For the Type A’s who want to know where this is going and if there’s a plot or plan, the answer is yes. It’s going somewhere.
What will we cover in The Daily Omer?
The main writings will be:
on theology
on family
on business
on design
on learning.
These will be the buckets. This is where we’re going.
If you want some more specifics, or something more tangible, well…
On theology, there’s this thing I’ve been marinating on for 20+ years. We’ll get a taste of that. The more I learn, the more I realize I don’t know. Endless discussions to have. So much to explore. Feels like a cave dive and we only get so much oxygen in our tanks.
On family, I’ve got this whole notebook on parenting and being a dad at different stages of your child’s development. If you’re a parent, I think you’ll like those posts. It’s not the stereotypical stuff. Being a good husband, so much I’ve learned and so much still to learn.
For the business nerds, I’ll dive into some lessons I learned while working in an Inc.5000 fast-growing company and what I’ve learned since leaving and building my own thing. Marketing, sales, product, operations, talent development, and culture, we’ll cover all that. Big teams, small teams, solopreneur, the whole gamut.
For design, I’m absolutely enamored with beautiful museums, landscaping, and cathedrals. We’ll look at pictures from Ireland and Barcelona and all kinds of lovely places. What does it mean to design well in physical space and digital space? How do you create an atmosphere? What is flow?
For learning, hahaha! Welcome to the jungle my friends!
Why does it matter?
The point sits somewhere beyond the words I have at the moment. A friend texted me today and told me he and his wife were in an accident. The truck flipped three times, was completely totaled, but somehow they walked away unharmed. Not a single injury.
A neighbor kid was riding his bike back home and a car came flying up over the hill on his side of the road. He darted his bike into the ditch to avoid a collision. You know who wins in a 65mph car vs. a bike. The boy was unharmed. Not a single injury.
When I was a teenager, I had three separate incidents in less than a year. Two times where I barely missed head-on collisions because someone came into my lane at 55+mph. One incident where I hydro-planed into a ditch and thankfully avoided telephone poles.
People I loved dearly have died in the past few years. Teachers, professors, mentors, grandparents.
Seriously, I don’t have the words.
Still don’t think these snippets above are quite the right words, but you understand what I’m getting at.
Selah.
Tomorrow may come. It may not. We don’t know when the oxygen will run out of our tanks.
So, I will plan where we want to go with The Daily Omer.
But who knows?
The library is deep. The writing is brief.
We’ll go for a marathon post once in awhile, when its absolutely necessary.
When I wrote that Tea Time post about being in the doghouse, and the raw, tender, deeply emotional moments…
You know what I told people when they asked, “How are you and the family doing?”
“We’re doing ok.”
That was the outer circle answer.
If they were one circle closer,
“We’re going through a rough patch, but we’ll be alright.”
One circle closer,
“Kids are good. Hannah and I are trying to sort through some things.”
One circle closer,
“Hannah and I are going through a rough patch, probably our roughest one yet. Maybe say a prayer if you think about it.”
Do you realize what’s going on here?
I was telling my outermost circle, “We’re doing ok.” “We’re going through a rough patch.” “Trying to sort through some things…”
…like who has which kids when we get a divorce, and how will we handle the house or should I get an apartment in town that we call my office, and how will we split the vehicles. We’re trying to sort through THAT!
Then, we’re trying to sort through decades of stacked up emotional pain
…and times other people hurt us,
…and times we hurt other people,
…and times we hurt each other.
We’re sorting through e-v-e-r-y-thing!
It was an absolute mess. I was an absolute mess. And I was wearing a mask.
Now, the other thing that must be mentioned here is boundaries and degrees of trust. Of course, we shouldn’t air all of our dirty laundry with every person who asks “How are you?” Of course, we shouldn’t overshare the most intimate parts of ourselves and our relationships with people we don’t trust. Of course, we shouldn’t share every THING with every ONE.
