Five years ago today, I had no idea where What Can’t Be Hidden would travel.

When the book was released in 2021, I hoped people would connect with the story. What I didn’t anticipate were the conversations that would follow.

Over the years, readers have shared stories about seeing themselves in the characters, wrestling with questions raised by the novel, and finding language for experiences they struggled to describe.

As I prepared the 5-Year Anniversary Edition, I found myself revisiting not only the story itself, but also those conversations.

Today, I wanted to share the cover of the Anniversary Edition with you.

Twelve weeks from today, on September 8, the anniversary edition will be released.

That evening, we’ll also gather for a launch celebration at Bespoke Events + Experiences in downtown Columbus in collaboration with Viewpoint Books.

Over the next three months, I’ll be sharing stories from the journey, behind-the-scenes reflections, and a few surprises that have never appeared in print before.

Thank you for being part of the story.

More soon.

Peace,

Brandon

I’ve been in traffic jams every day. Let me be more specific. I’ve been in traffic jams every time I get on any interstate highway in or around Indianapolis—multiple times a day.

And internally, it wrecks me.

But there’s something worse. When two lanes of traffic are instructed to merge into one, and other cars fly by, skipping everyone who has already merged, only to cut into the line at the last second.

I only experience hatred during those moments. And I mumble under my breath.

For a moment, I quit thinking about Indy, construction, and terrible drivers. My mind went back to 2023–24, when I drove the two-lane roads of southwest Indiana every day.

Ah yes.

Life was easier then. Hardly any construction. No traffic jams. Drivers were even nicer.

But then I remembered following horse-drawn carriages for miles. That last line was not a joke.

Or following slow-moving semis for 38 winding miles with nowhere to pass. Thinking about it makes my heart palpitate.

Get out of the way!

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There’s a character in my novel What Can’t Be Hidden who regularly stares at a painting. It’s a painting of an old man sitting in a rowboat next to a child. Their boat is docked, and the sail is down. But my protagonist always studies the distance. He sees other sailboats on the horizon, seemingly headed somewhere else. He imagines himself on one of those boats, leaving his present life behind and finding peace somewhere else.

But the more he stares at the painting, the more he notices something on the old man’s face as he looks at the child beside him. Even though the sail is down and the boat isn’t going anywhere, the old man’s face exudes peace and contentment.

My protagonist has a realization.

Peace isn’t found by leaving and going somewhere else to find it.

Peace begins within you, no matter where you are.

I’ve thought about that scene often over the years.

As I’ve been preparing the 5-Year Anniversary Edition of What Can’t Be Hidden for release this September, I’ve found myself revisiting these scenes again. What I’ve realized is that my character’s struggle wasn’t really about leaving. It was about believing that peace existed somewhere else.

But peace has a way of eluding us when we treat it like a destination.

Maybe that’s why this scene continues to resonate with me all these years later. The old man in the painting isn’t at peace because he found a better place to be. He’s at peace because he finally learned how to be where he already was.

And that’s a lesson I really needed today.

Question

Where am I waiting for a different set of circumstances before allowing myself to be at peace?

Peace,

Brandon

What Can’t Be Hidden
5-Year Anniversary Edition
September 8, 2026

I may get in trouble for this post, but we will see.

My wife has always told me the reason she only orders pickles on her cheeseburger is because they have to make it fresh. If it’s a restaurant that offers mayo, she’ll get pickles and mayo. Over the years, she has explained that she doesn’t want to eat a burger that’s been sitting around. If she special-orders it, they have to make it fresh. It seemed like a logical argument for the 32 years we’ve been together, even though she takes the pickles off when she starts eating it.

But I witnessed something a few weeks ago that just about knocked me out of my chair.

I had just grilled cheeseburgers. Everyone had gone through the line and filled their plates. We were all eating at the table when, between bites, I started studying the plates around me. My mother-in-law only had pickles and mayo on her cheeseburger. If that wasn’t enough, my father-in-law had taken the pickles off his cheeseburger.

And if you think that’s it, we went through a drive-through for my son later that week, and he only wanted pickles on his cheeseburger.

It’s extraordinary how we become what we learn. Even more fascinating is how we pass those things on to others.

Which brings me to our cat, Tabby Girl.

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Tabby Girl don’t stop, won’t stop. She just turned 18 years old and hobbles through the house from top to bottom. She has a swayback and cusses us out every morning. Her belly hangs to the floor which makes her legs look as if they are only a half-inch long. She has short- and long-term memory loss (try to figure that one out). And she is deeply in love with Caroline, who was five years old when we got her. Side note—Caroline bought foam stairs that go from the floor to her bed so Tabby Girl can still sleep with her. I have much more to say about Tabby Girl, but I’ll save that for another day and another post.

The thing about Tabby Girl is that we took her to the vet when she was still young because she had small patches of hairless sores on her chin. The vet said she had a condition called feline acne. Apparently, the condition develops when cats do not adequately wash and groom themselves. He explained that it was likely Tabby Girl’s mother never taught her how to clean herself. As a result, I tried to teach her by licking my hand and wiping my face… just kidding on that part.

Our lives are weird and complicated. Like pickles and mayo, we learn things a certain way. Or like Tabby Girl, we fail to learn the things we desperately need in order to function well. Many times, we do things simply because it’s the way we were taught, or because no one ever showed us another way. We move through life carrying habits, assumptions, fears, and behaviors we never consciously chose for ourselves.

And maybe one of the hardest parts of being human is realizing that some of what feels most natural to us was simply inherited. Sometimes wisdom is not learning something new at all. Sometimes it is finally stopping long enough to ask why we have been doing it that way in the first place.

Question

What habits, beliefs, or behaviors in my life have I simply inherited without ever questioning?

