Month: July 2026

Question for the reader: In your opinion, what are the best words in the English language? Judge them however you’d like. Does your mind turn to the most profound phrases from religious texts or mantras? A perfectly crafted line from a Shakespearian sonnet? Would it be the words that revealed that the person in front of you was going to be someone special in your life? A compliment or parting message from a loved one? “Life, laugh, love” or “Bless this mess?” (Please don’t.)

Author’s thesis: I submit that the very best words in good old American English have the power to frame every human condition ever experienced. In some cases they unite people of varied races, ethnicities, and religious beliefs/non-beliefs. They’ve been said quietly in the most sacred of moments and screamed with the most profane intentions. And they are, debatably, not even words.

Think about this: if I were to wake you from a dead sleep and shouted “One, two, three, four!” How would you react?

Would you tell me, “My baby don’t mess around because she loves me so, and this I know for sure?”

Or would you recount how “She was just seventeen?”

How about lamenting that, “The highway’s jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive?”

If I stuttered the count slightly would you nasally say, “Everybody’s talking about bagism, shagism…”

Maybe you wouldn’t say anything. Maybe you’d whistle the intro to Guns N’ Roses “Patience” or hum the guitar intro to Billy Joel’s “A Matter of Trust.”

If you’re a fan of current indie music, read: younger than 40, maybe you go right into “Straight Line Was a Lie” from the criminally underrated band The Beths. (Side note: at some point we need to discuss the culturally impactful couple of decades New Zealand has had.)

When they’d play live, The Ramones had a reputation for starting each song with a rapid-fire count-in. George Stroumboulopoulos, a Canadian broadcaster, once asked Markey Ramone, why Dee Dee Ramone always did the count-in. Markey’s response was, “You know Dee Dee was always good with numbers.” Perfect response. There’s no need to over-analyze an act of magic.

Author’s summation: Maybe suggesting the count-in to a song counts as language is cheating or neglects timeless poetry and is a modern quirk. But the Greeks invoked muses before their works with the goal of summoning something bigger than one person. An invitation to connect. I’d say the count-in does the same thing. 

If all of this feels like an overstatement, I politely suggest you attend a concert by a major artist and witness, no feel, firsthand what happens to tens of thousands of people when the performer counts into one of their most beloved songs. It’s inexpressible.  

Maybe the best thing about these four words is that they open us up to a world beyond what words can do.

I have to confess that, despite not having a head for finance, I am a devotee of CNBC’s morning show, Squawk Box. Amidst a sea of cable news networks with more motives than a film noir plot, Squawk Box’s agenda is overt, namely “what does this news mean for financial markets?” The hosts are knowledgeable, balanced and likeable. But amidst the talk of market consolidation, options expirations, and relentless debate over AI, what I really love is when Arthur Brooks joins the show for a hefty 15 minute segment which seems to be about every other week. I have skipped breakfast, been late to work and in one unfortunate incident missed a call regarding one of my children’s educational challenges just to hear what Arthur Brooks has to say.

Brooks doesn’t so much have a resume as he has a journey. His background is well documented on his impressive website and manicured Wikipedia page. It’s the story of an interesting but unfocused youth, a pass through academia then politics, and into the broadest mission there is – a search for meaning. As a DC person myself, [shudder] I first heard his name as the head of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), a conservative think tank that in the Pre-Trump times had a reputation for being modern and widely engaged. In the mid-aughts, word had spread to my colleagues that Brooks was looking to reinvent AEI for a world he saw as shifting rapidly and I started watching him more closely. 

These days, Brooks has ascended to a rare and most important title, billing himself as a “thinker.” And it’s safe to say the world has endorsed it. He’s published at least 7 books and seems to have a non-stop schedule of speeches and media appearances. He’s Ram Dass for people who order Huckberry clothing. He’s Tach Nicht Han for people… well, for people who watch CNBC in the morning.

And when you hear Brooks speak, it’s easy to see how he’s achieved this status. He seems very in touch with the contradictions of modern life such as our ability to access all knowledge and entertainment at all times while still feeling like we’re missing something. Or how we’re achieving more but getting less fulfillment. Or how we feel we have a duty to serve a potentially dying world despite our inability to manage our own lives or emotions. He acknowledges these contradictions as things that are not just in our heads, and his recognition of this fact alone is helpful for lots of us. Sometimes, he cites research and historical precedent to explain why the emotional problems we have as adults in modern America are different from those experienced 2 or 3 generations ago. Other times, he draws on religion and myth to reveal how our problems are timeless. He makes you think about what you’re chasing in life and why. Though it’s worth noting that he’s been suspiciously quiet on how we’re to reconcile Bravo reality TV shows with the existence of a just and loving God.

