NOTE FROM ELIZABETH: Every Heartspoken Life is unique, and it has been my honor to meet many smart, interesting, caring, generous women and men through my online activities who exemplify the Heartspoken Life in their own way. Today’s guest, Sue Painter, is one of them. She and I are among those folks who have had […]
Connection (Connect with others)
8 Ways To Get Past Feeling Misunderstood
“What we have here is failure to communicate!” The famous movie line from Cool Hand Luke was spoken facetiously by the Captain, a prison warden, to Luke, the young prisoner played by Paul Newman. Perhaps one of the reasons it has stayed so deeply ingrained in our cultural lore is because the failure to communicate is […]
We’re All In This Together
My writing friend Joy Newswanger dislikes the term “social distancing,” and I agree with her. What we’re doing to protect ourselves and our communities is physical distancing, not social distancing. In some ways, we’re connecting socially more than ever before. John and I are trying to call or email or write friends and family to […]
How to Distinguish God’s Voice from Satan’s Lies
An age-old question One of my Heartspoken readers recently sent an important and challenging question: Hi, thanks for God’s work here. My question is how do you differentiate between God’s warning and Satan’s warning? And how do you feel it when it’s God’s warning or how do you feel it when it’s Satan’s threatening? Thank […]
Top 5 Reasons to Write a Thank-you Note (You might be surprised)
Turn obligation to opportunity I’m not going to tell you WHEN to write a thank-you note. You can find that information anywhere. Today I want you to think about WHY you might write a thank you note. As Simon Sinek reminds us in his wildly popular TED talk, the most significant things in our life […]
Living Reconciliation
ABOVE: Kathryn Laws and the author visiting the Philadelphia Zoo in 2018 Note from Elizabeth: The May 25, 2020 death of George Floyd from police brutality has galvanized the world and sent people like me scrambling to learn, understand, and take action to be part of the solution. I was put off by the extremes […]
Independence Day: Remember, Be Thankful, Pray, and Celebrate
First, let’s remember… As the world is rocked with a pandemic combined with cultural, political, economic, and societal unrest, it is entirely appropriate and important that we reflect today on this great nation—even with all its flaws—and marvel at the vision of our founding fathers so long ago. Let’s remember our history: On July 2nd, […]
D-Day Commemoration
I hope we never get too jaded or cynical to be moved by the remembrance of those who have fought—and those who have died—in service to our country, especially on this day as we celebrate the decisive victory of D-Day, 1944. This marvelous performance by the D-Day Darlings of Vera Lynn’s classic song, “There’ll Be […]