The Fire Within The Human Fire 3.6 - January 12, 2025 The difference between containment and sustenance. Photo by Eliezer Muller If you value the insights you receive through The Human Fire, please consider supporting this work through my tip jar. Your generosity enables me to keep this publication free for everyone. Los Angeles burns. Sides debate. Families weep. I mourn with those I know who have lost childhood homes and decades of memories. Tables that families and friends shared meals and...
9 months ago • 3 min read
Going Forward The Human Fire 3.5 - January 5, 2025 One step at a time. Mt. Auburn Cemetery, Photo by Christi Beebe “So we saunter toward the Holy Land, till one day the sun shall shine more brightly than ever he has done, shall perchance shine into our minds and hearts, and light up our whole lives with a great awakening light, as warm and serene and golden as on a bankside in autumn.” ~ Henry David Thoreau, Walking Happy New Year, readers! I think Thoreau said it beautifully, and I pray all...
9 months ago • 1 min read
Going Outward The Human Fire 3.4 - December 29, 2024 How we show up in the world. Photo by Christi Beebe If you're like me this year, the holidays arrived sooner than expected. In our family, the season is a bit tender after my mother-in-law died unexpectedly before Thanksgiving. That's come with an extra layer of responsibilities for my wife, given that her mother left her estate, shall we say, without all the ribbons and bows tied neatly on the package. To add to that, our aging car popped...
10 months ago • 4 min read
Going Inward The Human Fire 3.3 - December 15, 2024 Inhabiting an interior castle. Photo by Peter Herrmann If we take our cues from the natural world, winter is the perfect time to go inward. The critters are preparing to hibernate, stockpiling their stores and burrowing deeper into the earth. The trees are conserving energy. The birds have escaped to warmer shores. I'm by the fire with a book. Don't get me wrong: I love a good holiday party. But "good" doesn't mean, to me at least, the kind...
10 months ago • 3 min read
Going Deeper The Human Fire 3.2 - December 8, 2024 Rooting ourselves in the depths of what matters most. Photo by TrebleExtenstion When the trees are bare, and the first snow covers the brown grass, I feel the need to get quiet and go within. To be like a tree, conserve my energy, and put my efforts into delving below the surface, gathering sustenance and strength for the months ahead. Two years ago, I wrote a piece titled "What Is a Deep Soul?" in advance of a running a course I created...
10 months ago • 4 min read
Go Easy On Us The Human Fire 3.1 - December 1, 2024 Healing the wounded hearts of our world. Photo by Christi Beebe Today is the first Sunday of Advent, that season of liturgical Christianity focused on preparation and waiting. It's been my favorite season of the Christian calendar for some time, and for the past two years I've marked it by starting a new volume of this newsletter. If you've been with me from the beginning of this endeavor, I'm grateful for your continued companionship along...
10 months ago • 5 min read
The Value of Structure The Human Fire 2.16 - October 8, 2024 On the supportive tissue of human flourishing. Photo by Augustine Mullick I've had that old Joni Mitchell line singing in my head for several days now: "Don't it always seem to goThat you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone" Watching the roads in western North Carolina wash away last week from record rainfall, and anticipating the storm surge soon to strike Florida from Hurricane Milton, I'm struck by how much we take for...
about 1 year ago • 4 min read
The Value of Stories The Human Fire 2.15 - September 15, 2024 The library of our lives. Photo by Dibakar Roy I spent Friday in downtown Boston with my wife, son, and a group of homeschoolers exploring the famed "Freedom Trail" and debating the tea tax that provoked the "Boston Tea Party" before revolution broke out in the colonies. One interesting dimension of the tea tax debate lies in the fact that the British tea, even with the tax, was the cheaper option available to the colonists. Here's...
about 1 year ago • 4 min read
The Value of Stuff The Human Fire 2.14 - September 8, 2024 Beyond a consumerist view of what we receive and make. Photo by Phyllis Poon When I was a poor graduate student - is there any other kind of graduate student? - I lived in a neighborhood of Boston delightfully called "the student ghetto." Every September 1st, the apartment leases changed over, and thousands of students, new and old, shuffled around the city to better or worse digs. The sight of hundreds of sweat-and-stuff-filled...
about 1 year ago • 3 min read