But while Brooks confidently and affably holds forth on a news program, a bud of conflict grows in your mind. Here is a man who understands the need for simplicity in life and the futility of chasing fleeting rewards like status, material wealth or internet points. And he easily convinces you of the same. But your brain smells a disagreement: to see Brooks on this national TV program, he must spend so much of his energy chasing, as my kids say, that bag. Which somehow feels like the opposite of the advice he’s giving. 

Dig into Brooks on the web and the conflict between guru and influencer gets deeper. He, like so many untrustworthy internet things, deals in superlatives, hyping his new book, The Meaning of Your Life as “the hardest book I’ve ever written.” 

Earlier this year, his account on LinkedIn posted an opening on his team for an Operations Assistant to help with scheduling, travel, time management, etc. A section of the job listing is called, “why this role matters” and read, “You will directly enable the creative, intellectual, and mission-driven work of a nationally recognized thought leader and the CEO of a high-growth company…” It’s hard to articulate why, but that feels icky, right? It’s not just me?

Another LinkedIn post tells followers, “[Knowing your affect profile] helps you see where your happiness comes from, what drains it, and how you relate to other people whose emotional patterns may be very different from yours. I have a test called ‘The Happiness Scale’ that helps you understand your affect profile, by the way. If you’re interested in seeing what it can do for you and your teams, you can check it out here:” The post then links to Brooks’ website where you enter your credit card and, after a ten minute test, get results and guidance for a mere $14.99. 

The conflict in your brain fully blossoms and becomes clear. Many of the things Brooks touts as the key to happiness seem to be at odds with the way he exists in the world. He eschews the same tools he uses to promote his work and himself. He suggests simplicity while living a complicated life.

As far as I can figure there are three assumptions we can make to resolve the contradiction of Arthur Brooks:

Option One – Arthur Brooks is at peace. It is you who is not. Let’s assume that Brooks is 100% the real deal. That he heeds most of his own guidance and has somehow reconciled the emptiness of the modern world with his utilization of that same world. In short, let’s assume that, from Brooks’ standpoint, there is no conflict. The problem with this assumption is that you know that behind the scenes he’s negotiating book deals, turning down speaking engagements that are too small, and scrapping to get higher and higher caliber media appearances. You can easily picture him second guessing decisions that have affected his status and/or personal wealth. And none of that sounds peaceful or like the life of man who understands true happiness.

Option Two – and this feels the least likely, Brooks is in it just for the money. Here, we assume that some combination of his life experience and his cognitive wiring has made Arthur Brooks a snake oil salesman. He and his team spend time crafting insights drawn from others’ research and historical knowledge. They draft speeches and talking points and are always, always, always working on the next book and the next media tour. When one insight is finalized and polished, Brooks or someone on his team strategizes ways to monetize it using, for example, website quizzes. There are two problems here. First, as simple and naive as this may seem, he just doesn’t seem like a person who would do that. But second, wouldn’t the act of doing the research, refining it all and putting out into the world actually be the thing he’s purporting to be? In other words, wouldn’t doing all the work it would take to be an effective fraud actually make him the real deal to some extent? And if so, is it ok for us to heed the advice of someone who is not what he appears to be?   

Option Three – Brooks is a product that you can choose to buy or not buy. Maybe it doesn’t matter? Maybe whether Brooks is the real deal or isn’t the real deal is not relevant to the messages he delivers. You can find value in his work or not. Or you can just find value in some of it. Buy one book, but not another. Take inspiration from a speech, but don’t buy the personality test. Honestly, this seems like the best option. The only remaining problem here is that addressing the modern problems in life is hard. Very hard. So hard, in fact, that most of us question whether it’s possible at all to achieve a deeper peace on a day-to-day basis. And that it’s nearly impossible to trust even part of the guidance Brooks offers if we suspect that he – the human who has internalized it best – isn’t living it. It’s easy to see Brooks as an all-or-nothing offering. But what human, or human-built entity is purely all just one thing? 