But we can have boundaries and still be honest. We can cry when our hearts are breaking. We can confide with 1 or 2 extremely close friends. We need an outlet.
In that post, I shared with you that I was living in my own prison cell in the basement. My wife and I were not in any semblance of a functional relationship. But my outward answer was, “We’re doing ok.”
So I ask you…
What’s going on behind the façade?
What’s going on just below the surface?
What’s going on a layer or two deeper?
When you’re talking to other people…
What sort of punch is packed in the simplest alternative to “We’re good” vs. “We’re ok.”
“It’s alright.”
“On the struggle bus.”
“Been better.”
“Just glad to be here.”
Do we actually hear people? Do we actually hear ourselves?
As humans, we need other humans.
At a soul level.
I revisited the Tea Time post from this angle, because nearly 400 people visited that post in the last couple days. That’s a lot of people. I’m guessing some are in the middle of it. I know some are.
Marriage is tough. But a healthy one is so worth it.
Maybe your first one didn’t work, but you’re trying to heal…
Or your first one didn’t work, but now you’re remarried and sorting through new muck on this second go-round…
Or if you’re 30+ years into one, but it feels like you’re just living in disillusionment now…
Or if you’ve never been married or don’t want to be, but you’re still trying to heal from a breakup or a past relational wound…
The point in all of it, is that you’re not alone. There is still time to do the internal work and heal. There is still time to have the raw discussions and see what happens.
You aren’t doomed. You aren’t stuck. You aren’t unworthy of love.
Let’s start with a little vulnerability, shall we?
“Yes! Yes! Give us the tea, Omer!”
I don’t think we’re ready for the full Boston Tea Party experience. 92,000 lbs is too much to handle!
But let me give you a small bag, or a dime bag? Let’s stick with a small bag… of tea 😉
Three years ago at this time, I was sleeping on the couch, in the basement, in the dog house of my own home.
If you were following my wife during this time, she was on the highlight reels of social media.
Competing for Mrs. Wyoming, winning, competing for Mrs. America in Vegas. It was bonkers! She was (and still is) an absolute smoke show! Fancy dresses, fancy makeup, toned and tan, like a supermodel.
But what wasn’t shared, what we kept private for that time, was our marital struggles.
We had happy moments, for sure. There are pictures and videos from that time period where we had blissful experiences. But as late summer turned to fall, we could no longer ignore the monster under the bed. The undercurrent, the backdrop, the tone beneath the surface, was one of struggle and bitterness and years of stacked up pain.
I had taken the day off work just before my birthday. That way I’d have a three day weekend.
And that morning, before I left for some alone time in the Wyoming wilderness, my wife told me she had been thinking about separating. In fact, as I remember it, that was the first time we had let the D word enter the conversation.
Hell of a birthday, huh?! Felt like I was punched in the gut, kicked square between the legs, then the door hit me on the way out.
From my birthday, all the way through to Thanksgiving, I was living in the basement of my own home. Still working, still eating meals, still showering and getting ready for the days, but doing it from a place of isolation. No touches, no hugs, no kisses in our marriage. No shower peeks, no booty grabs, no innuendos to speak of. She did her thing. I did my thing.
We wanted to keep a semblance of order for our kids. We didn’t want them to know we were going through the wringer. We did a pretty good job keeping it all hush-hush. But we had so much to work through. I had so much to work through.
Hours upon hours upon hours of emotional conversations, journaling, counseling, and prayer. Tears upon tears upon tears, coming from a guy who had only cried about 3x total in our first 12 years of marriage.
But everything was about to fall apart. Everything was about to come crashing down. And who knows how awful that would have been?!
Have you ever been in the dog house? Ever sent your spouse to the dog house? At the time, it feels more like a prison. At least the animals still get love and attention. But not you, not either of you.
Have you ever had to discuss how you’re going to handle the holidays, so you appear put together, but you know you’re a wreck? Fake a smile, fake a sickness, fake another obligation?
