R I S E S

August 16, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

It’s a tarry black uckiness
Called DARK
and every Soul knows
IT intimately
Every Foot has traveled
Its unmapped Valley
IT not only covers
but smothers completely
And when it descends
with the heaviness of a
Mud-coated itchy wool blanket
IT sucks even the last
desperate breath
no ventilator could salvage
IT HAPPENS
first at a distance
that no horizon can hold
and then even more resounding
than an amplified heart beat
using your ribs as a xylophone
L I G H T
IT rises
with a newness
The Lazarus
of a new day
And it doesn’t hold you
IT FREES YOU
to unimaginable beginnings
G R E A T
is what RISES
THAT never sets
(and is noticed)

HOROSCOPE(D)

August 9, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

We all have them, don’t we:

B I R T H D A Y S

and they always come around once a year. . .

Some are absolutely more celebrated more than others
but all of them have a huge message attached to them:
THERE IS ONE LESS ONE TO CELEBRATE

Now if that doesn’t
blow out the candles
crumble the cake
harden the icing
deflate the balloons
destroy the gifts
and hurricane the party–
N O T H I N G W I L L

B U T

WE AUTHOR OUR OWN HOROSCOPES

Now make no mistake about it. . .
We can allow others to write our scripts
and we can feel powerfully inspired and obligated to follow them. . .

B U T

Why not just author your own
and more importantly:
FOLLOW IT?

Every year has
T W O
N E W
Y E A R S:
January 1
a n d
Your BIRTHDAY. . .
both will have
hopes
new beginnings
anticipations
resolutions
and mostly
RESPONSibilities. . .

GUARANTEED
NEW
YEAR(S):

Write your own HOROSCOPE
and better still:
L I V E
I T
F U L L Y

HERE’S THE SECRET:

W O W
that’s being
H O R O S C O P E (D)

The EMERGING Department

August 2, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

Everyone feels like a shadow of themselves
when they’re not themselves
when your sick
m i s e r a b l e. . .

I hadn’t been able to go to the bathroom all night
I tried everything:
Walking
Jumping
Taking a Shower
Taking a Bath
Drinking Water
Taking an additional pill that had been prescribed
Laying down
Reclining
Standing
Leaning forward
NOTHING
Not a DROP
. . .and what made it worse was I had a huge event day; a funeral I was conducting of a friend of Thirty plus years on behalf of her family and an afternoon wedding for a young couple who already couldn’t get the first two ministers they asked to marry them because both were out of town;

I COULDN’T BE SICK

I called my family doctor and he urged me to go to the Emergency Department and when I told him of my time schedule he said I had no choice.

I arrived at the hospital and immediately began singing my song of woe and how I literally needed to be treated and released within an hour so I could make it to the funeral and they assured me that I would be able to make that commitment.

When I was back in the room a nurse came in and began taking my information and asked me what I did for a living.
When I told here that I was a hospice chaplain, she asked me if it was for Hospice of the Western Reserve and when I confirmed that, without looking at me, still typing in information she said, “My daughter just died with Hospice of the Western Reserve a couple of months ago.

She went and got a catheter kit to relieve the “URINARY RETENTION” problem, I readied myself for the procedure and she began asking me about the team members that took care of her daughter and I realized at that very moment, I was no longer a patient and she was no longer a nurse, she was a grieving mother who was re-telling the story of her daughter and I was her chaplain, her counselor. I don’t remember the procedure, as quick as it was because of our conversation.

She stated that we were done as if the instant relief I felt of not being able to go to the bathroom for nearly 10 hours didn’t let me know WE ARE DONE. She told me she would be back with instructions and my discharge papers and I was dressed in my suit/tie and ready to go when she came back to go over instructions and to have me sign my discharge papers. Before she reached the curtain to leave, she turned around and told me that this was her first day back following her daughter’s death and that I was her first patient. She asked me, with welled tears in her eyes:

“HOW DID YOU KNOW TO COME IN THIS MORNING?”

I wanted to say, truthfully, “I HAD TO PEE!”

It was a much deeper question with an even deeper answer:

“BECAUSE WE NEEDED EACH OTHER”

We gave each other a hug
and now, even a couple of weeks later,
it’s so much more than a memory
and certainly a blog post. . .

