in need of translation...

What does this mean?

You have no idea, right?

Yeah, me neither.

And that's a problem.  Especially when what's being said actually matters.  I mean, can you imagine not being able to understand something that was totally crucial to your survival?

(wait a minute, there's a story idea there...)

If you were a person who could 'interpret' or 'translate' that mysterious truth to the person in need you'd have 1) a thing to do with your life that was 'actually' worth something and 2) the ability to charge a premium for your services and 3) a way to build 'platform' or 'notoriety' so that you'd be able to continue doing 1 and 2.

Right?

That's the thing that any 'expert' does.

See, I just got done interviewing a Professor in the History of Evolutionary Biology.  She's expert at explaining the History of Darwin in laymen's terms.  I was interviewing her.  I'm expert at communicating with people, either in-person or from a stage. My Director/DP friend, Chris Stacey, was shooting it. He's an expert with cameras and lights and lenses and visual composition and editing.

All of us do what we do for you.

The 'end user', the 'everyday joe', the 'everyman'.  

And if we forget that, we lose our ability to do what we do for a living.

I'm also an expert preacher (for whatever that's worth, and up for debate in some circles I'm sure) and an expert producer (natch).  I was really challenged today by the frustration my interview guest felt with her inability to 'say' exactly what she 'meant' in a 'manner' that would be 'accessible' to her audience.

She was almost tortured by it.

I was reminded that you need to pick your area of expertise and go with it and trust your 'calling' and ability.  You need to just show up and 'do' what you do.

Don't over-think it.

Also, it occurred to me that 'experts' whose expertise are valuable to a 'mass market' are few and far between.  I mean, you may be an expert roofer, and that's legit and cool but you better make sure you don't have any delusions of grandeur because, even at the highest level, you'll be able to roof, what, 2,000 roofs in your entire life? (one roof per week X 50 weeks per year X a 40 year career).  Even if you have four crews working for you that number only hits 8,000 in your entire career.

By no means 'mass market' type numbers.

But, totally satisfying for a roofer.

Are you a roofer? Or, to the point, is what you do a 'mass market' thing or a 'niche market' thing?  Seems to me that our media system sells you this lie that only people with 'mass market' gifts are contributing to the development of culture.

Not true.

I think if you examine your life, you'll find that most of the impact you have is 'local', or non-mass market in orientation.

What I really hope (for me and for you) is for clarity in terms of what we're supposed to be 'doing' with our lives 'cause it'd suck to spend your life chasing a mass market application for a niche market gifting.

You'd spend your life lost in translation if you did that, and that's no way to live.

T

the surprise splinter...

So we had friends over for dinner last night.

They pastor FREECHURCH TORONTO the church I (and my wife) planted with one of my HOMEBOYS back in the day.  We were gonna' bbq and talk shop and hang out.

Then my littlest daughter, Zoe, stood up on her chair and fell, sliding down the front of the chair.  When she wouldn't stop crying (as would be normal after a little fall like that) Niki took her up to the bath to try and calm her down.

"Todd..." came the call from upstairs.  "Can you come here, please..."

And there it was, sticking out of my daughter's back.  A 5mm splinter.

My poor wife looked like she was going to pass out and my baby girl was screaming.  I grabbed the end of it and pulled. You can imagine the howling that ensued.  Out it came.

Or so I thought.

We thought Zoe would calm down for sure now but she kept moaning and jumping around trying to distract herself from the pain.  I pulled her out of the tub, pinned her on the sink (cooing to her all the while) and told her 'Daddy had to check it...' while pressing the wound and, sure thing, there was still a very large part of it imbedded deep in her back.

Now, let it be said, we have four kids.  I've cut slivers, chunks of glass even, out of my boys' feet and fingers.  I was a boy once, and learned to cut things out of my own body so that my Dad would stop doing it.

But a back?

No way.

