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Month: December 2022

Favorite Books for 2022

Published by on December 21, 2022

These are some of my favorite books from 2022. They’re in no particular order.

The Psychology of Money, by Morgan Housel, was excellent. There’s a good chance I’ll end up reading it again this year. When it comes to money, our decisions aren’t usually data driven. There are emotions and history and pride and fear all wrapped up, and we need to understand that if we’re going to make wise decisions with our money.

Financial Freedom, by Grant Sabatier, contained a lot of repeat material I had read in other FIRE books, but Grant supplies so much data backing up his teaching, which I found very helpful. There is also a lot of helpful info about earning more money, whether that’s through your current 9-5 job or through side hustles.

Shauna Niequist’s I Guess I Haven’t Learned that Yet was a beautiful read. She shares the struggle of pandemic life, illness, family issues, and moving to a new city. She’s a great writer, and I deeply appreciated her honesty.

Another book I’ll definitely come back to is The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry, by John Mark Comer. The title comes from Dallas Willard, who is one of my favorite authors. Comer brings a philosophical yet very practical teaching about the dangers of hurry.

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Stanley Tucci read his memoir Taste: My Life through Food. I’ve always enjoyed his work as an actor, but hearing his story, and how food and cooking weaves a path through it, made me even more of a fan.

The AntiSocial Network, by Ben Mezrich, tells the 2020 story of the collision between Reddit, Robinhood and GameStop in a way that would forever change Wall Street.

Michael Hyatt’s Living Foward is not a new book. I’ve had it for awhile, but in January I read it for the first time. Here is a blog post on how I’ve put what I learned into practice this year. I’ll be coming back to it next week as I spend a day planning for next year.

Finally, here are a few of my favorite novels I read this year.

2022 Grisham Update

Published by on December 2, 2022

As we near the end of another year, I thought I would take some time to reflect. It’s been a really good year, and one with thankfully far fewer transitions and scares.

Mandy has had a very healthy year. It’s been a little over a year since her SCAD heart attack, and she has had no issues. She’s been able to taper off of just about all of her medication, and has had no limitations. In June she celebrated a year in her new job as executive pastor at Christ City Church. She is a part of a great team there, and she’s able to use gifts, skills and passions in a way that she wasn’t able to do while she was a teacher. She’s doing a great job.

This summer she also took on a part-time side hustle gig. She is now the executive director of Memphis Choral Arts, which is the choir that she and I have been a part of for ten years. She is bringing those same gifts and skills to help this great organization.

This fall Adam began his senior year. It’s the countdown to college. Some days I feel really good about this. Other days I already feel the sadness of him leaving. What helps me process that is knowing that he’s ready. He’s been accepted to two universities already, and we expect a couple more this month. He continues to play soccer and his coach named him season MVP. He has enjoyed watching the World Cup, and is eagerly anticipating the coming spring season. He raised $2500 for St. Jude in March through a run-a-thon and was celebrated at the St. Jude Leadership Society conference this summer. He continues to develop his musical skills on both the electric guitar and piano. He’s gotten very good on both.

Micah is in his 8th grade year at St. George’s Independent School. He’s on the soccer team, the swim team, and he plays keys in the middle school rock band. The music teachers gave him the Middle School Band award in May. Mandy and I love watching him create, whether it’s new music on the piano or through visual arts. We’re going to be making high school decisions in January. Micah joined Adam in mowing a lot of lawns this summer, which means that they made a lot of money. Mandy and I are very proud of both of them, as they’re both such hard workers.

I’ve continued my real estate work this year. I split my time between being an agent who helps buyers and sellers and as a developer. We have just finished up a construction project where we built a 1500 sq ft house and three 500 sq ft “tiny” houses. Last month I taught my first Mastering Money workshop at our church. More details to come on this, but I hope to teach it at a few other churches this next year.

As is our normal custom, we built some great memories through travel this year. Highlights were Gatlinburg in the spring, Switzerland in the summer, and Acadia this fall. In all three we did lots of hiking, eating and laughing.

Finally, I must mention the newest edition to our family. We brought Sophie home in November. She is a four pound Coton de Tulear, and she is very sweet. It has taken some adjustment from all of us (Bella included) to get used to having a puppy around, but we all love her.

Our hope for you this holiday season is that you would create some space to reflect on the good things in your life and to be reminded of the radical way that God changed the world forever that first Christmas!