Best of the Month: A Nameless Cake, The Most Overused Word of the Year, and My New Ted Talk
Highlights from August (Plus Our Favorite Reader Comments)
Welcome to Best of the Month, a monthly wrap-up of all our notable posts and favorite comments from readers like you. We love hearing your feedback. You can post your comments here on Bulletin, on Facebook, on Instagram, or on LinkedIn. Just this week I changed a caption in response to a reader's helpful note.
Your comments help us learn what you want to see more of and, most importantly, help us build a community. Transitions of all kinds are easier when we go through them together.
And speaking of together, I'll be spending the last week of summer with my family. The Nonlinear Life will return after Labor Day with a special series: Helping Families Transition to Fall. Please join me and share your ideas, questions, and tips!
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1. Burnout: The Good News About the Most Overused Word of the Year
Our most-read article of the month. Readers shared their personal experience on the burnout spectrum:
I think there are varying degrees of "burnout". Yes, it is probably a term, used too often. As a nurse, I know it's real. - Natalie Campbell Porter
Others felt that learning the origins of the word burnout and the three traits associated with the feeling resonated with their own lives:
if this doesn't hit the nail on the head....... - Patty Koch
This post got a huge reaction, which was gratifying, because arranging this talk in the middle of the pandemic was hugely challenging! Grateful to read this comment on Bulletin from a longtime reader:
This is hands down one of my favorite talks you have EVER given, and I watched a lot of them, as I wrote my symposium paper. Everything going back to 1999, and Walking the Bible up to present-day 2021! The idea of a life transition is something we can all understand. We all go through them. So many of us have gone through them without even realizing during the pandemic. But with this, you gave us an important reminder that going through a change is okay. This is life, it's not linear. - Nina De Angelo
3. The Cake with No Name: How the Pandemic Supercharged Time-Shifting Holidays
Readers thought this article on time-shifting holidays was timely, with one of you commenting on Facebook:
50 years from now, kids are going to be looking through old family cookbooks only to stumble upon the recipe for "Nana's Belated Binge-Worthy Birthday Cake" - Jackson Withrow
Change is a natural part of life, but that doesn't make it easy. In the Bulletin comments, one reader contemplated how she sees society's reactions to fast transitions:
This made me think about social norms on this side of the world. They are changing quickly and many are having a difficult time accepting and adapting. - Silvana Ordoñez
Another reader sounded off on Facebook about how quickly change can come:
I was just thinking about that yesterday. Change happens many times faster today than it did even 20 years ago. Not sure it's a good thing either. - Devra Swiger
5. Embracing the Nonlinear Life
In a nonlinear life, transitions can oftentimes catch you off-guard. One reader sounded off in the Bulletin comments about realizing when his life was in transition:
This year was one of the first times that I consciously realized that I was actually in transition. I imagine that the lack of movement outside of my own life only served to magnify every decision that I made into something more than it potentially was. - Ryan Huettel
Thanks again for all of your comments and for embracing this new project. We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday, 9/8, when we introduce even more features of The Nonlinear Life.
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Thanks for reading The Nonlinear Life. Please help us grow the community by subscribing, sharing, and commenting below. Also, you can learn more about me, read my introductory post, or scroll through my other posts.
Or these books: Life Is in the Transitions, The Secrets of Happy Families, Council of Dads.
Or, you can also contact me directly.
