Indholdsfortegnelse for June 2018 i Guideposts

Have you had inspiring mentors? Have you struggled with debilitating physical pain? Have you had a dream of doing something so improbable that only God could be behind it? Have you learned to forgive the people in your life who were supposed to love you but hurt you the most? Have you wondered how far you could travel if only you gave yourself the permission to start off? Do you know someone who has overcome addiction, or have you fought that battle yourself? These are some of the inspiring stories you will read in your new issue of GUIDEPOSTS. I identify with so many of our narrators this month. Colleen Kelly Alexander was hit by a truck while riding her bike home from her job. She suffered horrible injuries and…

VACAY REPLAY Coming home from a wonderful 19-day tour of Australia and New Zealand gave me the post-vacation blues. Jet lag made my body clock feel upside down, and I used the tiredness as an excuse to sit around doing nothing. Until a week later, when I saw a Facebook message from Terri, who’d also been on the tour. During the trip, we discovered a shared penchant for silliness—and that we didn’t live far from each other. Had we known each other growing up, we probably would have gotten into trouble together! “Mary, I so enjoyed meeting you. I can’t wait to meet up again! Here are some of my pictures from the trip,” Terri wrote. Looking at everyone having a good time brought a smile to my face. “Wow,”…

MY HUSBAND, MIKE, AND I sat in the office of a pain management doctor. I felt worse than I’d ever felt in my entire life. There was only one thing I wanted from the doctor. Permission to stop taking my pain medication. I had been in a terrible accident. A car going highway speed had run a red light and T-boned me. I’d suffered devastating internal injuries. My pelvis was shattered. I was in the hospital for a month, undergoing multiple surgeries. I came home in a wheelchair. I also came home with a physical dependence on the array of opioid pain meds I’d been given in the hospital. I knew right away something was wrong. I was lethargic, depressed, nauseous, disoriented. I could barely sit up. Sometimes I didn’t…

POT LUCK The best thing about being a caregiver is the people I get to know. People like Estelle. At 97, she was still full of life, with a wacky sense of humor. “What’s your secret to longevity?” I asked her one day. “You’re so full of pep for your age.” “I’m just a kid!” Estelle replied. “Ask me when I’m a hundred!” I shook my head. Estelle would be moving away soon to live closer to her daughter. I’d really miss her jokes—even her corny puns. When I left her home that day, I took a box of pots and pans with me. Estelle wanted to donate them to Goodwill. “Hey!” Estelle said as I picked up the box. “Don’t go to pot!” I could still hear her laughter…

“YOU’RE TAKING A JOB WHERE!?” That was the question I’d heard over and over from my friends and colleagues at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. “Guideposts,” I’d say emphatically, meeting blank stares. I’d grown up professionally with these people, working as an assistant prosecutor at the DA’s office for 14 years—much of that time leading our efforts to combat human trafficking. We’d worked long nights and even holidays together, usually without much sleep and always with unhealthy food. The bonds we forged in those hours made us a family, one held together by the belief that we could make the world a better place one case, one person, at a time. But no matter how hard they tried, my colleagues just couldn’t wrap their heads around why I would want…

A Tribute to Dad In this GUIDEPOSTS classic from 1964, beloved Hollywood screen legend Jimmy Stewart tells the poignant story of the enduring influence his father had on him. guideposts.org/jsfather Addicted but Not an Addict Linda Maher (page 33) found herself addicted to opioid painkillers after a terrible car accident. In our video, Linda and her husband, Mike, recall her ordeal and how faith fueled her recovery. guideposts.org/lmaher Family Travel Tips Getting ready for your summer vacation? Guideposts.org blogger Michelle Cox shares her advice for making the most of summer travel with family. guideposts.org/3vacationtips Our Favorite Summer Salads Warmer temps mean cooler dishes! We’ve got nine healthy, delicious, easy-to-make recipes—from Green Bean and Grilled Peach Salad to Avocado Citrus Salad—that you and your family will love. guideposts.org/summersalads…

OCTOBER 8, 2011. I WAS RIDING my bike home from my office. It’s a gorgeous 12-mile ride on Boston Post Road along the Connecticut coast. The last thing I remember is a vague sense of something behind me, then glancing over my shoulder. The paramedics managed to keep me alive till I got to the hospital, but there was no stopping the bleeding. The front left tire of the six-wheel freight truck had crushed me first, then the back double tires rolled over me. My abdomen and pelvis were ripped apart. I coded over and over again. I was kept in a medically induced coma for more than a month. When I came out, I should have been glad to be alive. But the pain was so intense, so excruciating,…

THAT MORNING, I WAS JUST walking around Crown Heights, Brooklyn, my old neighborhood. I was home on a break from shooting The Wire, the hit HBO series, my first major acting role. It felt good to be back. Then I saw him outside M.S. 391. Dominique, a middle-schooler I’d mentored since he was in third grade. His eyes fixed on me. “Is this how it works?” he said. “You just leave and forget about us?” For a second, my mind went to the character I played on The Wire, Marlo Stanfield, a ruthless drug dealer. He would have tried to lead a kid like Dominique into that world, a world I’d hoped to lead him from. But there was no script for me to follow here. “I’m sorry, Dominique,” I…

Why do people like Linda Maher get hooked on opioid pain medication so quickly, and how should they wean themselves off? Opioid medications are more powerful versions of pain-regulating chemicals that occur in our bodies. Those natural chemicals provide some degree of pain relief, but severe pain, as from major surgery, may require opioids. However, if opioid medications are taken regularly, the body becomes habituated, requiring more medication to relieve the same pain. This increase in tolerance can start with the first doses and lead to physical dependence in virtually anyone. From there, some people develop the psychological and social symptoms of opioid use disorder, aka addiction. Once physically dependent, a person cannot simply stop taking the medication. Cutting off the supply causes withdrawal symptoms such as intense pain, nausea,…