When I was taking a Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) class in Seminary over 40 years ago, I remember our instructor once telling us that we need to remember, often when one that we serve goes into the Emergency Department it signifies an event that has been EMERGING.

Doing hospice work for 25 years now and hospital chaplaincy for thirty-two years I’ve been enlightened to KNOW that there are no accidents. No chance meetings. No coincidences.

If you dare yourself to believe we all are actually connected and that one’s pain is another’s and one’s happiness is as well. . .

WHAT IS EMERGING FROM YOU. . .
WHAT IS IT YOU CAN GIVE WHEN YOU CAME TO GET. . .
WHAT BROUGHT YOU TO ANOTHER PLACE THAN THE ONE YOU THOUGHT YOU ARRIVED. . .
?

Why would WE ever not
reach out
connect
or more. . .
HOLD ON?

IT MAKES ME WONDER

Can it be that when you are truly
HOLDING SPACE
for one
YOU too,
Are having that very sacred
S P A C E
being HELD for YOU as well. . .

IT MAKES ME WONDER
(maybe that’s the
g l o r i o u s
E M E R G I N G
in us)

Out of this World

July 24, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

Many celebrations will take place this week commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing. We’re focusing on Georgia connections to this amazing historical feat, along with the future of space exploration.

Tiffany Davis is an aerospace engineer. You may have seen her on your timeline with the hashtag, #YesIAmARocketScientist. That hashtag went viral in 2016 after Davis posted it on her Instagram page, announcing her graduation from the Georgia Institute of Technology

Among her more earthbound accomplishments: her plea to make college more affordable caught the attention of then-President Barack Obama. Since then, Davis has interned and been hired at Boeing’s mission operations and engineering group in Washington, D.C.

On Second Thought host Virginia Prescott spoke with Davis and asked her what a rocket scientist looks like.

Interview highlights

On what advice she would give to any young minorities interested in STEM

It takes … a type of ambition and determination to know that you’re going into a field where there’s not a lot of people that look like you, and some people will doubt that you belong there because there’s not that representation of you already in that field. So [there] will be times where you feel like you have to prove yourself, or you may not belong, but just understand that you have a purpose, and you have an intention, and practice makes perfect. Once you put in that work, and once you put in that effort, know that you do belong there, that you do deserve to be there, and you’re gonna crush it.

On her advice to girls who worry STEM is not a ‘feminine’ field.

Your life does not have to be binary. Women are not black and white. We can be many different things. I’m not one thing, I’m not just an engineer. I also was a track athlete. I was a basketball athlete. I was prom queen. I was all that in one. I didn’t have to pick and choose between what society wants me to be and what I feel like I am.

On how she knew she wanted to major in aerospace engineering

Since I was a young girl I was always interested in understanding and learning how things work. I was the type of girl that would beg my parents to go to RadioShack instead of Toys ‘R’ Us. And I was also the person that would take apart my gameboy and try to figure out if I could put it back together.

On the future of space exploration

I think [the moon landing] was just the beginning for us. I actually hope to be one of the first people that walk on the surface of Mars one day. And I think that’s exactly where we’re going with capabilities being developed at Boeing such as the SLS, which is the Space Launch System, our heavy lift rocket that’s gonna take us to the moon, and Mars, and eventually beyond that. People want to mine asteroids, people want to set up amusement parks in space.

On how space exploration benefits life on Earth

Many inventions come from space, and us going up there with limited resources, and figuring out a way to make it work, and that ends up creating some type of innovation or product that we can bring back to Earth to make other people’s life easier or more healthy. Something like osteoporosis medicine, where you’re looking at the bone decay, and how the bone acts differently in space, we were able to diagnose that and treat that by looking at how astronauts’ bones decay in space under a no-gravity environment. . .

SO WHAT?

Like most miracles
Like most vast awakenings
They’re not always
recognized/noticed/seen
Especially when they’re right in front of us. . .

What’s even more amazing to me
is advanced as we are
FIFTY YEARS LATER
or TWO-HUNDRED-AND-FIFTY YEARS
from now
it’s not our scientific advances
our medical technology
our Pharmacology
our psych-social interventions
that heal us. . .