This mystery isn’t really about Arthur Brooks, of course. And it isn’t about the sphere of Ted Talkers, influencers and life coaches that do similar work. I think, as strange as it sounds, the thing that is curious about Brooks isn’t even about whether there’s hope for emotional and spiritual peace in the modern world. I think maybe it comes down to a simple and much older question: how much can you trust advice from someone who makes money off of it? And despite it all, I find myself wondering, “what would Arthur Brooks say about that?”

One of the topics we don’t seriously discuss in modern America is how parents shape the next generation’s view of our country. There are obvious ways, of course. It takes only seconds to find images of elementary school kids in MAGA hats and tee ball players at No Kings rallies. And it’s certainly not a new topic. The story arc of early indoctrination, followed by teenage rebellion and finally becoming yourself is ingrained in stories older than books. 

But there are less overt, less intentional ways in which parents frame their children’s impressions of the United States. Ways that deserve attention. One of them is the example set by adults in how they interact with others, finding common ground – or not – in front of their kids who watch it all happen in real time. 

As a kid, political debates in my family were loud, sometimes personal and for the most part quickly forgotten. Occasionally they lingered.   

My grandfather served during World War II, playing the trumpet in a band division of the Army. He referred to the war as “the big one,” and as far as I could tell, from the end of his service until his death he never doubted that he had played a part in a great achievement. He carried all the pride and none of the haunting that the other WWII vets in my family had. He glorified all things Army-related. Every once in a while, he’d hang out at the bar at the VFW in our small town to reminisce and comment on the state of the world. He always made sure to let us know when he’d made it down to the VFW. 

My father served a tour in the 101st Airborne Division of the U.S. Army during Vietnam and earned a Bronze Star. He carried a rifle in the jungle for weeks at a time and rarely referred to the war by name after coming home. Until his later years, he never seemed to know what to feel about his experience and even then, I don’t think he ever fully came to terms with it. He did not glorify Army-related things. He told me that he had been to the VFW bar once or twice, but did not like it. 

My grandfather’s patriotism was unmitigated and all-encompassing. Both international and domestic politics could be cleanly split between those who were pro-America and those who weren’t. My father very strongly believed in America but felt that its leaders needed to be watched and questioned – not taken at their word. He believed the world was too complicated to be easily divided between good guys and bad guys. While both men believed in American exceptionalism, the power of American free enterprise and that the United States was unique in offering unlimited opportunity contingent upon your willingness to work, they saw the country they lived in very differently.

As a kid, I was both the audience and the subject of their political disagreements. “He’s going to go to West Point!” my grandfather would aver. “The hell he is,” my dad would counter. Thrust, parry. Sometimes, my grandfather would then point out that his generation had won their war. My dad would respond by noting he couldn’t think of a single conflict that had been decided by the sound of a trumpet. They’d move on from these arguments, but never quite fully get past them.

I watched their disagreements, never sure what to make of it. That would come later. 

Too often, we talk about finding “common ground” with those we disagree with, but the phrase falls short. Common ground is a trope, a phrase used in the opening of political introductions meant to purchase credibility. It’s a promise of a checklist or Venn diagram. But real commonality, the kind that can help us, draws from something deeper. Something more human and more connected.

My grandfather spent the final seven-plus years of his life bedridden, confined to one room of his now empty house with a hospital bed and a small TV. (Don’t smoke, kids.) He’d watch the local news, the network news, and game shows, using them to inform the state of the world outside his house. His outdated conviction of the many things wrong with the world metastasized. Yet, somehow, every night for nearly two presidential terms, my father went to see him. He’d drive over to my grandfather’s house after dinner to check on him. To make sure he had what he needed, and to give him someone to rant to. To make sure he was heard and connected to another. I was lucky enough to accompany him on many of those trips, but probably not as many as I should have.

This is the political example set for me and it’s a tricky one because, as far as I can tell, it doesn’t contain a broad systemic recommendation for a better political environment or more efficient debate. There’s no suggestion of issues we can all support or a framing of our challenges that makes for a better dialogue. For a better America. What it does offer, though, is a template for how an individual can make the country better, without persuasion, facts, or conversion of beliefs. Just abiding and care for others.

At a time when I repeatedly hear stories of families torn by political disagreements, I am eternally grateful to have the example provided to me by my father and grandfather and I hope that in some small way, I am passing it along to the next generation. In fact, that is my hope for all of us.