’t you seek out someone to help and establish a friendship? Telephone someone. Visit your new co-worker or new neighbor. They may be lonely also.