Each one of us has unique stories to tell about how we got to today from yesterday. These stories explain who we have been, who we are, and where we are going. Here are some of mine.
Closing Spaces?
What is this blog about?
My life's work consists of attempts to help disconnected people connect in meaningful ways. Often, people are separated by lots of "Space." This space can be physical distance, but I also mean it in terms of emotional distance, interpersonal distance, perceptual distance, and cultural distance. One of my basic attitudes about life, is that if people can understand others better, the distance, or space, between them may close, and they may become "closer."
More understanding would mean more "closeness" and less space between and among people, and their relationships, communities, and cultures.
By trying to help people close the spaces between them, I am trying to help them understand those who are different, see those around them as resources for their own journeys, and vice versa. Sure, it's terribly optimistic...but I think it is a worthwhile task.
One of my Mentors, Donald N. Larson, encouraged me to see that the more I learned and knew about someone, the more I could be able to meet their needs, and help them with the problems that they faced. I like to apply that to encouragement. Encouragement by itself, without a real understanding of the person, is superficial. Encouragement arising out of understanding, fine tunes the encouragement, and makes it a precious communicative event. It is knowing just what someone needed, because that person was already known.
So as I blog, keep in mind, that in whatever arena I ramble, I seek to find ways to be an encouragement, and to close space.
Keepin' it close!
Brent Lindquist, fellow pilgrim