Peace,

Brandon

My good friend Seja Brumley from A Meeting Place returns with a beautifully poignant and powerful Mother’s Day post. She writes:

The sun is at my back and bright this morning. I put on my shoes and grab the leash. My dog hops so she is just on her back feet, excited at the sight of the blue plastic, knowing it means the walk is about to happen.

We make it to the end of the long driveway, pools of rain from the night before settled in the places of where the gravel has been pushed away. I look to my right and see the white peonies growing by the roadside as I do each morning. I like to see how much they’ve changed from the day before, a little more open, some more droopy from the weight of their blooms.

Today I notice the mulitflora rose growing up amongst the petals, the thorny stems with small white blooms. They are what we call ‘invasive’. Not supposed to be here. Definitely not supposed to be in the middle of a blooming spring peony. Absolutely not the picture of perfection, what some would call a weed growing in the mix of classic beauty.

But here it is, the multiflora rose making her presence known, whether it is how I picture it or not. Here she is, ruining the ideal image of peony perfection.

I remember when I was five years old, cutting flowers from the neighbor’s front landscaping for my mom. It was Mother’s day morning. I ran into the kitchen, my hand dirty from my flower theft, holding them up to her as she stood by the kitchen sink.

“Where did you get those, honey?”

“Mrs. DeLalla’s front yard. Aren’t they pretty, mommy? They are for you.”

A laugh and a knelt down hug. She and I planted flowers later that week in Mrs. DeLalla’s front yard to replace what I had taken.

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My children are three and five. Homemade cards and a scribbled picture that says “I love you, mama,” in three-year-old written lines.

My kids are eleven and thirteen. It is Mother’s Day weekend. No cut flowers stolen from the neighbor’s garden. No breakfast in bed. Just teen angst, a forgetting of what day it is, a mother’s expectation of what the day should hold.

I see a grandmother walking the aisles of the local greenhouse with who I imagine is her daughter. They tell the clerk as they pay for their cart of flowers that they do this every Mother’s Day weekend. It is the mother’s favorite day of the year.

I spoke to an acquaintance who is driving her son to rehab today. He will be there for the next month. She is hopeful. I hold her hands in mine.

I met a woman in a waiting room this week who is glowing and eight months pregnant with her third baby after two miscarriages.

This is my first Mother’s Day weekend without my mother. I feel her absence more acutely today. My twenty-one year old and nineteen year olds see it on my face. They walk over and puts their arms around me. I am seen and known and held in love visible and invisible.

A day of envisioned relationship perfection. A greeting card. An image without nuance.

I walk by the peony with the thorny stems growing up through the middle. I see the truth of all of it. I see the beauty in all of it. They exist together.

I walk back to the house. I get my clippers and walk back to the growth and clip some peony blooms and a few multiflora rose stems to peek out the middle of the bouquet I will build for my kitchen table. I don’t want one without the other.

I want what is real. I want both ends of life. I want it all.

Holding all of the mothers, the children, and everyone this Mother’s Day weekend.

—Seja

It’s been a wild month and a half.

You can feel like you have a real grasp on things—settle into a relatively predictable routine—and then be reminded that nothing is ever guaranteed to happen the way you expect. Of course, I’m talking about our Spring Break trip imploding before we could even leave Indiana. And of course, I’m talking about arriving for Will’s chest surgery a few weeks ago, only to be told that it had been canceled.

Each time, we came back home, brought in our bags, and lived out of them for a few days. It was like cognitive dissonance—believing that maybe, somehow, someway, someone might call and tell us to grab our bags because everything was back on. The calls never came, and eventually, we unpacked.

So we found ourselves in this strange period of stasis, putting life on hold until Will’s surgery was rescheduled. The good news is that there was a cancellation just three weeks after his original date. And this past Wednesday, we went to the same desk and held our collective breath—waiting, hoping that everything was still good to go.

And it was.

Will has a condition called pectus excavatum, which means his sternum and ribs sink inward, creating a dip in the center of his chest. According to their index, anything greater than 3.5 typically requires surgery. His number was 7.4, which meant his ribcage was significantly impacting his heart and lungs. The fix is to lift the sternum and place bars behind it. It sounds primitive. Drastic. But compared to how they did it thirty years ago, we felt incredibly fortunate.

The doctor showed us video footage from inside Will’s chest—before the procedure and after. All I can say is that I’m grateful for the level of expertise in the medical community. And I know this may sound strange, but if a beating heart could smile, that’s exactly what his heart was doing after they lifted his chest and gave it the room it deserved. The only moment that rivals it is watching my kids being born.

There were so many moments during our short stay at the hospital that I could write about. But one, in particular, has stayed with me.

We were in the recovery room with a drowsy, loopy Will. He could hardly keep his eyes open and was talking in fragments. As we spoke with the nurses caring for him, my wife told them how great they were—how great everyone at the hospital had been. One of the nurses responded, “Yes, but we are the only ones the patients never remember.”

That one line stopped us.

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These post-op nurses show up every day, serving and caring for patients who will never remember them. Even now, Will can tell you about the doctors and nurses leading up to that moment—but he remembers nothing about the recovery room.

And yet, that’s where some of the most important care happens.

It made me wonder how much of the world is held together by people we never remember. Maybe the most meaningful work isn’t what’s seen or remembered—but what’s quietly given when no one is aware enough to say thank you.

Question

What does it look like to live a life that offers something meaningful—even if no one ever remembers you were the one who gave it?

Peace,

Brandon

It’s been a few years, but you might remember Laurel and Yanny.

Didn’t expect me to start there, did you?

If you don’t recall this maddening sound bite, just know that some people heard Laurel and others heard Yanny when the audio clip was played. For me, I heard Yanny consistently for two weeks, and now I can only hear Laurel. For some reason, my brain won’t let me hear Yanny anymore.

