If you asked someone to recall a moment when they felt really, truly alive, they might describe it with words like ecstatic, euphoric, awakening, flow, vision. Like the mundane and commonplace take on new and more animated meaning around them. That is to say, they don’t alter reality or bend the world toward themselves, but rather feel their inner person change and rise up with renewed hope in their current… Read More »Stirring the Imagination
I have learned two main things through this process, first is that ideas do not form and come alive at the speed which I would like, and second that the best way to go through the process of forming and putting a container around an idea is within community. Goldenwood’s intentional slowing down at the beginning of this process was so helpful, it forced me to hit the breaks on… Read More »Unlocking Your Creative Process
For we walk by faith, not by sight,For years I strived to run with all my might.Grasping for control, held tightly by fear,Overthinking every idea—Was that me, or was that God I hear? I reached a point of surrender,A realization: this dream I have, I cannot do alone.Down on my knees I begged God,Bring me the right people—I can’t do this on my own. And in that moment, everything began… Read More »For We Walk By Faith
I am one of the lucky ones. When I was four, I said I wanted to be a veterinarian. I set the goal and then began doing the studies and the activities that would lead to that outcome. I graduated from Cornell University in 2005 with a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, and it was one of the best days of my life. It’s been 20 years, and I still find… Read More »From Nebulous to Necessary
What happens when people create space to listen deeply for God’s voice, tend the seeds that have been planted, and cultivate hopeful imagination for the future? For the past six months, fifteen “Gardeners” have gathered inside the GreenHouse—a community dedicated to slowing down, discerning God’s invitations, and nurturing the seeds He has planted in their lives, work, communities, and imaginations. Through spiritual rhythms, communal discernment, coaching, and shared practices of… Read More »Inside the GreenHouse: Cultivating Seeds of Hope
Cultivating an embodied human life in our harried technocratic age seems to be a sizable challenge, with rapidly increasing proportions. Various cultural commentators are voicing their concerns and questions online and in print, sharing their hopes and apprehensions in the midst of accelerating technological innovations. Many offer life-hack tactics and “best life” strategies for negotiating the potentials, promises, and pitfalls within our hyper-connected social media spheres. From my limited sampling,… Read More »Reviving Patronage
Some people have no issue with it. They close their eyes at night and their minds fill with lucid visions and experiences, though they are fast asleep… and they usually want to tell you about it. Others rhythmically bounce between day and night, barely aware of whatever their minds are doing in the full third of their lives spent unconscious. It may be similar with the figurative sense of the… Read More »What Does it Mean to Dream?
Though I’ve been a part of a few different cohorts over the years I haven’t had much experience in the “faith and work” space. Was the DreamForum going to be some “Shark Tank” like space of hawking our dreams to an evil panel intent on putting it to shreds? (I didn’t really expect that, but, who knows!) Or, perhaps, we were going to get training in certain leadership skills essential… Read More »No Idea What I Was Getting Into
When I reflect on what has transpired in just a few months of being in the DreamForum, I am simply in awe of how God has been working on my heart as much as He has been working in my business. The structure and support that the DreamForum has provided me is exactly what I needed to reestablish a robust rhythm of activating, cultivating and aligning a Sound Mind, Strong… Read More »A Beautiful Paradigm Shift
As I reach the conclusion of my time with the Goldenwood DreamForum, I find myself reflecting deeply on the journey these past few months. From the outset, for a career-long professional in banking and finance, my aspiration to become a writer and craft my first novel seemed distant, but this forum has given me the structure, encouragement, and space to turn that dream into a tangible goal. It seems like… Read More »It’s Really Just the Beginning