Have you ever had to talk to a friend for two hours and word vomit about how you felt blindsided, self-assured in your rightness, just to have them tell you in the kindest and politest way to pull your head out of your ass? You’re part of the problem and it takes two to tango? I appreciate these loyal friends. Eternally grateful for them. Faithful are the wounds of a friend.
Have you ever had to think through what it would look like to move to another place, likely an apartment, while your spouse took care of the kids at home? Because your spouse was the emotionally present one and you were emotionally absent?
Have you ever had to sort through heartache and relational wounds from 20+ years ago that had nothing to do with your spouse, just so you can finally move forward in your marriage?
These raw and tender and deeply emotional moments are happening in our lives or the lives of people all around us…
Maybe even happening with you, right now, right this moment.
In the middle of people’s highlight reels, there may be a whole world we don’t know about just below the surface.
Guess who’s back? Back again. Shady’s back! Tell a friend.
There’s something here.
I’m hungry.
“Write hungry,” the Spirit said to the Omer.
The Spirit moves where He wants, when He wants, how He wants.
You can’t manufacture Him, you can’t channel Him, you can’t contain Him.
No such thing as turn off or turn on.
He’s always on. You just roll with Him.
I met with a pastor who recognized my name, knew it was Old Testament, knew it was deep in the recesses somewhere, but couldn’t quite place it.
It’s a measurement.
It’s a day’s worth.
It’s “your daily bread.”
“The Daily Omer.”
Our Daily Bread has been running for decades. My grandma used to read it, my mom used to read it, and I even tried a couple. That daily devotional has been published for thousands upon thousands of issues.
But The Daily Omer is a new move, a new wave, a new beginning.
Daily is a lot. Yeast starts small. But it grows gradually.
Not writing, not sharing, not publishing is no longer an option. I’ve been shut up for too long. I’m about to burst.
Part of me loves Stoicism. Part of me hates Stoicism.
In this post, I’ll share my love / hate relationship with Stoicism and how it can both help and hurt you as a young man transitioning through different phases of life.
When life is flying at you like a 100-mph fastball, ready to hit you square in the ribs, you need something that helps you get out of the way.
Or, if you can’t get out of the way, at least you know you’re going to take the pitch hard on the ribs, you’ll be bruised for weeks, but you’ll barely grimace as you jog to first base and give a hard-line stare back at the pitcher.
You need David Goggin’s mentality that “you can’t hurt me.” The Marcus Aurelius quotes. The RedFrost Motivation on YouTube.
The trivial things of life won’t affect me.
Respond, don’t react.
I won’t be worried, anxious, scared at whatever comes my way. I’ll handle conflict and obstacles with an even-keel demeanor. Challenges will roll off my back like water off a duck’s back.
I love it!
I lived into that mentality during my teenage years and early adult years.
It helped me get through a number of tough transitions, tough situations, and tough relationships. (More on those another time.)
Stoicism allowed me to get married at 22 to a 19 year old, both of us being jobless for our first two months of marriage, dealing with a miscarriage, moving across the country, handling life with 3 kids under 4 years old, a failed foster parenting attempt, and living below poverty line for a handful of years.
Stoicism helped me muscle through 4 years of doing jobs I hated just to put food on the table and try to improve our lot in life.
As I got older though, maybe around 30, I started to realize that some of the Stoic philosophy wasn’t serving me.
It was great in theory and it had helped me through a lot, but it was starting to cause trouble in practice. In fact, Stoicism was transitioning into more of a liability than an asset.
Here’s what I mean by that:
Stoicism as a Liability, aka The Bad Parts
In real life, my wife was trying to navigate healing from trauma and abuse of various forms. She was trying to figure out how to draw the right boundaries with a toxic family. She was trying to get herself healthy and raise healthy kids – physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually.
She wanted a man who could feel, who could empathize, who could show that he actually cared about what she was experiencing. I had suppressed my own feelings for so long, I could hardly feel anything myself, let alone feel for someone else.