Sorry, Yanny.

Anyway, here it is, listen to it with your friends, and let the arguments begin.

But the way we perceive the same stimulus differently doesn’t just happen with audio memes.

Have you seen the picture of the gray and teal (or is it pink and white) sneaker? This meme continues to divide people. Half swear the shoe is gray and teal, while the other half are convinced it is pink and white. Or, along the same lines, the dress that divided the world—half saw a gold and white dress, while the other half saw a black and blue dress.

Perception—what it is and what shapes it—is fascinating. Two people can listen to the exact same sound clip or see the exact same image and interpret it in entirely different ways. These differences may be influenced by our upbringing, culture, life experiences, or biology.

All of these factors together shape how we see the world, but they can also keep us from seeing or hearing it from a different perspective.

None of this makes us bad people. It simply means we interpret the world through the lens of our own unique inputs, which shape who we are and how we see everything around us.

And maybe that’s where it stops being about sound clips, sneakers, and dresses.

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If how we individually and collectively perceive reality can differ that easily for things that don’t matter, what does that mean for the things that do?

If perception can shift over time—like how I now only hear Laurel—then maybe it isn’t fixed. Maybe it can be influenced and shaped by any number of factors, including how our brains are wired to process the same information differently.

And if how we perceive people, situations, or even reality itself can be influenced or manipulated (and it can), does that mean we are always at the mercy of those perceptions?

When ancients spoke of “seeing the light” or a “veil being lifted,” they often used the image of scales falling from their eyes. It described a physical condition—a scaly encrustation over the pupil that caused cloudiness and prevented clear sight. In much the same way, our hardened perceptions can cloud our vision. Our mind’s eye becomes occluded, unable to see people or situations with clarity.

This is why the posture of love—and the outflow of grace—matters so deeply. Because the only thing capable of breaking through faulty perception, of dissolving illusion and restoring clarity, is something strong enough to reach beyond what we think we already see. That is what love and grace can do. Love can see one’s worth despite how differently they perceive the world, while grace can walk alongside them even when we don’t see things the same way.

Question

What if what you’ve always been certain about is the very thing keeping you from seeing clearly?

Peace,

Brandon

The restaurant shall remain unnamed to protect the innocent.

But I have to tell you—when I placed the order on the app, I knew what kind of ordeal I was getting into. Ordering from this restaurant is always a chaotic experience. Still, having sent in my order thirty minutes prior, I (naively) expected I would walk right in and right out.

However, the Burrito Gods had other plans on this day.

I walked into the restaurant with not a single person sitting at a table. Instead, fourteen people (I had time to count) stood waiting for their app-ordered food. Leaning against the wall in resignation, I joined the other modern-day hunter-gatherers. Save for the hustle and bustle of the kitchen crew, the dining area was dead silent.

Having left my phone in the car, I studied each person in between quick glances for a brown bag with my name on it. What I noticed made me profoundly sad—fourteen people with their heads bowed in unison, silently scrolling their devices. I don’t make this observation in a judgy way. Had I known I would be waiting for thirty minutes, I would have taken my phone into the restaurant as well. What I witnessed convicted me. I have truly never seen anything like it.

But this reflection isn’t about condemning our insatiable addiction to these little rectangular things.

I promise.

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People have asked me over the years why there are weeks or months when I don’t write. My simple answer is that I have to live life in order to have experiences and stories. If all I do is go to work, come home, watch television, and scroll social media, there isn’t much to write about. If I am preoccupied or distracted, I miss moments. I miss the beauty around me. I miss conversations. I miss the uniqueness of people.

For example.

On that day, had I been on my phone and lost in the feed, I would have missed two young couples who came into the restaurant together. They had not placed an order through the app. However, because of the backup in orders, they had to wait in line. As they stood together, they talked and told stories and laughed. For the fifteen minutes that I watched them, not one of them pulled out their phone. It was a wild contrast—two couples alive in conversation, surrounded by everyone else with heads bowed in quiet absorption.

I may look back at this post in five years and realize that making this point was futile. That facing an ever-growing tsunami was a laughable endeavor. Maybe this inertia is inevitable. Who knows. But for today, I believe it is a battle worth waging—of not completely losing ourselves, losing our humanity for the convenience of always being somewhere else.

Question

What stories, people, or beauty have I scrolled past in real life?

Peace,

Brandon

After waking up at 3 AM and arriving at the surgery center at 5:45 AM for Will’s chest surgery, we were told that it had been canceled.

Anger—molten, volcanic—pulsed from my center and radiated throughout my body. We had been waiting four months for this day. Days and weeks of meticulous preparation, only to be turned away. Sensing a dormant Vesuvius unexpectedly awakening, my wife stepped in front of me and took over the conversation.

Background.

In the middle of November 2025, we scheduled chest wall surgery for Will’s pectus excavatum. Fast-forward. Four months later. Last week—the week leading up to the surgery—was wrought with unexpected challenges. If it were possible to embody the entertainer who balances bowls on her head, feet, and hands while riding an eight-foot unicycle—Jenny and I did it.

Take this medicine.

Shower, but apply this and rinse.

Put this in each nostril twice a day.

We’ve been parenting a while. We’ve got this. This isn’t our first balancing act.

But then the unexpected.

Since Will had been sick three weeks prior in the middle of March, we were told that he needed an X-ray of his lungs.

You know, just to make sure.

So we scrambled, picking Will up from school multiple times to make it happen. Evidently, electronic signatures don’t travel well through the World Wide Web. I know we’re all worried about AI taking over the world, but it turns out that electronic signatures still elude us.

Another story for another day.

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But by last Friday, we were in the clear. Or maybe I should say that Will’s lungs were in the clear. The X-ray—and its technicians—said they were clear. Crystal clear. In fact, they said there had never been lungs so crystal clear and beautiful.

