Degrees in Idealism

When You Can’t Do Date Night

01.13.2018 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // 4 Comments

Scheduled date nights are often prescribed for couples to keep their relationships strong. I don’t think this is a bad thing— I think it’s most often a very good thing! Creating uninterrupted, quality time and space to spend with those we love is essential. Nobody wants their marriage to become a mere roommate-situation. Scheduled date […]

Christmas Baby

12.27.2017 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

Christmas Day and an infant sleeps on my chest And I figure that he’s closer to me now than he’ll ever be. So I bury my nose into this sweet-smelling baby head And I breathe in deep what doesn’t seem to last. Christmas music plays and the lights twinkle beside our heavenly peace. Little boys are […]

My Advent CD

11.27.2017 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // 2 Comments

Properly celebrating Advent can be tough in a society that typically starts Christmasing around Thanksgiving and promptly ceases merriment on December 26th. One thing that has always been particularly bothersome to me is the general lack of Advent music. I’ve got an Advent playlist I add to every year, but this year I wanted to do […]

Why Growing Up Makes Us Sad

11.18.2017 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

Cherish these precious moments. They grow up so fast. Every parent has heard this advice. Older parents have probably given it. I am only now beginning to understand it. In fact, I used to really dislike this advice— and not just when I became a mother. I disliked it a long time ago when I heard people […]

Being There

11.01.2017 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // 4 Comments

Being present. It’s something most all of us struggle with in this digital, fast-paced world where screens lure us in and distract us from the depth and beauty in our lives— where there’s always new entertainment to shield us from contemplation, imagination, and the age-old “problem” of boredom. But as much as we struggle with […]

What Does It Profit to Gain All The Likes?

09.09.2017 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

The other day I found myself captivated by a slew of “America’s Got Talent” child singers’ first performances. The videos have millions of views; the reactions of the crowd, the other judges, the children, the families of the children, and the rest of the world are largely the same: this is a good thing. This […]

“There are degrees in idealism. We learn first to play with it academically, as the magnet was once a toy. Then we see in the heyday of youth and poetry that it may be true, that it is true in gleams and fragments. Then, its countenance waxes stern and grand, and we see that it must be true.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

I found this quote well described my own experience– consistently reworking my idealism, being surprised by it, sometimes even losing it only to discover it all the more fully. I know we will never find all the answers, but how thrilling it is to find ourselves getting a little closer to the source and summit of things, a little closer, as we work our way through the “degrees.”