IT IS OUR RELATIONSHIPS

. . .And that’s the only thing that
HAS
DOES
WILL
be for an ever
OUT OF THIS WORLD

Your HAPPINESS Thermometer

July 17, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

HOW’S YOUR HAPPINESS THERMOMETER. . .

Is it R I S I N G

Is it F A L L I N G

Is it

S T U C K

By many accounts, Americans are living in contentious times. Yet they report being happier in 2017 than they were in 2016, according the 2017 Harris Poll Survey of American Happiness, shared exclusively with TIME MAGAZINE

That’s not to say that Americans are especially happy overall; only 33% of Americans surveyed said they were happy. In 2016, just 31% of Americans reported the same.

The Harris Poll, which has been conducting a happiness survey for the last nine years, surveyed 2,202 Americans ages 18 and older in May 2017. The survey was not designed to measure why Americans are or are not happy, but John Gerzema, CEO of the Harris Poll, has some ideas.

“It’s really interesting that Americans’ overall happiness went up from last year—a year of alt-facts, mean tweets and robots coming for our jobs,” Gerzema says. “Either people are becoming immune to the news, or there’s a promise of change for so many Americans that felt alienated.”

The people who reported being the happiest were men and women in high-income households and those with a high school diploma or less. Republicans and Democrats experienced similar increases in happiness levels (but Republicans tend to report higher happiness levels overall, Gerzema says).

Overall, men reported a greater increase in happiness levels compared to women, though they were more likely to say they were frustrated at work. Millennials were the most likely to say they were optimistic about their future: 79% said they were. However, 77% said they worried about finances, and slightly more than half said they were frustrated with their career. Despite the back and forth over health care changes, 53% of Americans surveyed said they rarely worry about their health, up from 48% in 2016.

Some of the biggest changes were in how people felt about their spiritual lives. In the survey, 71% of Americans said their spiritual beliefs were a positive guiding force to them, compared to 66% in 2016. Americans also say they feel close to their relatives; 86% said they have positive relationships with their family members. “One hypothesis is that we are trying to control what we can,” says Gerzema. “Maybe we are turning off cable news and turning back into our families and communities and faith.”

Americans have never been the happiest bunch, Gerzema says. In the nine-year history of the happiness poll, the highest happiness index was 35% in 2008 and 2009.

Distraction and a lack of control may be part of the reason why only about a third of Americans say they are happy, Gerzema says. Close to 40% of Americans said in 2017 that they rarely engage in hobbies and pastimes they enjoy, and 75% said that “my voice is not heard in national decisions that affect me.”

“To me, it feels like a cultural lack of presence,” says Gerzema. “We are so caught up in our texting, multitasking, jobs and commutes that we seem to have less and less free time. Older people age 65+ are the happiest.”

Despite the happiness gap, the majority of Americans remain hopeful, and 72% say they feel optimistic about the future. “We are not that happy, but perhaps that’s ok,” says Gerzema. “Optimism, but not necessarily happiness, seems to be part of the American psyche. Perhaps we wear it like a coat of arms.”

S O. . .

ARE YOU H A P P Y

Are you happy?

If you were to fit into a survey right now

would you be on the upside of being happy

or on the low side of being happy?

What’s

YOUR HAPPINESS THERMOMETER READING

Are you happy with your life

Are you happy with your job

Are you happy with your family

Are you happy with your self

There will always be questions when we talk about happiness

because by the way that the world takes look at us we’re not all that happy

or does the world actually have it wrong. . .

Right now

at this very moment what makes you the happiest in your life. . .

not what do you dream of that would make you happy

W H A T

ARE YOU

Happiest with right now in your life. . .

Could that get better

Could that get worse

Could that actually be shared. . .

Are you responsible just for your own happiness

Of the happiness of others

ARE YOU RIGHT NOW

H A P P Y

with this machine gun kind of questioning. . .

Well something tells me

it won’t be a pill

intervention

therapy

voodoo

or a particular kind of psychic surgery. . .

