I’m sure people told me I needed hearing aids long before now. I just couldn’t hear them. And I wasn’t thrilled about sticking little wires in my ears. Last week, I sneaked into a hearing aid specialty store just to look around. An hour later, I wore fancy hearing aids. For …
My guess is, most people over 70 have times when they are struggling a bit. I’ve hit a few weeks of this. Nothing big, mind you. Just little, nagging medical issues and personal decisions I need to make. I keep pushing them off for another day. Then another week or …
One thing I’ve learned over my 30 years of work at The Change Companies®: The most brilliant researchers and scholars have a way of making complex issues easy for a guy like me to understand. Last week, I had the opportunity to speak with Martin Seligman, PhD, the Zellerbach …
When I can’t go to sleep, I think of one of my faithful dogs of the past. Last night, it was Zackery Adams’ turn to send me to dreamland. Zackery was our “DSM-IV Dog” from a decade ago. As a puppy, he could have kept a psychiatrist busy for an entire career. He was …
The individuals who taught me useful skills at an early age were not the wisest folks in any room. But boy, were they street smart. My dad was street smart. He sold grain aerators to farmers in the Midwest. He never drove a fancy car. He had a Ford and made certain it wasn’t …
So, I made a list of my 10 best friends. What do they all have in common? I came up with three personal traits: 1. All my friends are curious people. They search for answers to questions I’m only thinking about. Their curiosity leads to wisdom and unique points of …
I was the youngest in the Irene and Vern Kuhl family. It went girl (Connie), boy (Eddie), girl (Marlene) and me, little Don. At 75, little Don still has pieces of each of his siblings deep inside. Eddie was my big brother, a natural athlete with a big temper. Often, his …
I read somewhere: “Enjoy life now. It has an expiration date.” What if a tall stranger in a tan trench coat slipped me a note saying, “Your expiration date is tomorrow”? What would I do differently? My first thought is, “By golly, I’d better get busy.” Doing what? My …
I have an old friend who is making daily visits now. After two back surgeries and two new hips, Gabby, my chronic pain pal, is waking me up each morning and sometimes following me to work. Back in an earlier day, chronic pain controlled much of my life. I’d try to hide from …
One of my favorite artists is Simon Bull. He feeds me beauty each day. He opens my creative mind in ways I could never do on my own. Here is what Simon wrote in 2001. “Each one of us carries some special gift. We all have contributions to make. For me, it happens to be …