One path doesn’t work for everyone, as I wrote before. So people are starting to discuss just what an honest commitment means. The New I Do suggests that young couples–and even long-married folks–discuss their values and goals in a relationship, before making or reaffirming a commitment. In this model, you could choose: A “beta”…
So that path to becoming a monk or nun looks very different from America’s “relationship escalator.” You know, the one that moves smoothly from dating to relationship to engagement to marriage to children, in perfect happiness: Or as Jenna McCarthy puts it in her TED talk, two million American couples each…
Don’t have time to read right now? Consider downloading the PDF of this four-post series here. In college, I considered becoming a nun. I think I was drawn by the focus, the devotion to a way of life. I even took private vows for a year… thinking that if I stepped…
So John Oliver’s just come out with a Chrome extension called Drumpfinator, that changes all web mentions of Trump to his ancestral name, Drumpf: This is fantastic! But why stop there? There are so many other Chrome extensions to change your perspective! If you feel like the Internet (or the…
We’re more like the monkeys than we think. In one classic research experiment, Frans de Waal found that caged monkeys will give researchers rocks in exchange for tasty cucumbers. But when one guy gets paid a delicious grape, and the second gets cucumbers for the same work… well, he…
For hundreds of years, influence has circulated among affluent European folk, highly educated and living in cities. These guys formed our laws, built networks of influence, ran companies and nonprofits, and produce creative works that influence us today. And often, it’s hard for others to really be heard until people…
In my early twenties, I found an old journal. Wanting to preserve my past, I sat down to type each entry into the computer. But I was jolted out of myself when the phone rang: my teenage brother was in the hospital with significant injuries. By the time we got to the…
“…Before we were serious,” I admitted to my boyfriend, “I was scoping out dates using the census. And my odds weren’t good. There were only like 100 eligible guys in our area of Maine.” “Yeah, but my odds were even worse,” he laughed. I was astonished. “I thought it’s…
A few months ago, I took my bike in for repairs to a local business, where the friendly and tattooed owner began chatting me up. Filling out forms extremely slowly, he told me all about his businesses, his son’s private school, his plans for a custom-build house in Florida…
I still remember the day that my fellow student Joe Vohlers died. News spread quickly on campus, and we set aside textbooks to gather in cramped dorm rooms, televisions blaring. We were stunned. Joe had keeled over suddenly from heart trouble, gone from the popular crowd to — dead,…