It certainly won’t be prime time days

it’ll be something in yourself

from yourself

maybe a recognition

maybe a throwing away

of all that could lead to your happiness

and ultimately

the happiness of those around you. . .

O R N O T. . .

YOU TELL ME!

Her SAD

July 12, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

Without a doubt sometimes the greatest sermons anymore
the greatest blog posts
can be found in the most unusual
and yes
most usual places;
our biggest problem
is we just don’t notice. . .
that’s always been our biggest problem:
THAT WE FAIL TO RECOGNIZE WHAT WE NOTICE. . .
So here I am in a Giant Eagle Grocery Store,
Early Sunday Morning,
trying to find something for a Junior Sermon
I’m going to do for the kids at Church
and I hear the
W A I L
of a small child crying

Not and not an infant
but a small toddler
and another little girl comes up the aisle
right past me
and then she sees the kid crying. . .
she tells her mother the baby is sad,
and the mother said,
“Yes, she’s very sad. . .”
And then this child sat back in the shopping cart and almost starting to cry herself. . .
She then said a most beautifully innocent thing:
“Her sad makes me sad.”

I love what the mom asked her next,
“Do you think there’s anything we can do to make her a little happier and less sad. . .”
And without pause the little girl said,
“Give her a cookie. . .
She was already eating one from the clear little box they had obviously just gotten from the Bakery Section. . .
So they walked down the aisle
the other child and her mother were walking;
still crying
still sad
and after asking permission from her mother
gave her a cookie. . .

In that single moment
the Grocery Store Aisle seemed to
literally turn upside down

The little girl was
sad
no more. . .
Not only how innocent–
how simple. . .
I mean a little child gets it. .
She knew in an instant,
IF HER SAD MAKES ME SAD
could it possibly be that
MY HAPPY COULD MAKE HER HAPPY. . . !

This little Caring Catalyst
challenges us to find out what she found out:
OUT OF ALL THE THINGS DOWN OUR AISLES THAT MAKE US SAD
THERE ARE JUST AS MANY THINGS UP THOSE AISLES
THAT CAN MAKE US HAPPY. . .
and if
T H E I R
S A D
has the potential to make us Sad
OUR HAPPY
HAS THE POWER TO THEM HAPPY. . .
Let’s have the guts
to find out what came easy for her—-
DARE TO FIND OUT
You just never know
what you’ll find down
THAT AISLE
(nor will they)

NINE INFAMOUS WORDS

July 10, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

T I C K – T O C K-
T I C K – T O C K

T H E Y

C A L L I T

T I M E

and the

MILLION DOLLAR QUESTION IS:

HOW DO YOU SPEND YOUR

8 6 , 4 0 0 Seconds a DAY ?

If you’re anything like me the other 8 Billion Plus People in the World

you have based your life on the

NINE MOST INFAMOUS WORDS KNOWN TO HUMANITY:

IT SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE
T I M E

which brings us to another important question

(AND IT IS NOT:
HOW DO YOU SPEND YOUR TIME?)

How CAN YOU
Have the Most Fun in Your Free Time?

The calendar is an indispensable tool in our over-committed and over-stimulated culture, and one no longer reserved solely for work commitments and appointments. Many busy people, faced with ever-dwindling free time, resort to scheduling everything from time with friends and family to coffee on the deck with your spouse.

But is scheduling your free time a good idea ?

Researchers from Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business and Rutgers Business School evaluated existing research (much of it their own) on time management tactics and how they affect the uptake, outcome and enjoyment of various activities. Many of their assessments, which are published in the journal Current Opinion in Psychology, are in line with conventional productivity wisdom. They determined that scheduling an activity increases the likelihood that it’ll get done, for example, and that multitasking helps people achieve more, but with spottier results.

When it comes to enjoying leisure activities, however, the researchers found that classic time management strategies may backfire. Just as with work tasks or errands, science shows that getting fun activities on the calendar increases your chances of getting them done — but there’s a cost, according to the researchers’ analysis. Here’s how to plan your free time without sacrificing fun.

