Our society is frantic with worry. You’ve probably noticed. Worry is expected of responsible people. We equate worry with good citizenship and awareness. We actually pressure each other to keep worrying. We are expected to remain on emotional “high alert” as evidence that we care about the world around us. Other people want us to […]
My new book, Blessed Are the Unsatisfied, makes a counter-intuitive, counter-cultural claim: when we embrace our lack of satisfaction in this life, rather than try to deny or overcome it, God blesses us. And he blesses us not just in spite of the lack of fulfillment in our lives, but also in and through our […]
When my husband and I were dating, we spent some time living 1000 miles apart. I was in college in Illinois, and he was attending seminary in Colorado. During those months, we sometimes felt desperate to be close to one another. No matter how many much time we spent on the phone, there was no […]
So if you’ve been paying attention to my writing this year, you know that I’ve been writing a lot about the topic of my newest book, Blessed Are the Unsatisfied: Finding Spiritual Freedom in an Imperfect World. I’ve been talking about various reasons that embracing our unsatisfied condition is the best way to live. But […]
I hope you’ll enjoy this guest post by Katie Dale. Katie is a mental health worker, a writer, and an advocate for people who live with mental illness (at the end of this post, you can learn a little more about her and her writing). She’s frank, open, and brave about sharing her experiences with […]
On the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality inventory, my type is INFJ. Among other things, this means I struggle with idealistic perfectionism. Here’s a quote from 16 Personalities, describing INFJs like me: “INFJs are all but defined by their pursuit of ideals. While this is a wonderful quality in many ways, an ideal situation is not […]
Pleasure takes many forms—physical, mental, spiritual, emotional. We have many words for emotional pleasure, including elation, euphoria, delight, bliss, and good cheer. But perhaps the best overarching word for this category of emotion is happiness. And boy, do we place heavy expectations on the shoulders of happiness—far more than it can ever meet. After all, […]
I don’t think any of us enjoys being sick. I certainly don’t. But not all forms of sick are created equal. Some are far easier to put up with than others. If I had to rank, by misery level, the symptoms that come along with the everyday bugs that tend to infect relatively healthy humans, […]
For years, as Denmark has consistently ranked among the happiest countries in the world, people have been speculating on the reasons behind this relatively high level of self-reported happiness. After all, this Scandinavian country doesn’t fit the image most people would form when asked to dream of the place where they might be happiest. Explanations […]
These are stressful days in the Simpson household. With two high schoolers and a school counselor in our family, this time of year is always busy with end-of-year school demands. This year our oldest is a graduating senior, which means this month and next are even busier than usual. She’s looking ahead to college plans, […]
© 2018 Amy Simpson.