This Thanksgiving will be a quiet one.

I had been feeling trapped by my circumstances. No travel, no extended family. It felt like a punishment for a crime I didn’t commit.

But then I remembered that this isn’t the worst Thanksgiving I’ve ever had. There was the one where I had some kind of mysterious food poisoning and spent Thanksgiving on the bathroom floor, unable to eat a single bite of food.

Read More

In newspaper articles and conversations, I’ve been seeing and hearing references to Groundhog Day, the classic 1993 film directed by the Harold Ramis and starring Bill Murray and Andie McDowell in which a TV weatherman has to live the same day over and over.

For many of us, it feels like we’re stuck in a loop that there’s no way out of. Every day is the same routine, bringing stress, listlessness, and more bad news.

For some, there is a sense of waiting for life to resume, as careers, travel, and educational plans are put on hold. And the very real threat of illness hangs over us all, requiring our strict vigilance.

Read More

My husband, unlike me, is a lifelong athlete whose muscles have developed with the aid of testosterone.

In the moment, however, when he’s on the other side of the net, I have a hard time remembering that. The ball comes at me too fast on the eighth shot of the rally, and I whack it into the net or over to the adjacent tennis court with an involuntary cry of frustration.

What happens next is critical. It makes all the difference as to whether we have fun playing tennis together…or ride home in silence wishing we had skipped it.

I have to carefully consider what I will say to myself.

Read More

People are trying to make sense of the passage of time.

Reflecting not only on the past year, they’re attempting to process the past decade, hoping to glean some lessons and understand the trends that shaped the events they’ve just lived through.

If you’re feeling a sense of loss, a fear of missing out, a worry that there’s a party going on without you, let me reassure you: Nobody knows what the heck they’re doing.

Read More

So much of the vast array of self-help literature boils down to this:

If the story you’re telling yourself is making you unhappy, tell yourself a different story.

Our stories come from many places: Family, church, school, and that all-purpose scapegoat, society. Some stories seem to be our own creations. Believe it or not, even very young children already have a narrative that is helping them (or perhaps not helping them) to make sense of the world.

Read More