“The ultimate security is your understanding of reality.”
(H. Stanley Judd)

So much of our lives is spent in the pursuit of security. We arm our houses with locks, alarms, and even cameras. We insure those houses, along with our cars, and even our lives. We invest our hard-earned cash into stocks & bonds, and even call them “securities.” (And no one laughs.)

Even more, we go out of our way to protect our kids from any and all harm, lest we try to sleep at night without such security.

It’d be great if any of these searches for security actually worked, but of course, they can only offer a measure of insulation against the truth: There are no guarantees. There is no such thing as absolute safety. There is no other human, and no other thing, that can make us feel totally secure.

Ironically, the most secure people you and I know are the ones who are most comfortable with this lack of certainty.

Peace begins with pause,

“Long before I wrote stories, I listened for stories. Listening for them is something more acute than listening to them.”
(Eudora Welty)

Most famous writers have this in common: they are insatiably curious about the world around them and what makes people tick. When asked about their craft and how they find the amazing stories they tell, they frequently remark that they just listen for them.

The truth is it’s really hard to listen when you’re talking. So, as parents and spouses and co-workers, we might try this little trick: Think of yourself like a writer of a script instead of an actor in a scene. Refuse to dismiss the other person’s fears or arguments as silly. Listen for what’s NOT being said; listen for what’s REALLY going on.

Also, don’t ignore your own anxiety or frustration. Listen for why your button got pushed. Be as curious about what makes the other person (and yourself) tick as a writer is with his characters. You might be surprised at the new stories (maybe even happy endings?) you can create.

Peace begins with pause,

“What we hope to do with ease we must first learn to do with diligence.”
(Samuel Johnson)

Keeping your cool when you want to flip out is one of the best things you can do for everyone. It’s also one of the hardest. Remaining calm in the midst of chaos is hard work — especially if you’re new to this whole idea. Being ScreamFree is never easy; nothing worthwhile ever is.

It does, however, get easier the more you do it. Your “adulthood” is like a muscle. It gets stronger with use. Just like you might not be able to run a marathon right now — even if you really tried really hard — there are things you could begin doing now that’ll one day enable you to do what you cannot currently do by sheer force of will. That’s the power of training.

One of these days, you’ll surprise yourself with how calm, cool, and connected you are able to remain when you normally would have lost it. You can make being ScreamFree your default setting, but it doesn’t just happen because you want it to. And it doesn’t happen just because you try really hard; it happens when you train really hard.

Peace begins with pause,

“The highest possible stage in moral culture is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.”
(Charles Darwin)

Interesting idea: we control our thoughts; our thoughts don’t control us. So many of our troubles come about because we forget this simple, little truth.

No matter what happens to you today, you have the ability to change the way you feel and act by changing the way you think. When someone pushes your buttons — your kid, your spouse, your boss — take back your remote control. Acknowledge (to yourself) that you want to strangle them, and then choose a better, more productive path. Before you act, ask yourself, “Is this action going to be helpful?”

You might be surprised just how many times you find yourself saying no.

Peace begins with pause,

“Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves.”
(Marcelene Cox)

Our son Brandon is graduating high school in a few months, and Jenny and I have been doing a little reminiscing, selecting photos for his high school and church celebrations. It’s brought laughter, more than a few tears, and multiple moments of utter shame at our fashion choices through his 18 years.

Life with children can be hectic and harried. Between driving them here and there — from ballet to a birthday party to buying new shoes to replace the ones we just bought them that they’ve already outgrown — it’s easy to forget whey we had kids in the first place!

Does anyone else remember staring at your kids’ toes when they were first born? For hours? Everything was so new, and it was easy to be bowled over by the sheer wonder of it all.

After a while, though, you start to take for granted some of the most amazing things life has to offer. The unique smell of your kids after a bath. The perfect layout of freckles across the bridge of your son’s nose. The way your daughter hums to herself as she draws.

Today, do yourself a favor and take a moment to really see your kids. They really are a wonder.

