A Unitarian Universalist minister was once my student in a negotiation course. At the end of the course, by way of thanks, he gave me the gift of one of his books, a collection of reflections on life. There’s a gentle calmness about the collection, and one entry in particular that I return to again and again.

In Consider the Lilies Rev. Stephen Shick reflects on a colleague who had a habit of putting the present moment into perspective by comparing it to well-known historical moments. He’d say things like, “We are in the same moment as the Union Army was at Gettysburg right before the reinforcements arrived.”

Stephen turned his friend’s historical predilection into a lovely meditation for tense and stressful moments: [Read more...]