So, apologies and hugs to our friends, Nik and I hopped in the car (Niki's Mom showed up at just the right moment--bringing 'This is It' for my MJ-obsessed eldest--so she agreed to stay with the three big kids) and drove to the emergency room.

Once there, Zoe's cute-factor and obvious need ('foreign body lodged in back' is the magic phrase to use...) got us fast-tracked and an hour after arriving I had Zoe pinned to my body, her little back exposed, her little lungs forcing the air out of her mouth in bloodcurdling shrieks as the Doctor cut her little back open just enough to pull this out...

A 3-4mm splinter.

Awesome.

As soon as they finished the nurses showed up with a popsicle and a bandage and Zoe looked me in the eye asking, "All out, Daddy?"  

Yes babe, it's all out.

Thank God and thanks to the great team at Joseph Brant Memorial hospital.

Poor baby.

The cool thing was how calm Niki and I were.  We knew exactly what to do, knew to bring my laptop with 'Elmo's World' on it followed by 'UP', knew exactly how to hold her and what to sing to her, knew how to 'work' the staff and encourage our little girl.

You'd think we'd been parents for a decade or something.

And there's YOUR point good reader.

You keep living your life, keep doing what you do long enough and you'll end up gaining some degree of mastery, which should help you navigate the little surprises life throws at you...

T

BIG vs little...

A strange thing happened to me yesterday that I thought might be encouraging to you.

I was on a conference call with our co-development partners in NYC from 8:30-9:45pm on that new dramatic TV series I've been mentioning to you, while my staff from THE WELL (our small church which is EXPLODING by the way...) waited patiently upstairs so we could adjourn our staff meeting and move to our backyard hot tub.

(now that's MY kind of staff meeting...)

Anyway, on the call, the development exec and I were hashing out two new pages that needed to be added to our (now 14 page) series proposal.  The two added pages were in response to the first two meetings they had in Hollywood on the series last week.  The upshot of the meetings? They LOVED the mock trailer we cut for the thing and liked the concept but wanted more 'story world' detail and some deeper description of the 'stakes' at play in each episode.

Cool.

See, I'm a writer/producer.  I LIKE story.  The whole reason I do what I do is because 'story world' gets me.  I love to explore a world and learn from it.  I love finding redemption in the strangest places.

Story world.  I dig it.

A stress for me in the early stages of development has been working with our wonderful partners to 'pare down' my extremely messy and complicated 'story world' into a concept that was simple enough that they knew the execs they were going to be pitching wouldn't get overwhelmed.

It felt at times (I must confess) like we were gutting 'my' story.

Okay, I'm officially developing this in 'partnership'.  It's not 'my' story.

Got it.

Second, sometimes you gotta' 'gut' something to get it to live.

Alright.

So, out the treatment goes, and they 'love' the trailer (rich in story world I might add...) and want more story world detail.

"Yeehaw!" shouts Todd.

But, last night, in the ongoing back and forth it becomes clear to me that I'm thinking too 'small' for them.  My indie (I 'aint never had a network series) roots are biting me in the butt. They say 'stakes' and I think 'emotional', 'contained', something I can shoot in two days. 

They're thinking exploding trains with the Secretary of State onboard.

Ahh...

"What you're saying, is you want me to 'Hollywood-ize' it a bit for you..."

(a pause on the line)

"Exactly..."

So that's what we did.  Added some 'sizzle' to it. Took it and sprinkled some L.A L.A-land 'dust' on it.

I was so humbled. So reminded that I need to give myself permission to THINK BIG despite all the beats I've taken (and will continue to take) in trying to make it.

THINK BIG friends.

think big...

T

wasteland...

Yes, we were up early again today. I told Niki yesterday (our first day of 6:00am wake-ups--a tactic we're employing to hopefully help us increase our work-ethic and impact) that today would be the day that told the tale.  Could we pull off an early wake up two days straight?

You might be thinking we're crazy thinking 6:00am is early.  6:00am might be your jam, day in and day out.