Keep it vague

Studies have shown that any amount of scheduling may reduce your enjoyment of leisure activities by disrupting their “free-flowing nature,” the researchers write. But if putting a friend date or shopping trip in your planner is the only way it’ll get done, keep the timing as loose as possible. The researchers suggest designating chunks of time rather than specific hours — “after work” is better than “at 6 p.m.,” for example.

Give yourself time

When you find yourself with an expanse of free time, it’s tempting to squeeze in as many fun activities as possible. But studies show that imposing a hard stop on a fun activity — even if it’s to start another pleasant thing — will subconsciously affect your ability to enjoy it while it’s happening. This phenomenon, the researchers write, may be related to our tendency to underestimate how much we can fit into blocks of time — hence why you may find yourself whittling away the 30 minutes before a meeting instead of starting a new task. When it comes to free time, letting the day unfold organically is a better strategy.

Stay in the moment

In a similar vein, the analysis showed that, independent of time pressure, the “mere knowledge of future upcoming activities may also undermine enjoyment,” perhaps because it takes participants out of the moment and splits their attention. The researchers recommend resisting the temptation to over-plan, and instead focusing on one activity at a time. . .

So maybe it’s ultimately best the remember:

and better still. . .

PLAN’S
B
C
D
E
F
G

may ultimately be better than any
PLAN A

and ultimately better yet. . .

IT SEEMED LIKE A GOOD IDEA AT THE TIME

e q u a l s

WOE TO THOSE WHO EXPECT FOR THEY WILL SORELY BE DISAPPOINTED

Psssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssst:
Just go out and
Have The Time of your LIFE

GET READY,
S E T,
G O

NO WORDS

July 8, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

Sometimes the loudest
S O U N D
is the one
NEVER
H E A R D
(but still very much experienced)

I’ve known Stephanie Jessup most of her life
and she never ceases to amaze me. . .
Among her many talents,
The Tsunami she is has washed up on the many different shores
of her students at Medina High School
where she is a ASL Teacher. . .

Every year Stephanie’s class presents a song
she and the students have worked endless hours
so that others can not just see
so that others can not just hear
so that others can ACTUALLY EXPERIENCE. . .

This year they chose the song,
“WAVING THROUGH A WINDOW”
from the 2017 Tony Award Winning Show:
DEAR EVAN HANSEN

SOMETIMES
THE GREATEST SOUND
YOU CAN EVER MAKE
IS NEVER HEARD
. . .BUT FELT

KUDOS
To Mrs. Stephanie Jessup
and the students of Medina High School
ASL I, II, and III. . .
You’ve done far more than
C O M M U N I C A T E D
(loud and clear)

NO WORDS:
s o m e t i m e s
the best words
are those
never spoken
b u t
intimately
H E A R D

FOURTH Better or Worse

July 5, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

It was a wedding
T H A T
W A S N ‘ T

T H E Y
called me less than two weeks ago’s
after he asked his Father,
his hero
Suffering from ALS,
If he would like to see him and his fiancé
get married;
His dad agreed
and the first hurdle was
W H O
neither of his Hospice Spiritual Care Coordinators
were able to conduct the Wedding
SO
a Hospice Social Worker
remembered a boast of mine from years earlier:
“I’D MARRY ANYONE, ANYTIME, ANYWHERE!”
When she called and asked
I was in. . .
When she told me it was going to be on the Fourth of July
I was even more in. . .

There were other hurdles:
Caterer’s, Photographers, Family schedules, Cake Decorators, Alterations, Florists, Table Settings and a host of behind-the-scenes details. . .

3:00 p.m. on the Fourth of July finally came
and with candles burning and
canned music playing
SHE
WALKED DOWN THE Make Shift Aisle in his parents living room
They faced one another and held hands;
Teared-up
Repeated Vows
Exchanged Rings
Mixed two Different Colors of Sand in a Vase
k i s s e d
Walked away with a series of flashed bulbs capturing the moments. . .