So we had a normal, busy weekend.

And then everything stopped at 5:45 AM on Monday morning.

I don’t want to prolong the story, but somewhere between our crystal-clear, beautiful X-rays and our family standing haplessly in front of a hapless registration clerk, an anesthesiologist decided the surgery should not move forward. And somewhere between that anesthesiologist’s decision and our family standing helpless in front of a helpless registration clerk, no one was able to get ahold of us… save for a lone, unchecked MyChart message conveying the unexpected decision. Because while AI is taking over the world, landlines still struggle to call cell phones.

Another story for another day.

If you’re thinking about our Spring Break that didn’t happen, so were we. A family huddled together in a waiting area after being told our thing was canceled, heads spinning, trying to make sense of what just didn’t happen. It was a rerun of the same show one month apart—with a slightly varied script, the same actors.

The irony?

Will got sick during Spring Break, likely because of the trip that didn’t happen. And Will getting sick was the reason he could not have the surgery.

Bada boom.

Bada bing.

I know you’re thinking how these things come in threes. Don’t worry. The person who returned my wallet to the store didn’t take my driver’s license or credit cards—just the cash that was inside it.

Jenny asked me last night what we needed to learn from all of it. I told her I wasn’t in the mood to learn anything from any of it in that moment.

Then she said what a kind wife might say to an aging husband, “While we handle times of stress differently, you handled this much better than you have handled similar situations in the past.”

A day removed from the debacle, I’m honored by her words. Maybe the interruptions don’t change. Maybe we can.

Question

If the interruptions keep coming, what is changing in me?

Peace,

Brandon

I grew up in the charming town of Madison, Indiana, along the Ohio River. While my hometown boasted hydroplanes and historic architecture, it was not known for its diversity in the 1980s—especially religious diversity. And when I say religious diversity, I don’t mean different Christian denominations. I mean anything outside of Christianity.

In Madison, like much of middle America, you were either Christian or not. Until high school, the only Muslims I knew of were Muhammad Ali and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. I didn’t know a single Muslim personally. My understanding of Islam wasn’t shaped by relationships—it was shaped by distance.

Years of news cycles—especially surrounding war, terrorism, and fear—quietly constructed a framework in my mind. It wasn’t something I consciously chose, but it was something I absorbed. And without any real relationships to challenge it, that framework hardened over time.

Even as my thinking matured, one thing remained true: I had never sat across the table from a Muslim and listened to their story.

That changed in the summer of 2018.

A friend invited me to join a three-month dialogue between a group of local Muslims and a multi-denominational gathering of Christian leaders. I didn’t hesitate. I knew instinctively that this was something I needed—not just intellectually, but humanly. I wanted to move beyond secondhand narratives and into real understanding.

When I walked into the conference room that first evening, most participants were already there. What I saw immediately struck me.

The Christians were seated on one side of the table.

The Muslims were seated on the other.

Without thinking, I took my place with the Christians.

I turned to my left and greeted the Baptists, Presbyterians, Catholics, and others. Then I turned to my right and greeted the Muslim group across from us.

It was subtle, almost unspoken—but unmistakable.

Two sides.

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In many ways, the seating arrangement felt like a microcosm of the broader world. Two groups, facing each other from opposite ends. But it also revealed something closer to home. Even within our side of the table, we carried our own quiet divisions—denominations, labels, distinctions that separated us even as we claimed unity.

As the evening began, I wondered what each of us had carried into that room. What assumptions. What misconceptions. What quiet prejudices shaped by years of distance and secondhand information.

But something began to shift almost immediately.

As we introduced ourselves and shared our stories, it became clear that no one was there to debate. No one was there to win. We were there to understand.

And there is something powerful—almost disarming—about sitting in the presence of another human being and simply listening.

Stereotypes don’t survive proximity.

Caricatures dissolve in conversation.

The word Muslim—a label I had heard thousands of times—began to change. Because now it wasn’t a category. It was a person. A face. A voice. A story.

Within the first hour, something unexpected happened.

The distance closed.

We shared our backgrounds, our families, our experiences. Under sterile lights, gathered around a table with cheese, crackers, hummus, and fruit, we began to cut through years—decades—of assumption.

And what I realized in that moment was simple, but profound.

The change we hope to see in the world doesn’t begin at a distance.

It begins across a table.

For most of my life, I had formed opinions about people I had never known. I had inherited perspectives without ever testing them in the presence of real human lives. But here, in this room, those inherited ideas began to unravel—not through argument, but through relationship.

And the more I listened, the more I began to see something beyond this particular conversation.

This wasn’t just about Christians and Muslims.

It was about all of us.

We create categories for people we’ve never met. We inherit narratives we’ve never examined. We allow distance to do what distance always does—it simplifies, it hardens, it distorts.

From a distance, it is easy to reduce a person to a headline, a label, a single story. From a distance, “they” become easier to define—and easier to dismiss.

But proximity changes things.

When you sit across the table from someone, the categories begin to crack. The assumptions begin to loosen. And the person in front of you refuses to stay inside the story you had already written about them.

For a man who had never known a single Muslim by name, what happened next was deeply unsettling in the best possible way.

One by one, people across the table began to share their experiences.

They spoke of fear.

They spoke of being misunderstood.

They spoke of carrying the weight of actions they did not commit, yet were constantly associated with.

And as they spoke, I saw something I hadn’t expected.

Not anger. Not defensiveness.

Pain.

Real, human pain.

It was in that moment that something shifted in me—not just intellectually, but emotionally. The narratives I had absorbed over decades could not hold up under the weight of lived experience sitting just a few feet away.

Because it is one thing to hear about people.

It is another thing entirely to hear from them.

