Sixty-one years ago today, on November 15, 1959, a singing group known as The Quarrymen lost in the preliminary round of Carroll Levis’s TV Star Search competition. This was the third time they entered the competition and lost. They lost to a woman who played a tune on her spoons. The Quarrymen found little success,…
Don’t overthink things. Confucius said, “Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.” Recovery is like that. We never fall because we don’t know what to do, but because we don’t do what we know. Here’s my advice – seek God more than you seek recovery. In my experience, when I seek…
George Carlin said it well: “In the United States, anybody can be president. That’s the problem.” Carlin’s point is well taken. In America – and many other countries – a person becomes the sum total of his decisions. If he strings together enough wise decisions, he will enjoy the intended outcome. But what about addiction?…
Visit any recovery meeting and you will hear addicts describe how they “fell into addiction.” May I respectfully disagree? It is my observation, after knowing and working with hundreds of addicts, that no one ever falls into addiction. We slide into addiction. To fall implies an unintended slip or stumble. But the way we got…
If you are a recovering sex addict, you probably get frustrated that you don’t see progress and change as quickly as you might like. If you are married to an addict, you have certainly had moments of doubt when you don’t see God working in your spouse the way you had expected. Hold on! Salman…
A grocery store manager wanted to get to know his new employee, so he asked him a few basic questions. He led with, “Where are you from?” The young employee said, “Sir, I’m from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the home of ugly women and great hockey teams.” The manager responded, “That’s interesting. My wife is from Lancaster.”…
It was a weekly routine early in our marriage. We would run to the Blockbuster video store to rent a movie, which we could then watch as many times as we wanted for the next three days. Then on this date in 2013, the unthinkable happened. Blockbuster closed its doors for the final time, marking…
Philip Seymour Hoffman won the Academy Award for his leading role in Capote (2005). Hoffman was nominated for three other Academy Awards, along with three Tony Award nominations. Unfortunately, Hoffman held another title. Addict. In 2006, Hoffman told his story on 60 Minutes. He was a drug and alcohol addict. At age 22, he got…
On this date in 1811, William Henry Harrison’s army prevailed over the Shawnee leader Tecumseh in the Battle of Tippecanoe. The Shawnee leader proceeded to place a curse on Harrison and every president who would be elected at 20-year intervals. Harrison (elected in 1840) caught a cold and died one month into office. Abraham Lincoln…
Why do we act out sexually? Dr. Timothy Fong addresses this in his article, “Understanding and Managing Sexual Behaviors.” He writes, “Psychologically, sexual behaviors serve to escape emotional or physical pain or are a way of dealing with life stressors. The irony is that the sexual behaviors become the primary way of coping and handling…