No. 26 - Half a year's worth! - Friday, July 21 - 2 Minute Read - Audio Version Here​

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​Living Wisely Kids Pod — My kids and I have released the third episode on Living Wisely, our story podcast summer project. Our goal is to release 10 episodes and hit 1,000 downloads over summer, so if you know someone who'd enjoy, please share 🙏. If you have a child that would enjoy voicing a character, we're taking guest voices. Email me at joseph@excellentatlife.com.

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The Game We All Play

Did you know the sun and the flowers, they play a game?

Hide and seek, the children call it.

The flower asks:

Should I bloom today? Sun, are you shining?

The sun:

Should I shine today? Flower, have you opened?

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They may choose fear.

Each fears the day may be cloudy, they may open into the dark.

I fear the storm, the gale that may tear my petals apart, says the flower.

The clouds are thick today, and if the day yet clears, perhaps I will shine too brightly, the sun says.

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Or they may choose faith.

The flower may let down its petals and shudder in the gale, trusting the rays to peak through.

The sun may shine, trusting the dark, gray clouds to part.

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Did you know we too play a game?

Each peaking from behind the petals, looking for faith.

If I flower, will you shine?

If you do, will I?

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I think you know this game.

Your father and your mother, they played it.

Did they play it well?

You know the answer.

It was one of the first things you knew.

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Everywhere you go, the game is being played.

All the people you see pretend to speak many tongues,

but they only speak this one, the language of the game.

It has its own language, a universal grammar with no words, always spoken.

I wonder how well Chomsky knows this one.

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There is one reward for playing it well: everything.

Only one consequence for not doing so: nothing.

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You would think people might be interested in mastering a game they always play.

Such thoughts bring pain, such thoughts bring grief.

But such thoughts are also seeds.

Nourish them.

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There are some who think they cannot play well,

that because they were born in winter they cannot know the sun.

Please tell them that which can shiver, already knows that which is warm.

These shivers are the tremors of trust.

Please let your heart flutter with them,

so the winter may thaw as the tears of understanding.

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When you trust, you will know the clouds are just the hands covering a child’s eyes as it pretends to hide.

You will see that all eyes are shining, every heart, open.

You will play the game well.

You will speak with no words, but never be misunderstood.

Even the deaf will hear your speech.

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You and I were born in a sun.

What a shame that we should think each other separate,

when each of us is just waiting for the other.

I hope you can let your flower bloom.

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Joseph

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