That night didn’t erase every difference. But it did something far more important.

It changed the posture of my heart.

It reminded me that understanding doesn’t begin with certainty—it begins with proximity. With humility. With the willingness to sit across from someone you do not fully understand and choose to listen anyway.

Sometimes, subverting the narrative doesn’t require a platform.

Sometimes, it just requires a table.

Question

Where in my life has distance shaped what I believe about others? Who ought to be on the other side of my table?

Peace,

Brandon

A little over a decade ago I interviewed to take my boss’ job when he left our company. He had mentored me for over two years, and I was incredibly fortunate and grateful that he endorsed me and advocated on my behalf.

Throughout the hiring process, I had eight hour-long interviews and hit grand slams with each of them. I had even asked each interviewer to make me their top candidate, to which all but one person agreed. I felt incredibly confident the position was mine to lose.

But when the decision was ultimately made, I didn’t get it.

And I was completely devastated. I mean it thoroughly wounded me.

Not getting the position wrecked me.

I’m not trying to be melodramatic. This is what I really felt on the inside. And it was hard not to feel it moment by moment. Even worse, it was hard not to live out of the wound and the pain I was experiencing.

I’m not sure if you have ever lived out of a wound, but let me tell you—it is a place of death.

It is angry.

It is bitter.

It is hateful.

It is prideful.

It is toxic.

And it makes you into someone you were never created to be.

The easiest thing in the world is to ignore the wound and let it fester. And I promise you, it will become the source from which you begin to live. The infection spreads and shows up in how you see people and situations, how you relate to others, and in the words you use and actions you take.

A neglected wound is toxic and leads to death.

And I am ashamed to say, that was me.

Not too long after not getting the position I was talking to a friend. While I came into the new year resolved to mentally move forward, there was still hostility in my words that came from a deep wound. My head was saying it was time to heal, but my wound disagreed—and it was winning the battle of my heart.

That’s when my friend said something that stopped me in my tracks:

“Outside of work you have so much peace, but at work, you have a lot of anger.”

I knew he was right. But it was so hard to hear—so hard to admit.

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While I had been trying to move forward, I had actually buried my wound and was living out of it. And while it was toxic, I had never taken the time to face it, to introspect, to pray over it, and open myself up to the healing I desperately needed. I had tried to ignore it and move on, but it was there the whole time—quietly infecting everything.

It’s easy to live with selective introspection. But we all have blind spots. And if I hadn’t been pushed by my friend, I might never have looked inward, asked where this death was coming from, or come face to face with my wound.

The truth was that I had been living out of a painful wound for over a year. And it didn’t begin to heal until I humbly faced it and asked God to meet me in that place of pain.

Here’s the truth: Living in the pain of our suffering can either become an end destination or a passageway.

As an end destination, pain becomes the place where we remain—stuck in bitterness, anger, resentment, and unforgiveness.

As a passageway, pain becomes the path to transformation—to new ways of seeing and experiencing the world.

Suffering breaks us down into insufferable pieces where we can either self-destruct or cry out to God. Our sense of control fades. Our identity feels shaken. And it is there, in that place of pain, that we are faced with a choice: Will this be where I stay? Or will this become the way through?

Question

Where am I still living out of an unhealed wound—and am I willing to bring it into the light so it can become a passageway, not my destination?

Peace,

Brandon

I took four pictures on our Spring Break vacation last week.

One of them was a screenshot from the airline, apologizing for delaying our flight.

As soon as I heard our flight from Indianapolis to Orlando had been delayed until the next morning, I knew we would miss our connecting flight to San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Orlando flight would arrive two hours after our San Juan flight had already left. Heads spinning, we made our way to baggage claim and set up our makeshift command center.

For the next six hours, Jenny and I ran every scenario and calculated every combination and permutation that would get us to Puerto Rico. We started with the obvious—any airline from Indy to Orlando, then any airline from a city within four hours of Indy. The issue was south Florida. Heavy thunderstorms and the threat of tornadoes had grounded everything. We inched up the coasts, searching for any city in Florida, to no avail. We considered driving to Orlando, but we wouldn’t make it in time. Maybe drive to Nashville, Atlanta, or Charlotte, then a late flight to Orlando. But all flights—and I mean all flights—even the late ones, were canceled.

We refreshed travel sites, checked every airline, chased every possibility. Finally, we bailed on south Florida and refocused on the goal—getting a direct flight to San Juan by the next day. This time, we went big. O’Hare. JFK. Newark. Logan. Nothing. Every search came up empty. It felt apocalyptic. Severe storms in the south. A blizzard crippling everything north and east of Indiana. Every route canceled, delayed beyond reach, or already booked by other Spring Break travelers. And that doesn’t even include the TSA debacle.

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Beleaguered, Jenny and I made one last attempt with our airline’s check-in attendants. They were overwhelmed, their hands tied, and clearly not equipped for something like this. Then we noticed two Delta attendants behind us with no line, waiting out the end of their shift. With nothing to lose, we walked over and asked if they could get us to Puerto Rico. They searched and told us the best they could do was St. Paul, Minnesota. We thanked them and went back to our baggage claim command center.

I turned off my phone, closed my eyes, and shook my head.

“I found something,” Jenny said. “There’s a direct flight on a regional airline out of Minneapolis to San Juan in the morning. We just have to get to Minneapolis tonight.”

We ran up the escalators to the Delta desk.

“Can we still get to Minneapolis tonight?” we asked in unison.

“Yes. You have thirty minutes.”

We explained the third-party site and the regional airline. I told them I needed to secure the direct flight before booking with them. While I entered our information online, Jenny gave the attendant everything she needed. Finally, I typed in my credit card and hit submit.

Processing.

Processing.

Processing.

And it kept processing.

Five minutes.