Nik and I live somewhat 'outside' the 9-5 so we've never had to have an early start. We've also been having/raising babies for the past decade so we've taken sleep where we can get it.

Anyway, we did it again today. It was 6:30am due to getting hooked by 'Elizabeth' on my new flatscreen last night which resulted in an 11:30pm bedtime.  Loved the movie.  Realized we can't watch movies except on Friday or Sunday nights. So, make that tweak, and on with it.

Winter is a tough time in my business.  

I know it's not just me.  Many of my guys in L.A are dealing with the same thing.  Job insecurity, hustling deals, hoping one or two will close, wondering if you're going to make any money in 2010.

It was exactly this same way last year and the year before and the year before. 

It's a rush leading up to Christmas, trying to get as many pitches in as possible so that, come January/February you can be 'in play' and hopefully get some decisions made that will have you working (and getting paid for it) by April/May.

Funny thing, given the fact that I've dealt with this for years now, is that I still find this limbo so uncomfortable.

I don't like not knowing what's going on.  I struggle with faith. It's hard for me to believe in something I can't see. It takes work for me to hope in the midst of uncertainty.

It's also hard to keep my level of 'joy' and 'diligence' on 'high' while writing proposal after proposal that end up going nowhere.  Sure, once in a while a proposal breaks through and we end up working on it but, I've said it before, if you kept track of all those roads that led to nowhere you'd get very depressed and quit.

The trick is to remember (and believe) that no good work is ever wasted. Even if it's just building you as a person/worker, that's going to enhance your ability later when you're actually 'doing' the work you were pitching.

But it sure feels like a wasteland sometimes.

I guess the hope here--if you're less experienced than I am as a producer--is that you take encouragement from this, knowing you're not the only one dealing with the winter wasteland and that someone a little bit further up the food chain from you deals with this too.  

If you're further up the food chain from me, maybe you could call me...

'Cause I've got pitches coming out my ears!

T

Fuel...

Saw IT last night.

Very cool.  If you like Denzel, if you like apocalyptically-themed stories, if you like stylized visual composition, if you like Gary Oldman, if you like Mila Kunis, if you like westerns, you'll like 'The Book of Eli'.

I don't want to ruin it for you but I will say that the lingering impression I have from it is that, in Hollywood, it really comes down to what the power brokers want to do.  When you see it you'll likely agree with me that this movie got made ONLY because Denzel probably called Joel Silver or Joel Silver called Denzel and--because they were feeling a little rebellious, and because the must've liked the story--they decided to do it and damn what Hollywood proper thinks about it.

It's all about who you know.  It's all about getting to know the power brokers or becoming one yourself.

Challenging and inspiring all at the same time.

Wifey and I took our game to the next level today in terms of trying to get some more 'power' in our lifestyle.  We were up at six, coffee in the living room by 6:45am where I read all of Philippians (hilarious--blogger's spell check thinks I've misspelled that--they obviously haven't read it...) as part of my ongoing preparation for my next sermon series at THE WELL then some of my Buffet book then cleared my inbox, checked my daily sites and here I am blogging.

Up to cook breakfast in a minute.

'The Book of Eli' is the kind of movie I'm in the business of trying to make.  T'was really cool to see it done, and done well.

In other news--got 'hated on' yesterday for this here blog and loved on twice for it--all in the same day.

Funny that.

I'm starting (and 'just' starting mind you...) to get to the point where I need to be careful not to read my press or my praise.  I'm a sensitive dude and it gets to me.  Praise inflates my already large head and hater-ation causes me chest pain.  Either way I over think it and it gets in the way of me doing what I do.

My desire is to keep my head down and keep focused.

That's the lesson this morning from my Buffet book.  There was a quote in today's reading referencing a dinner with Buffet and Gates at it and, when asked what the secret to their success had been (back in 1991) each replied simultaneously 'Focus'.

