It’s OK not to be OK

77% Weekly Newsletter

A startling discovery about 2024—this year has 53 Mondays, not the standard 52.

2019: 52 Mondays
2020: 52 Mondays
2021: 52 Mondays
2022: 52 Mondays
2023: 52 Mondays
2024: 53 Mondays
2025: 52 Mondays
2026: 52 Mondays
2027: 52 Mondays
2028: 52 Mondays

This means the ratio of Monday newsletters (41) to weeks in the year (52) is not 40/52 (77%), but 41/52 (78.8%).

I’m not changing the name of the newsletter this year (or in 2029, 2035, 2040, or 2046).

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ION2BOK

A short message this week: “It’s OK not to be OK.

At (almost) every Saturday service, I hold up a sign with this phrase.

It’s OK not to be OK.

Sometimes, as you can see in this composite image, I amend the “be,” turning it into the word “feel,” making the phrase “It’s OK not to feel OK.”

And it’s true—IT’S OK NOT TO BE OK. IT’S OK NOT TO FEEL OK.

<INSRT RB IOKNTBOK>

It’s an important message.


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I Am Not Okay Today
by Jarod K. Anderson

I am not okay today.
So, in the absence of okay,
what else can I be?

I can be gentle.
I can be unashamed.
I can turn my pain into connection.
I can be a student of stillness.
I can be awake to nature.
I can sharpen my empathy
against the stone of my discomfort.

I am not okay today,
but I am many worthy
Things.


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Let’s keep this in mind.

We don’t have to shine the brightest at all times.

We can be OK even when we are not OK.


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💙rB

See Me.

Shoes.Shoes.Shoes.  The long glass wall separates me from a display of more than 100,000 shoes at Auschwitz-Birkenau.  Men’s shoes and women’s shoes and children’s shoes and baby shoes.  Everyday shoes and work shoes and formal shoes and boots and sandals and slippers and high-heeled shoes and orthopedic shoes.  Woven sandals and wooden-soled shoes and leather shoes and cloth shoes.  Shoes

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Last Tuesday / This Tuesday

Last Tuesday. I’m sitting in an Adirondack chair, my feet resting on a well-weathered log here in Sisters, Oregon. It’s my family’s annual week-long vacation at the same beautiful house we’ve rented for the past four summers. My favorite spot. Just above the little creek. Most of my worries are 153 miles away. ✧✧✧ This Tuesday. I’m sitting in my

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Five More Wisdom Biscuits

  1. I know garbage “You should put the garbage bins back where they were before you remodelled,” I tell the managers of the Grant High School construction project when they host a neighborhood forum. “Funny thing, that,” the lady in charge says, “It’s a bit counterintuitive.” She explains something city planners learned about beaches. “If there is a garbage

Read More »
77% Weekly Newsletter
77% Weekly Newsletter