Ten.

Fifteen.

“We’ll need to check your bag in the next ten minutes if you’re going to make this flight.”

“Still processing,” I said. “We’ll know in five.”

Jenny and the kids watched me as I watched the wheel spin. Five minutes passed.

I stood and walked to the counter.

“I’m certain it’s going through. Let’s check the bag to Minneapolis.”

I paid, and they sent the suitcase down the conveyor. We watched it disappear beneath the plastic divider strips. I looked back at my phone.

No spinning wheel.

Payment canceled.

Flight to San Juan: FULL.

I raised my arms and told them to stop the luggage.

For the next twenty minutes, the attendants worked tirelessly—retrieving our suitcase, calling the gate multiple times, entering information to reverse the charge. As they worked, I checked the time and realized how far past their shift they were. They didn’t have to do any of this. Our original flight wasn’t even with them. But they saw our desperation and chose to help. They stayed as long as they could, trying to get our family to Puerto Rico—even though, in the end, it didn’t work.

The second of four photos was of Stacey and Luann behind the counter after we thanked them for working so hard for us.

In the age of automated everything, AI voices on the other line, and the growing sense that no one wants to go the extra mile, there are still people who remind you that humanity hasn’t been automated yet—and who refuse to let you become just another transaction. This is the humanity I hope we can preserve.

Question

In a world that no longer requires me to care, where is life quietly asking me to be present anyway?

Peace,

Brandon

Walking the most difficult terrain in the United States was nearly impossible with a purple ankle the same size as my knee.

It was only day two, and it didn’t help that I still had 30 miles to go, including a difficult trek across ice and snow at a 40-degree angle. The additional 35 pounds in my backpack increased my misery factor exponentially. You never feel like a conqueror in that kind of wilderness, even on the best of days. On the worst days, you feel conquered. It doesn’t take long to realize how infinitesimally small you are and how easily changing conditions and circumstances can turn against you.

Rain for days.

Overnight heavy snow.

Curious bears in your camp.

Hostile caribou.

Moose blocking your trail.

Boots falling apart.

Altitude sickness.

Blisters upon blisters.

I could keep going. All of those have happened to us, and so much more. I have stories for days.

But this busted ankle, man.

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If the heavy sobbing had not fully humbled me, what happened next obliterated whatever little ego remained.

My pace had dropped significantly, and I was falling behind, forcing the other three guys to wait for me. The snow we were crossing was frozen solid. Even following in the tracks laid down for me was precarious with no ankle support. I willed each step, knowing there was no one coming to rescue me or carry me out. But in a profound moment of compassion, one of the guys decided to leave his backpack behind and carry mine ahead. He would then backtrack to retrieve his own pack. Essentially, he was doing twice the mileage over brutal terrain.

At first, I vehemently resisted the offer. My pull-yourself-up-by-the-bootstraps mentality wouldn’t hear of it. I got myself into this mess, and I will get myself out of it, I thought. But he persisted. He knew how much I was hurting. I knew how much I was hurting the group. Fully emasculated, ego obliterated, I consented. And I was deeply grateful that he had done something for me that I could not do for myself.

We have a hard time letting other people help us. We do not like to feel insufficient or incapable. But an ego posture keeps others from the honor of being able to serve us. Simply because we do not want to show that we could actually use another person’s help, we push back and resist. Yet the most humble and honoring thing we can do is welcome someone’s kindness. That’s what I learned that day.

Ultimately, Josh Brown let me have my pack back once we hit level ground.

For a couple of treacherous miles, he carried my pack — and I learned that sometimes the bravest thing you can do is let yourself be carried.

Questions

What am I carrying right now that I don’t have to carry alone? How is my pride keeping me from receiving the help I actually need?

Peace,

Brandon

If ever there were a TMI (too much information) post, it’s this one.

But we’ve established a baseline in these weekly posts in which I pretty much tell you everything about myself—what I’m working on, how I fail people, and what I’m learning. Self-preservation and embarrassment died a long time ago.

In August 2019, we decided to backpack the Wind River Range in Wyoming. Ninety-five percent of this 40-mile route was off-trail, meaning we would spend a week navigating some of the most brutal terrain in the United States without a trail. You can think of this area as broken and beautiful. Every step among the boulders is an uneven balancing act. But when you aren’t fighting to keep yourself upright, you are mesmerized by its magnificence.

We got up early the second morning to blue skies and crisp air at ten thousand feet. We had a couple of miles on trail before we would begin relying on maps, navigation, and route finding. Our spirits and collective optimism were high. We were chatting away when a mosquito landed on my forearm. I was quick to smack it but took my eyes off my path to wipe it off my arm. Within seconds, my feet were over my head (literally), and I hit the ground harder than I have ever hit it. I stepped on a softball-sized rock, causing my ankle to turn a complete 90 degrees.

I knew I was hurt badly. But we had planned this trip for six months. I couldn’t be the reason we had to pull out. I tightened my laces and assured everyone I would be fine for the next 38 miles.

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The truth is that I should not have been walking on it, let alone navigating the most difficult land I had ever walked. I slowed us down. I am certain I tried the patience of the other guys. During a break to pump water and eat a snack, I sobbed. It was a top-five cry of my life. I was really hurt. I was letting everyone down. It was impossibly difficult. It was the worst.

We were a hundred feet below a snow-covered pass at 11,000 feet. I was nauseous. I had to poop. I felt like I could vomit. I told the guys I needed a few minutes. I hobbled down behind a boulder and fished out my trowel to start digging a hole. How was I going to squat with a damaged ankle? I sat beside the hole and stared at the horizon, trying not to throw up. I’m not sure I have seen anything more beautiful than what was in front of me. Despite my situation, I didn’t miss the profound irony—immense pain and palpable delight, a hole meant for human excrement and the sheer radiance and allure of the horizon, tears of both suffering and joy.