THERE ISN’T A SUBJECT I’M MORE passionate about than wholeness. By that I mean being the highest and healthiest version of the person God created you to be, the greatest state of being this life offers. I talk about it a lot. Just ask the people who go to the churches I pastor—The Potter’s House at One LA, one of the fastest-growing churches in Los Angeles, and The Potter’s House of Denver. I’ve even written a new book titled Wholeness. We can’t choose the experiences that keep us from being whole, but we can recognize the broken areas within ourselves and overcome them. Becoming whole takes work. Deep emotional and spiritual work. As the Bible says, the word of God is “sharper than any double-edged sword…it judges the thoughts and…

Christopher G. Smith (How Sweet the Sound, page 40) wants to fill the world with sweeping, inspiring scores. He was so moved by John Williams’s score for Star Wars that he ended up watching the movie more than 30 times. Now that the tour of his musical Amazing Grace is winding down, he’s looking ahead at new projects. Christopher helped form Lights on Broadway, a nonprofit dedicated to giving artists of faith a place in the theater community. “Most people catch the entertainment bug in middle or high school, and the lyrics and spoken lines of those early performances stay with them for life,” Christopher says. “We want to develop plays and musicals that honor God and shine a light into artists’ hearts.” He and his team looked to Ireland…

“We do something for someone else that we may not even remember but can cause that other person’s life to turn in some way that’s positive.”ANN CURRY, Emmy-winning journalist “Creative living is living a life that is driven more strongly by curiosity than by fear.”ELIZABETH GILBERT, writer “Helping those who are vulnerable and in need is not a burden or an obligation but an opportunity to be like Christ.”message posted on Facebook by the Church of the Good Shepherd in Scranton, Pennsylvania “Love is the greatest thing of all, so give it to everybody, every day.… Love is not the most important thing. It’s the only thing.”musician DOUG SEEGERS in his book, Going Down to the River “‘Silent’ and ‘listen’ are spelled with the same letters.”submitted by ROSEMARY MARBACH, of…

Colleen Kelly Alexander isn’t alone in her pain. A 2015 analysis by the National Institutes of Health showed an estimated 126 million American adults reported some type of pain in the three months prior to their being surveyed. Elena Klimenko, M.D., isn’t surprised. Every day in her integrative medicine practice, she sees patients looking for pain relief. Here are her top five recommendations: Avoid overexertion. Exercise helps manage pain, but don’t overdo it. “People get excited about doing something new,” Dr. Klimenko says. “But if they’re not already in shape, they pay for it.” Intense exercise creates a painful buildup of lactic acid and carbon dioxide in the muscles. Start with 15 minutes of exercise, then boost each new session by one minute, she suggests. Be sure to stretch beforehand…

My boss called me into her office. The company had taken a big downturn, she told me. Are they going to let me go? I wondered, trying my best to stay calm. My husband, Rick, and I had just moved to the area. We loved skiing and had always wanted to live in Colorado. We’d finally gotten the chance when Rick was offered a high school teaching job there. The move from Oklahoma to a small town near Telluride drained our finances. We couldn’t even afford to ski. I needed full-time work just to help cover our living expenses. Most jobs were seasonal. But I’d secured this one almost immediately. Was I now about to lose it? “Just hang in there,” said my boss, to my surprise. “The company is…

I STOOD BENEATH THE THEATER marquee, the name of my show in bright lights. Broadway, the Great White Way, a place where dreams are born. And die. My wife, Alana, squeezed my arm. The last of the audience trickled into the theater. “I guess that’s it,” I said. “It was still worth it,” she said. Nothing she could say would hide the truth. Eighteen years of writing and rewriting, readings, tryout runs, backers’ auditions and countless rehearsals. This was it. My musical had opened on Broadway and now, four months later, was closing. That I’d come this far was amazing enough. I was the least likely person to write a Broadway musical. A police officer and an education director at a church. I loved working with kids, loved our church…

SALAD 1 small shallot, thinly sliced½ teaspoon salt3 ears sweet corn, kernels scraped from cobs4 small cucumbers, chopped1 red sweet pepper, diced4 smallish sprigs dill, minced¼ cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, mincedCrumbled feta cheese, rinsed and drained, for garnish DRESSING ⅔ cup buttermilk¼ cup plain yogurt (not Greek-style), stirred1 tablespoon white wine vinegar3 tablespoons sweet onion, minced1 small garlic clove, minced and mashed with a pinch of salt¼ cup extra-virgin olive oilSalt and freshly ground black pepper Corn Salad With Buttermilk Dressing Toss shallot with salt and let sit for about 20 minutes to draw out harshness. Rinse well and pat dry with a paper towel. In a large bowl, toss corn kernels lightly to separate them, then add shallot and all remaining salad ingredients except feta; toss again to combine.…

ALWAYS BY OUR SIDE My sister, Lois, has metastatic cancer and is receiving hospice care. Prior to hospice, the only way we could manage Lois’s pain was by reading Edward Grinnan’s book Always By My Side. We tried other books, but Always was the winner. The stories about Edward’s dog Millie and her best friend Winky (and other dogs) took us out of our distressing situation. A favorite passage is about the veterinarian at the end of Winky’s cancer battle: “Easing an animal through a gentle and painless passing took a remarkable kind of human, one who could resist the basic instinct to preserve life and approach the act of dying as a form of healing, of becoming whole again. It takes great strength to do that.” This reframed our…