blog – sharing the stairs

What If…Practice Introspection

17 Oct 202017 Oct 2020

I was 👟running on the trail when I started to smell smoke. It's not uncommon to smell smoke from a barbecue or the smell of a woodpile 🔥burning. It wasn't…

What If…We Lift Each Other

3 Oct 20203 Oct 2020

We spend a lot of ⏰time on the sidelines at volleyball games. It's a lot of fun to watch the teamwork, the awesome 🔥kills, those 💥aces, a few shots that…

What If…We Find Calm

26 Sep 202027 Sep 2020

I've noticed that I feel 🌅calm, and that sounds a little crazy to me, given this 👻insane year. 2020 hasn't been what any of us would have expected. There is…

What If…We follow the Example of RBG

19 Sep 202020 Sep 2020

The 🌎world lost a great one this week with the passing of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. 💔The United States lost an important Supreme Court Justice. 💔Women lost a champion. 💔Fighters for…

What I…We Don’t Try to Race Time

12 Sep 202012 Sep 2020

"Time waits for no one." -Folklore (dated as far back as 1225) Have you ever noticed that every single 🛑stoplight is red when you're in a hurry? What about those…

What If…We Do Things Right

27 Aug 202029 Aug 2020

School🍎 started this week, and I'm not afraid to say that I was 😬anxious about it. Let me tell you how I usually teach my students. There's a desk in…

What If…You Use Your Mission Field

19 Aug 202022 Aug 2020

In addition to publishing in this space, I have been posting weekly writings to my social media platforms. I don't share everything from this blog on social media. These Sunday…

What If…It’s the Same and Different

16 Aug 202016 Aug 2020

I haven't had much ⏰time for anything else this week because one thing has been on my mind and my schedule- 🏫school. This is the time of year that I'm…

What If… the Arrow is Shot?

7 Aug 20208 Aug 2020

I've heard a phrase a few times lately that sparked my interest to learn more.✨ It's actually a Buddhist parable that uses a metaphor of arrows to illustrate pain and…

What If…We Didn’t Share Everything?

1 Aug 20202 Aug 2020

(Fun fact before you read: As I was writing this piece in early March, I decided that there was a bigger story on the horizon. I scrapped this one to…

What If…Contradictions Hold the Keys

22 Jul 202026 Jul 2020

I love wordplay. There might be 🍌Bananagrams pieces on our kitchen table any given day. I like to rearrange the letters to spell words- looking for interesting ways to combine…

What If…Silence is Golden

17 Jul 202018 Jul 2020

When I was sharing a college dorm room with my bud from junior high, we had very different ideas of what we considered to be appropriate noise levels when 📚studying.…

What If…We Choose Not to Be Bored

11 Jul 202011 Jul 2020

When we were in the lockdown phase of this 😷pandemic, I was thanking my lucky ✨stars that I didn't have small children at home anymore. Don't get me wrong. I…

What If…They Tell Your Story

3 Jul 20204 Jul 2020

The Hamilton film came out this weekend.🌟 If you're a super-fan like I am, you've been waiting for this. If you're wondering why this is such a big deal, have…

Let’s Try to See the Forest

29 Jun 202029 Jun 2020

So, I wrote about choosing sides recently. I talked about how the world seems to make a sport of choosing sides and how we should really work to learn from…

What If…It’s Not About Choosing Sides?

26 Jun 202028 Jun 2020

When I was a kid, I was always the last one to be chosen for any activity in gym class. I understood why. If you needed to ⚾️catch, throw or…

What If…We Do Better?

20 Jun 202020 Jun 2020

I have a pet peeve.😞 I can't stand it when I pour out my heart from fear or frustration or disappointment only to have my listener say, "I know exactly…

What If…You Create a New Habit?

9 Jun 202013 Jun 2020

Things have been pretty heavy 😢lately- and they should be. There's some critical work to do in this 🌎world with race relations and living through the pandemic. The quote on…

What It…We Listen

3 Jun 20207 Jun 2020

When I wrote my 📚book (LIFEGUARD- available on Amazon), I dedicated a few sections to 💖kindness. In one chapter, I told a story about an encounter with a woman during…

What If…This Year Didn’t Feel Cursed?

30 May 202031 May 2020

2020 hasn't been the year that many of us hoped it would be so far. There's been a lot to process. 😢This past week, I watched the video of a…