Focus.

Here's to it for my day today.

And maybe yours...

T

of apples and agony...

Our communion table at THE WELL was covered in apples this week.

Ninety of 'em.

They were an illustration intended to help our people take 'communion' home with them.  The idea was each person takes an apple and keeps it on them this week until that first moment when they feel the darkness trying to encroach on their joy.

(I was preaching from Genesis 3--the 'snake' and 'fall' narrative) 

I suggested to them that at that moment (when evil encroaches) they pull the apple out, bite it and tell the snake to 'bite it'--if you know what I mean.

It worked.  As soon as people arrived at church they started asking what was up with the apples. They took 'em home.  I hope they're 'using' 'em this week.

A simple thing.  Apples.

What simple things can you be using to help your work have more resonance?

It's a question I never stop asking myself.

In other news, the pitch I was working on for L.A last week went really well.  I have follow up work scheduled this week.  Good news is, they didn't think we suck and the 'mock trailer' I directed for the thing (props to my man 'Izz the Alien' who edited it...) really blew their minds.

L.A minds.

So, here's hoping we can leverage this interest into further interest.

It's been many months gestating this thing and still no money has changed hands, everyone's still working on it for free, but we're inching closer to a 'deal'.  Once we do, the work will really begin.

But we should be so lucky.

Oh yeah, what's the 'agony' reference about?

I preached my butt off this past Sunday.  I think it went quite well.  I got home and got a call from my pastoral associate that the recording had gotten corrupted and we'd lost it all.  I was so upset I literally felt sick to my stomach for a good hour.

It's agonizing sometimes, how you can do your 'best work' and have it lost like that.

"POOF!"

So, I got him to bring me our recorder and re-preached it in my office.  Sure, the re-preach was nowhere near as good as it was with a 'live' audience, but I wanted the content up there--didn't want it to get lost--didn't want the agony to get the best of me.

How can I make this 'stick'?  

Apples.

How can I fix this mess?

A re-record.

Thinking, thinking, always thinking.

And hoping and praying and working and trying and believing.

Just like you...

T

Genesis 3...

That's my sermon text for preaching tomorrow at THE WELL.  The black is my 'first intuitive pass', the red is my second 'cross referencing pass' and the blue is my 'Hebrew pass'.

We're continuing our 'GENESIS' series with week three exploring the 'mythic' (and I don't mean 'I believe it's a myth' but rather that the significance of the event, as recorded, has taken on mythic proportions in our human story) event with the woman picking the fruit and giving it to the man.

We'll be exploring evil and temptation and suggesting 'the better way' of escape.

Tomorrow.

HERE.

Would love to see you if you're in town.

T

A year unfurling...

Been away from the blog a bit these past few days.  Sorry 'bout that.

I've been spending my time with the angels...

Sort of.

A new dramatic television series we've been gestating for some time (almost a year) is going to start being pitched around town tomorrow.  Feels like I haven't stopped since last Thursday because I haven't.

Thursday I was writing and prepping.  Friday I was in the edit suite all day re-cutting our mock trailer for the series.  Since we've started development the name's changed, the concept has morphed, the characters are new, etc.  The mock trailer needed to reflect those changes.

I'm grateful to say the 'underlying story world' is the same but--note to all emerging writers out there--it's been made very clear to me by our development partners (who've got a track record in dramatic series production) that the execs they're meeting with don't CARE about 'story world', in fact, the simpler the pitch the better.

Which is frustrating 'cause, for me, the WHOLE deal is about the story world.

Anyway, it's been really good to work in collaboration with people who have such a different perspective and gift mix.  I've been learning a lot.

Saturday I sermonized.

Sunday we ran church at THE WELL.  Had our biggest Sunday ever.  So far this month the church's website is out ranking my three other sites (two TV shows and this here blog) traffic-wise.  It really seems like things are about to explode at our wee church.  If you're the type, please pray for us as we begin to negotiate what looks like the beginnings of an intense and exciting season of growth.

