Mastering Life’s Challenges: How to Win the 5-Second Game

September 11, 2024September 12, 2024Posted by Steve Blaising6 Comments

Ask Cowboys Defensive Coordinator Mike Zimmer, who unexpectedly lost his beautiful wife to natural causes in 2009 at age 50, how to master challenges like the sudden death of a spouse.

Life challenges Cowboys coach — Cowboys Head Defensive Coach Mike Zimmer faces family losses/Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

Ask him how he coped when he got a phone call that his son and best friend, a talented NFL coach himself, was found dead on his couch alone in his apartment at age 38.

The sudden death of a spouse or a child ranks number one as life’s most significant stressor.

Ask Coach Zimmer how football, the game he loves, knows, and coaches is a metaphor for handling life’s toughest challenges.

Tags: Grief, tragedy

Faulty airbag: 3 rules to avoid auto accidents forever

August 5, 2024August 14, 2024Posted by Steve Blaising2 Comments

I have avoided auto accidents and faulty airbags all of my life, until last week.

On my way to the gym, I enter an intersection I’ve driven a thousand times.

A black Mazda abruptly turns into me delivering a crashing blow.

Upon impact, airbags from the steering wheel and driver’s door exploded, pulverizing my left arm with abrasions, cuts, and hematomas.

I get out fast.

Tags: tragedy

Free-falling grief in the holidays? Embrace the warmth that heals

December 3, 2023December 4, 2024Posted by Steve Blaising2 Comments

Grief piles up for many in the holidays.

Recently, our senior pastor at Highland Park Presbyterian Church, Bryan Dunagan, died at age 44. HIs wife, Ali, and three children grieve a sudden loss as the holidays begin.

Just a few weeks later, another rising star, Jack Gibbons, age 36, co-founder of Bandera Ventures, died in a neighborhood auto accident leaving behind his wife, Sarah, and their two-year-old daughter.

Sudden tragedies are like free falling.

Free-falling sorrow — Free-falling grief/Oliver Furrer/Getty images

How do family members survive?

Tags: Grief, sorrow, tragedy

Apocalypse in Israel: Is Mass Murder and War a Sign of End Times?

October 15, 2023October 15, 2023Posted by Steve Blaising2 Comments

Apocalypse in Israel or not, trauma is a daily episode in the modern world.

Israel music festival apocalypse — Israeli soldiers inspect the music festival attack site on October 13, 2023/Associated Press

Survivors of the Supernova music festival in southern Israel say the scene looked like the apocalypse.

Sky full of rockets at 6:30 AM
Suiciders blocking exits
Shooters everywhere

“This may be the most dangerous time the world has seen in decades.” Jamie Dimon, CEO JP Morgan Chase, 10/13/2023

The chief executive of the world’s largest bank said the terror attack in Israel and the Ukraine war have far-reaching effects on trade, markets and relationships for years to come.

The Bible details a number of alarming signs for “the end of the age.”

Here are two unfolding today with growing lethality.

Tags: Fear, tragedy