Optimize 2018: Successful Relationships

  Chocolates bulge from store shelves this month. Sale ads urge us to procure these sweet pounds to show our love ... or adopt as our own. After all, who would leave a lonely velvet heart to languish in the clearance bin next week? The pressure to sprinkle sugar, flower petals,…

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Cultivating Grace, Not Just Saying It

The ballerina pirouettes until stilled in her partner's embrace. With his support, she leaps toward heaven and floats to the stage. As the curtain swings to a close, she rushes in front of her partner to blow kisses at her fans. The audience acclaims her as graceful, flinging roses at her…

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Increase your Friend-ability Factor

  As mentioned in my post a few weeks ago, connections with life-giving people serve an important role in maintaining healthy personal energy. While some develop relationships with ease, others struggle to develop or maintain them. The difference might seem inborn, but the factors of a friend-attracting personality can actually be cultivated. If you'd…

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Relationship DNA

Toothpaste rollers grate their teeth at the mid-tube squeezers. Confrontational people chase the withdrawn away. We self-protect, only to cause more harm in the end. Fear and conflict weave barbs into interpersonal dynamics throughout the world. It's amazing relationships have not dwindled to extinction altogether. Yet, even prisoners balk at solitary…

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Hold on to your Hat!

"Therefore put on the full armor of God,so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. . . . Take the helmet of salvation" (Ephesians 6:13,17). I enjoy a solitary day at the mall, unless I'm searching for…

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