Sunday afternoon was my eldest son's 10th birthday.  In very Canadian fashion we spent it outside in -18 windchill tobogganing and skating before retiring to our house (18 kids in tow) for hot chocolate and ice cream cake.  The four families there have been friends of ours for almost 15 years.  We appear in each other's photo albums that far back--looking a little younger in them, I might add.

I felt 'wealthy' surrounded by that kind of depth of relationship.

C.S Lewis said, in one of his letters, that if he was to give any advice to a young man starting out his life and career it would be to do almost whatever it took to live near his friends.  As I age I come to see the wisdom in that 'wisdom' more and more.

Monday I sat at my desk all day writing (I usually take half the day off).  Tuesday I sat at my desk all day writing then went skating (again, I know, it's my wife's fault...) with THE WELL and that event--sadly if you're Israeli and 'cold-phobic' like me--is also growing exponentially which means I'm going to have to keep going ALL winter.

Sigh...

Today I finish the presentation templates for the series pitch, take a deep breath, and start prepping this Sunday's sermon, the third in our 'Genesis' series.

Oh, and did I mention my business partner had a HUGE network-level meeting Monday that will go a long way to determining what our 2010 looks like?  It went well, really well.  Of course nothing's 'for sure' but it's looking like this year might be our busiest ever.

Funny that.

AND, we've got a 'live offer' on the table for distribution (from a 'for real' Hollywood distributor) for one of our feature films.  So, THAT might make for a very busy fall--which is the projected release date.

So I'm working very hard to plan ahead.  I've got this growing church to steward which will practically mean continuing to try and preach well while doing my best to find, equip, encourage and release talented people to work in their areas of gifting in support of the growth of THE WELL while doing whatever it takes to make sure the production momentum we're experiencing finds traction.

Sitting on the couch last night my wife said to me, "So, if everything that's happening actually 'happens' how, exactly, are we going to keep up?"

And I told her what one of my most outstandingly-gifted entrepreneur friends told me.

"You just show up every day and do your best to put in an honest day's work and let the rest take care of itself."

So we're starting to go to sleep earlier (10:00pm) and get up earlier (6:00am) so that we can be good stewards of our days and work hard.

Bring it on 2010, bring it on...

T

The river of tears and the tree of life...

One image can birth a story.

And thank God, 'cause--from where I sit--people need this story.

Have you noticed the unceasing river of tears that lurks within people?  It doesn't show itself that often, but every once in a while you say something and--cue the weeping and exposition of soul--the person breaks.

My wife knows a lady who's going through a really tough spot these days. All Nik does is ask how she's doing and the river overruns its banks.

Sorrow.

Everybody is so sad.  

Lemme' tell you.  This is one of the THE primary motivations for doing what I do. I see the river, I feel the river, I hear it, sense it, smell it and want (nay, NEED) to do something about it.

All these people drowning.  Somebody's got to throw them a line.

What does the line look like?

A Tree.

"A tree?"

Yes, a Tree.

The 'Tree of Life' to be specific.  It still exists I think.  Somewhere in some farmer's field it lingers, as strong and tall as the day the Master Maker called it forth from the dust of the garden in the east of Eden where He put the Man.

(can you tell I'm preaching from Genesis these days?)

Lovely Tree.  Glorious Tree.  Tree that will have it's final transplant when the Master Maker takes it from that fallow field and re-plants it in Zion, outside the gate made of a pearl lit by translucent streets of finest gold that reflect the light of the Master Himself.

(...For they will need no light of Sun or Moon there for THE LORD HIMSELF will be their light...)

Oh yeah, don't tell me you're not feeling it!

And what runs along beside that Tree in the new Jerusalem?

A river.

Heck yes, a RIVER!!  Put that in your cup of tears and smoke it!

BOOYAH!