Peace begins with pause,

“My circumstances do not make me what I am; they reveal who I have chosen to be.”
(Dr. Wayne Dyer)

I believe in heaven. I believe in a new state of being, after death, that feels more real, and more free, than this life ever could. But that reality comes with a cost: Giving up the delusion that other people were mostly in charge of our  lives here on earth.

We can taste this freedom here and now, though, by doing the same thing. Am I willing to recognize my current circumstances as a reflection of my choices? Am I willing to see my adult life as more my responsibility than anyone else’s fault?

Are you?

Peace begins with pause,

“Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.”

(Raymond Lindquist)

We people are funny. We usually know what we need to do long before we actually do it. It takes a while to muster up our courage and talk ourselves into taking action; there’s something very scary about letting go of what we know, even if it’s making us unhappy.

Most of us choose unhappy over uncomfortable.

If you want to make positive changes in your life, you must let go of old patterns of behavior. It will be scary at first, and you might feel like you’re in a sort of free fall. But, before you know it, you’ll see that the rope you were hanging onto wasn’t as secure as you imagined. And then you’ll be able to experience a lightness you didn’t know existed.

Peace begins with pause,

“It is essential to respect the truth that integrity, honor, and accountability begin in our homes and then spread past those four walls into the world beyond.

A little boy overhears his mother say to his father, ‘You hurt my feelings when you said that, and I didn’t like it.’ Then he hears his father say, ‘You’re right. I’m sorry. I was out of line with that comment.’ Day in and day out, year after year, this little boy sees and hears his parents sticking up for themselves, fighting with clarity and respect, owning up to their faults without trying to weasel out of them, giving each other room to make mistakes without always being taken to task, taking risks, acting on their values rather than just talking about them, appreciating and loving each other and enjoying their relationship.

When this little boy becomes a man he automatically conducts the majority of his life with integrity and honor.”
(John & Linda Friel)

I can’t really add much to this quote. Rather than try, I’ll just encourage you to go back and read it again.

Peace begins with pause,

“Be like a duck: calm on the surface, but paddling like the dickens underneath.”
(Michael Caine)

Humans are emotional beings, and our emotions can be terrific assets in the right context. Remaining calm in the midst of conflict, therefore, can be unnerving for others to observe. They might confuse our calm for being detached or heartless.

Maybe we could help them understand by pointing to the ducks as a clever example of the great effort required to maintain a calm exterior.

Like a duck, gliding smoothly across the water, things appear graceful on the surface. Beneath the surface, however, they’re paddling like mad to move themselves forward. Staying calm often means working hard on the inside to contain yourself and consider what you can do to steer yourself in the direction you want to go. Being calm doesn’t mean ducking conflict; it means controlling your emotions and creating an intentional stream toward your goals while representing yourself with integrity.

Peace begins with pause,

“The thing that impresses me about America is the way parents obey their children.”
(King Edward VIII)

Our three-year-olds aren’t clad in togas and wreaths of gold leaves. They don’t sit on an enormous throne with a royal scepter in their hands.

They do, however, often bark orders and crack the whip while everyone else in the house bows and scrapes and caters to their every whim and desire.

Of course, they’re not born into that position. We give them control and allow them to hijack our households.

Sometimes we do this out of healthy impulses. Think about child-proofing your home. There are necessary precautions to take, safety hazards to be avoided. But — really — do we need foam bumpers on every corner? Might we be transforming the whole place into their personal playroom? And, if so, how different is a personal playroom from a throne room for a king?

We prefer trading in our white couches for stain-repellent micro suede. It’s easier, but it also removes consequences from the equation (spilling juice on the sofa is fine now) instead of teaching children boundaries (juice isn’t allowed on the sofa). By removing “problems” and cushioning the home for the benefit of the child, rather than giving them a sense of both space and place, a child is robbed of learning to adjust and live in an adult world.

Your kid is not a king. The sooner they learn this, the better off they’ll be.

Peace begins with pause,