The reality of my misfortune could not erase the brilliance around me. No amount of ankle pain and swelling could cancel the majesty of the moment. No hole full of muck could obscure the transcendence. To disregard one to the neglect of the other would be dishonest. A binary mind attempts to crown one over the other. The unwise can only see a veiled reality marred by catastrophe, shaming others for honest attempts at seeing both realities. However, an honest and wise perspective sees reality for what it truly is and can hold them perfectly in tension, grieving with one part and singing in praise with the other.

Question

Where in my life am I tempted to see only the hardship or only the good, instead of holding both together?

Peace,

Brandon

I started a new job at the end of last year, which included spending two weeks in Southern California for training. With as cold as it has been in Indiana, two weeks in SoCal seems sublime. But I was there at the beginning of November, meaning I missed two weeks of Indiana fall. That’s not what this post is about. I just wanted you to know how great autumn is in Indiana and how sad I was to miss two weeks of it.

This story begins the morning I left for that training.

It’s about a bus driver at the Indianapolis airport.

You know how chaotic early morning flights can be. It seems everyone is on the first flights of the day. People frantically look for open parking spaces. They walk briskly with checked luggage, carry-on luggage, and their one personal attaché. Then they hobble onto the shuttle in a mad attempt to secure all of their belongings while counting the minutes and seconds between stops before the terminal.

That was me—flying to California for two weeks of training.

I usually pack everything in a carry-on because I don’t like the hassle of checking luggage. Yes, I packed two weeks of clothes in a carry-on! But I am always thinking about the TSA checkpoint and how long it could take to get through. It’s this part of traveling that I really don’t like. Everything has to go right, and I don’t like anything unexpected happening in the process.

But there was this one bus driver.

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At each numbered pickup station, he would put the bus in park, stand, walk down the aisle, and welcome each person as they boarded.

The first couple of times he did it, my mental monster went into a murmuring rampage.

What is going on?

What is he doing?

We are in a hurry!

But at each stop, I kept watching him. His smile seemed to grow brighter every time the next person boarded.

The mental monster quickly quieted.

What a delightful man.

He greets each passenger as if he drove there specifically for them.

And how much extra time is this really taking?

I continued to watch him over the next half-dozen stops and told myself that the extra thirty seconds were worth the lessons.

Find joy in the work that you do, no matter your occupation.

Don’t just do your job well—honor those around you while doing it.

Stand out above other workers by taking what you do to the next level.

But also.

Calm down and see the goodness in others.

Don’t get so lost in your fast-paced routine that you lose the joy in life.

Let others inspire you to be better yourself.

Question

What does my mental monster sound like– and how often do I let it lead?

Peace,

Brandon

I’m still here.

I’m alive and kicking.

Thanks to all of you who checked on me during my hiatus.

This is the longest writing break I’ve taken in the last twenty years. It wasn’t planned. I just went into hibernation mode around Christmastime. I went from putting together my annual 1,000-piece puzzle to watching movies. Hamnet, anyone? Wow. More on that in a future post. I read The Ferryman and His Wife. I rewatched Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones and got through Season 1 of The Pitt. I bought a treadmill and started running every morning. I burrowed deep into the 15 inches of Indiana snow amid 23 consecutive days of single-digit weather and hibernated. And I did my very best to mentally check out for the last three months.

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I did a StrengthsFinder assessment several years ago that identifies a person’s top strengths from thirty-four different categories. The four central themes are Executing, Influencing, Relationship Building, and Strategic Thinking. While most people’s strengths cross multiple themes, I was the only person on my team whose strengths landed in singularly in one theme—Strategic Thinking. This means that my overall strength scores are skewed heavily toward thinking. And it’s spot on. All I do is think. Nonstop. About everything. All the time. And if you’ve followed my writing for a while (or seen my staring blankly into nothingness), you know this. It is a great blessing. But if I don’t take a break, it can exhaust and overwhelm me.

Which makes me think of the Greek aphorism: Know thyself.

The beginning of wisdom is the ability to look inward. To self-assess. To self-reflect. To self-examine. To know ourselves- the good, the bad, and the ugly. And to understand what we need to do for our individual well-being. The truth is, we can’t be our best for others if we don’t take the time to make sure we are whole, healed, and properly aligned. We can’t effectively look outside ourselves if we don’t first look within.

To that end, I’m back—and fully rested.

Question

Do I truly know myself well enough to recognize when it’s time to step back? What do I need right now to be whole and well?

Peace,

Brandon

I am counting down the Top 10 Most Read Posts this year. Before we jump to the excitement, make sure you pick up mybook Deep Calls to Deep: Meditations for Your Spiritual Journey, Vol. 1, which is available now (Amazon | Viewpoint | Barnes and Noble) and the ideal Christmas gift for your friends and family. And now, here are the Top 5!

#5- The Weight We Don’t Carry

#9- Wildflower

#3- When Time Stood Still

#2- The Most Brutally Honest Post I’ve Ever Written

#1- It’s All Right Here

That’s a wrap on 2025! Thank you for journeying with me this year. I am looking forward to where we will go next year.

Question

Which post resonated with you the most this year and why? Leave your comments below.

Peace,

Brandon

I am counting down the Top 10 Most Read Posts this year. Before we jump to the excitement, make sure you pick up mybook Deep Calls to Deep: Meditations for Your Spiritual Journey, Vol. 1, which is available now (Amazon | Viewpoint | Barnes and Noble) and the ideal Christmas gift for your friends and family. And now, here are posts 6 through 10.

#10 - The Boulder That Moved Me

#9 - The Little Girl’s Question

#8- Go West, Young Man!

#7- When Branches Grow Wild

#6- The Hidden Infection

I was making guacamole the other night.