See, the river of tears is testimony to the fact that the tree still 'is'.  You wouldn't be sad if you didn't know in the guts of you that happy 'is' possible.  You wouldn't miss 'happy' if that wasn't the way you were built to be.  You wouldn't pine for the garden if you hadn't come from there. Your soul wouldn't salivate like it just did reading about the tree and the pearl and the streets and the never ending cleansing light from the Master if you didn't still have some of that tree's nourishment lingering in the DNA you inherited from our first parents.

Pity the materialist.

To him/her the river of tears is just sorrow.

To me (to you?) it's a promise.  A promise of things to come.

Did you hear?  Seven farmers just discovered seven saplings in their fields.  Trees so old they can't be dated.  They'd never bloomed before, then all of a sudden, today they started blooming, all at the same time and all the same kind of fruit.

A fruit never seen before.  A fruit that one farmer took to his sickly daughter as she lay at home waiting to die.  They'd just brought her home from the hospital that day.  Better to pass away at home with your dolly in your arms then surrounded by linoleum...

(Think I'll open on a dusty road with an old ambulance driving slowly--'cause what's the rush? she's nearly dead--on it, headed for the farm.  The echo of that image--a road--will come back later in the film when we'll see 'THE ROAD' that leads to 'home' unveiled as the sky splits)

She couldn't even properly bite it, so he crushed it for her and--as the juice of it touched her lips--the cancer left her.

She was swinging under that tree by sunset.

Gotta' write me a treatment.

Do not lose hope my non-materialist friends.  There is a river, yes, but there is a Tree also.

Yes there is.  It's there.  Believe me.  

WOOOO!

T

on the war path...

Need to get producing again.

The Christmas/New Years lull is hard on me.  Every year it's the same thing.  We hustle our tails off trying to close deals before the end of the year.  By December 20th every producing entity we know basically shuts down 'till this week (the first full one of the new year), and this week is typically swamped with emails and phone messages that have piled up between Dec 20th and now.

So nothing much gets done.

You're looking at three weeks that vanish--POOF--just like that.

Frustrating, especially in media because anything in media takes FOREVER to get done. I was updating my mother in law on the progress with my career the other day (every once in a while it's good to try to assure her that we're not facing bankruptcy THIS month, yet...) and she marveled at how long it takes to get anything done in my line of work.

I told her that a big part of it is that we're dealing with high stakes in show business.  The deals we have pending right now (talk TV, dramatic TV, film, graphic novels, feature doc), if they all locked, would absolutely revolutionize my life.

Absolutely.

My biz-partner and I were reflecting the other day that our sense of 2010 is that it'll either be an uphill slog of a year where we fight and claw for every yard gained, or it might end up being one of those weird years where things go ballistic and you just hang on for dear life.

So far, the momentum is feeling like it's leading to the second option, with an explosive year of sorts brewing.

I feel ready.  T'will be interesting to see how it shakes down...

It's like an itch, the urge to produce.  You feel like you want to get busy with the 'doing' part of the job, but I've learned by now, that the gestating is as much a part of the doing as the doing itself.

Maybe you could benefit from being reminded of that.  

"Preparation is as much a part of success as procrastination..."

'Productive procrastination' mind you.  

The kind of 'wasted time' where you think 'till your head hurts, dream 'till your minds-eye gets sore.  Hope 'till it turns you to praying.

That kind of 'wasted time' 'aint wasted friend.

So, I'm here to remind myself and you, that if you feel like you're on 'the cusp' of something, keep thinking and dreaming and hoping and praying until...

Things start exploding.

I'll keep you posted on the fireworks on my end...

BOOM!

T

2010...

That's kinda' the scene we came from last night.

My first (ever) 'house party'.  First (ever) actual New Year's Eve party where you dance 'till 12 and blow those silly horns and wear those silly hats and kiss your wife then your friends at the end of the countdown then dance some more then leave before the Cops show up.