It was the wedding that WASN’T. . .
They lived in Pennsylvania
and had no wedding license
but plenty of witnesses
IT DIDN’T COUNT–
not legally. . .
B U T
when Love is the Law
it also becomes
G O S P E L
and their act of Love
wasn’t holding each other’s hands
and vowing their love;
but making sure
no hand wasn’t un-held;
that
LOVE
WAS THEIR CIRCLE
that excluded
NO ONE;
ALL FAMILY MEMBERS
Were Included
. . .and the best thing of all
for this humble
Caring Catalyst:
THEY INCLUDED ME

It made the FOURTH
far BETTER
than WORSE

It made
for a
FOURTH AN EVER

FEELING A PULSE

June 26, 2019 By ChuckBehrens Leave a Comment

U.S. Suicide Rates Are the Highest They’ve Been Since World War II

JAMIE DUCHARME reported in the TIME MAGAZINE JUNE 20, 2019 edition news that we might really be able to do something about that’s merely at the end of our our own hands and beats regularly, steadily in our own hearts. . .

U.S. suicide rates are at their highest since World War II, according to federal data—and the opioid crisis, widespread social media use and high rates of stress may be among the myriad contributing factors.

In 2017, 14 out of every 100,000 Americans died by suicide, according to a new analysis released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics. That’s a 33% increase since 1999, and the highest age-adjusted suicide rate recorded in the U.S. since 1942. (Rates were even higher during the Great Depression, hitting a century peak of 21.9 in 1932.)

“I don’t think there’s a one-size-fits all reason” since there’s almost never a single cause of suicide, says Jill Harkavy-Friedman, vice president of research at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, a nonprofit that supports suicide prevention research, education and policy. “I don’t think there’s something you can pinpoint, but I do think a period of increased stress and a lack of a sense of security may be contributing.”

It’s even more difficult to assign causes to the uptick, Harkavy-Friedman says, because it’s happening across diverse demographic groups. Men have historically died by suicide more frequently than women, and that’s still true: As of 2017, the male suicide rate was more than three times higher than the female rate. But female suicide rates are rising more quickly—by 53% since 1999, compared to 26% for men—and the gap is narrowing. For both genders, suicide rates are highest among American Indians and Alaska natives, compared to other ethnicities, and when the data are broken down by age group, the most suicide deaths are reported among people ages 45 to 64—but nearly every ethnic and age group saw an increase of some size from 1999 to 2017.

Youth suicide is becoming an especially pressing problem, with rates rising more rapidly among boys and girls ages 10 to 14 than in any other age group. A separate research letter published June 18 in JAMA found that youth suicide rates are at their highest point since at least 2000.

The JAMA letter doesn’t identify causes of the youth uptick, but first author Oren Miron, a research associate in biomedical informatics at Harvard Medical School, has two theories.

Opioid use, he says, has been shown to drive suicidal behavior among drug users and their children and families, and so recenthigh rates of drug abuse and overdose may be tied to rising suicide rates. The opioid epidemic may harm entire communities’ mental health, Miron says. “The entire community is bleeding. Kids see less of a future, they see more of their friends dying,” Miron says. “This might give us just one more reason to crack down on” substance misuse.

His second theory is that social media may be contributing to rising suicide rates, particularly for young people. “We know that now it’s used in younger ages and more intensively, and we also see some new apps that allow more anonymity, which in turn allows more bullying and more kids talking about suicide without their parents knowing,” he says. Heavy social media use may also lead to fewer meaningful in-person interactions—which can protect against mental health issues and suicidal behavior—and encourage unhealthy comparison with others.

One other possibility, says Harkavy-Friedman, is that suicide may be better reported and identified today than in years past, as people pay closer attention to mental health issues.

Though suicide is always complicated at both the individual and national levels, help is available. Experts encourage those struggling with suicidal thoughts to confide in a trusted friend or family member, speak with a health care provider, or seek care at an emergency room in cases of immediate danger.

The very first step in saving a Pulse
IS
FEELING
ONE
Reach OUT
Let your hand be the one
that’s FOUND by ONE
Who’s reaching out blindly
to grasp a lifeline
Let them know
when they can’t feel
THERE’S A TOUCH
(Y O U R ‘ S)

If you or someone you know may be contemplating suicide, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or text HOME to 741741 to reach the Crisis Text Line. In emergencies, call 911, or seek care from a local hospital or mental health provider.

T I C K – T O C K- T I C K – T O C K

How CAN YOU Have the Most Fun in Your Free Time?