Quick side note: I make really good guac.

But as I mashed the avocados with my stone pestle, I felt a tightness rise in my chest. It’s a familiar pressure—one I’ve carried for as long as I can remember—but I’ve been trying to meet it head-on whenever it shows up.

So on Taco Tuesday, I decided to name it.

“Why are you here?” I asked.

“I’m here because you’re angry,” it answered.

I grabbed the half lime, squeezing it harder than I needed to while replaying the last hour, trying to pinpoint exactly what was irritating me. My wife saw the shift in my face.

“What’s going on?”

“Just give me a minute,” I said. “I’m trying to work through it.”

I know it can sound strange talking to myself—like I’m having a psychotic break or something. But this is what the early stages of awareness look like for me in real time. As an Enneagram 1, I feel a constant simmer when things don’t go the way they’re “supposed” to, or when anything slips out of place. And instead of turning that energy toward something good, I repress it until it comes out sideways.

If there’s ever going to be a break in that cycle, I have to pay attention to what my body is telling me in the moment.

“I know why you’re here,” I finally said. “The plans I had for tonight changed.”

“Yes,” the feeling said. “All day you planned to go to the game. But everyone else wants to watch Stranger Things.”

True story.

That was the hinge moment—the little click of clarity.

I took a long breath and told the feeling it could leave. The river of the evening was already flowing in a different direction, and I could either fight it or let it carry me. There will be other games. But there won’t always be nights like this with the people I love.

I didn’t want to miss the moment by holding on to resentment over something that didn’t happen.

Breaking this pattern is hard. Moving from unhealth to health is slow, uneven work. This was one small victory in a long history of losses. But it was a victory. And I’m hoping they start coming more often.

Thankfully, I’m surrounded by people who offer grace and patience while I learn how to loosen my grip, breathe deeper, and let myself flow with the river instead of resisting it.

Question

What long-held pattern is asking for your attention, and are you ready to meet it with honesty instead of avoidance?

Peace,

Brandon

Will and I were watching television last night. It was late and just a few minutes before we were planning to go to bed. But the dog started circling in the family room and giving us hard stares. She couldn’t wait until our show was over and demanded that one of us let her out.

Since he was closer to the door, Will got up, followed the dog outside, and then immediately returned, asking if I could pause the show.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“I am going out to look at the stars.”

Proud dad moment.

I turned off the show, followed him outside, and we spent the rest of our time gazing at the sky.

I saw a TikTok video from a middle school girl “raw dogging boredom.” If you’re not familiar with the term “raw dog,” it’s used as a verb and has expanded beyond its original meaning to any activity done without preparation. In the video, the girl set the rules as: no television, no music, no food, no phone—for fifteen minutes on day one, increasing the time each day.

While there are many cynical commentators mocking the trend and questioning the thinking skills of the next generation, saying we have reached peak stupidity, I think the trend is worthy of reflection and not something we should so easily dismiss.

In fact, seeing Will step into silence on his own made that video feel less like a trend and more like a sign of something deeper happening.

I talk obsessively about pendulums. The idea is that when we, as humans, are so far to one side of a behavior or belief, we tend to swing hard in the opposite direction when we make a change. I see it all the time: people swinging hard the other direction with politics, ideologies, and religious beliefs. Usually, it means a person is trying to find freedom outside the norms and assumptions they’ve lived within. There is a deep yearning to break free and find more peace and balance in their beliefs and practices.

In an incessantly stimulated world, the pull toward balance and peace—for a generation that has rarely experienced either—may be a real thing. With so few guides teaching and living integrated and contemplative lifestyles, we may be witnessing a generation beginning to break free on their own, searching for respite from the technological quagmire.

For GenY and older generations, I wonder how we might let their experiments in presence become an invitation for us to step outside, pause, and look up again too. What might their desire for peace and freedom teach us about the natural yearning of the soul to break free from the only thing they have known? How might we learn from them and walk alongside them toward more liberated, more integrated lives?

So many questions worth considering.

Question

How would our lives change if we regularly turned off technology, stepped outside, paused, and looked up?

Peace,

Brandon

In the 1950s, social psychologist Muzafer Sherif conducted an experiment at a summer camp in Robbers Cave State Park—an experiment that revealed just how easily division can take root among us.

Two groups of boys, unaware of each other at first, spent their days bonding over games and campfires, building their own small worlds of belonging.

But once they were introduced—once competition entered the picture—everything changed.

Tug-of-war. Baseball. Capture the flag.

Taunts turned to hostility. Cabins were vandalized. Meals were eaten separately.

And no amount of forced friendliness could bridge the growing divide.

Until the day the water line broke—an event staged by the researchers.

Faced with a problem too big for either group to solve alone, the boys had no choice but to work together.

And in that shared struggle, something deeper began to happen.

Suspicion gave way to cooperation.

Rivalry gave way to friendship.

Division gave way to unity.

All because they learned what can only be learned when we stop fighting for our side—and start working for the good of all.

This classic experiment beautifully illustrates what’s possible for us today.

We are so much more—together.

I opened an email this morning from my son’s middle school. It described a food drive to help combat food insecurity in our community. While this issue is always present in every community, there’s no question that more people have been affected recently with food benefits being cut.

This is our broken water line.

And it just might be an opportunity for us to come together and work for the common good.

The campers could have waited indefinitely for the caretakers to fix the problem and continued their fighting. But sometimes the urgency of a situation demands that we set aside our differences and work together.

We can wait for the government to feed the most vulnerable—or, while we wait for politics to resolve, we can come together to care for one another, to make sure no one goes to bed hungry.

Question

What can I do today to make sure my neighbors have food on their tables, and that the shelves of my local pantries are full?

Peace,

Brandon