And you're thinking, "Gee whiz, what kind of guy waits 'till he's 35 years old to go to his FIRST house party and FIRST 'actual' New Years Eve party?"

A Pentecostal guy.

Or a guy who grew up that way.

See, my NYE's were typically spent with the 'youth group' at a racquet club we'd rented for the night pulling an all-nighter.

There was no music (except Petra or DC Talk...) no dancing (God forbid) and FOR DANG SURE no alcohol of any kind.

I remember getting invited to the house parties that my high-school friends were going to and always turning them down.

I'm afraid I was a self-righteous prick.

I want to apologize for that.  I hope to repent of that.  My desire is to (as my father taught me growing up) get 'looser' or more 'liberal' as I age.  More 'generous' with my orthodoxy, more hopeful with my storytelling.  Less rigid.  Less religious.  Less Pentecostal.

And if you're reading this and YOU are a Pentecostal, don't take it personally.  You know exactly what I'm talking about.  You probably loved those nights at the racquet club and--to be honest--we had the same hormones raging and desires running amok as our non-churched high-school friends did, but our girls, were in their BATHING SUITS by midnight.

(maybe being Pentecostal was actually cool...)

Mmmm...Racquet club.

And I say that to remind myself of the fact that--at heart--none of us are really any different from the others.

We all want to have fun.  Want to belong.  Want to watch girls.  Want to be liked.  Hope to 'get' a girl who we'll like (and who will like us) for the rest of our life so that we won't be lonely and so that we can take it 'past' the swimsuit tease--if you know what I'm saying.

There was an old dude (I realize I'm no spring chicken) pouring champagne into girls mouths last night.  He was much too old to be doing it, but doing it he was.  It hit me, watching him, that he's seen that same image in many of the same place you and I have seen that same image. A party.  A girl in a dress.  Dancing.  Hair flying every which way.  Music pumping.  A dude with a champagne bottle.  Her neck thrown back. The pour--will he miss?--on purpose?

His own little P-Diddy fantasy.

And everybody wants it.

You, me, the old dude.

So there I am, in the middle of all this, "Mr. Church Planting Preacher and TV/Film Producer" and the question is, "What did you do?"  or "What should you do?"

And the answer is:

I partied.  Not to excess (nowhere near there in fact) but enough to enjoy the moment.  I enjoyed (and I mean REALLY enjoyed) the wife of my youth.  The skinniest, most spectacular, butt-straight out of Brazil, looking woman there.  Danced with my friends.  Laughed with them and at them.  Met some new people.  Danced.  Hooted, hollered, then went home and...

(three words) 

Wife. Bathing. Suit.

Awesome.

And, I realized (and am realizing) that life isn't so bad after all.  I didn't miss out on that much. I'm still having fun and it's twenty years since my first turned-down invite to a house party. 

I love my wife.  I love my life.

And, sure, I'm still working very hard to find the 'level'.  Trying to find a way to be a dude who really loves Jesus (not just because he was raised to do that but because it's 'real' for him) really loves his wife (the easiest part of my job) really loves his kids, really produces and preaches/pastors well, while staying connected (in as non-idiotic a way possible) to culture and the people in it AND to the community of faith that is 'The Church' (universal) 'cause--like it or not and for better or for worse--I've got a 'place' within that context and a job to do.

Plus, no matter how hard I look, I can't find the principle of 'balance' in the Bible so that means I have to live with ABANDON in all the above spheres.

What would this next decade (2010-2020) look like if lived with ABANDON?

How would you follow Jesus with abandon?

How would you love your wife with abandon?

How would you love your kids with abandon?

How would you do your job (and for me that means producing/preaching) with abandon?

How would you truly engage culture (and her people) with abandon without abandoning your faith?

That's a piece of work right there.

By the time I figure it out I'll blink--and BOOM--I'll be 46.

On with it!

Happy New Year faithful reader(s), happy new year...

xo

T