My wife might ask how I feel about something and I’d just shrug or dismiss the question.
“Omer, there’s more than a ‘meh’ dismissive feeling about everything in life. You need to learn how to feel.”
Hannah Redden
Honestly, I needed one of those emotion charts they use for kids in counseling, where you point to the emotion you’re feeling based on the face the little icon is making. There are 30 options to choose from.
I actually remember referencing it a few times in discussions. “Well, I guess a little of this (frustration), with this (sadness), with a tinge of this (anger).”
We even had a joke amongst my work colleagues that I only had two emotions: bad and even. They made a shirt for me that had the straight-faced, expressionless emoji. That was me, to a tee / T. No pun intended, but definitely appreciated.
So, my wife wanted someone who could feel, empathize, and care. I couldn’t do any of it.
Pros and Cons List
Let’s take the stories above and make a quick, clear list of this, so you can easily apply it for yourself. Here are the pros and cons:
Disclaimer: these pros and cons come from personal experience. Any fault in applying the full Stoic philosophy correctly is my own.
Questions a Stoic Must Ask… Eventually
As my kids got into preschool and early grade school, I learned they were experiencing and displaying a whole slew of emotions that I had no idea how to handle. My wife was helping them emotionally, but I wasn’t. I certainly couldn’t help them talk through it, think through it, learn to manage it, because frankly, I hadn’t talked through, thought through, or learned to manage my own emotions.
This forced me to look even harder in the mirror. I had to decide, for the sake of my wife and my kids, for the sake of growing a healthy marriage and raising healthy kids, if I was going to learn how to handle my own emotions.
Was I going to acknowledge that I actually had emotions, more than one or two?
Was I going to delve into the real issues that were bothering me deep down?
Was I going to acknowledge and accept past hurts, as well as past accomplishments? So I could feel both the hurt and the joy in those experiences?
Was I going to face my childhood and the moments that shaped me the most? Good, bad, and ugly?
Was I going to acknowledge that I, too, had a heart and not just a head? That I was an emotional being as well as an intellectual being? I was not just the Tin Man, R2D2, or the Grinch?
Was I going to start working through this on my own, or with help, or both?
Was I going to shed Stoicism entirely or keep the good parts of it?
A More Nuanced View of Stoicism
Ultimately, I couldn’t just throw out Stoicism. It had served me so well through so many tough situations in life. And I knew there would certainly be more tough things to come.
But I also knew I had to face the hurt, scared, and displaced little boy who was hidden behind this tough exterior. I knew I had to shed this coat of armor because I had a chink in it, where my heart had been pierced.
I was wounded, and I couldn’t fight any more battles until I got healed up and healthy.
So, I started working through all the hurt, the pain, the moments of good, bad, and ugly. I admitted I had a heart and a head. I acknowledged that I had a lot more than one or two emotions and I started naming them.
I did this on my own, I did this with my wife, I did this with my children, and I did this with counseling.
For the deep, inner work: I went to counseling and received some tips. I wrote and journaled, more than usual. I used prompts to get clear on how I felt. I listened to emotional and mental health books. I also listened to podcasts on similar topics. I took a few solo trips, some close to home, one across the ocean to Ireland.
Basically, I went hard in the paint to learn what emotions were, how to acknowledge them, and how to manage them. And I did the solo trips because I needed full separation and space to get clear on who I was, where I was doing well, where I was falling short, and who I needed to become. (See the One Page Life Plan review I wrote for an in-depth look at those self-improvement goals.)
While I know I’ve made a ton of progress from where I was 5 years ago, and leaps and bounds in the last 2 years, I know there is still so much further to go.
Next Steps
I’ll be continuing to work on this more balanced view of Stoicism, growing into an emotionally healthy man, husband, and father.
I hope you’ll be doing the same.
If you need any help along the way, please reach out on social. And this resource may help you out as well.
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Omer Redden 