Degrees in Idealism

exploring how we would live if we truly believed life was meaningful

  • Culture
  • Marriage
  • Family
  • Wellness
  • Beauty
  • Soul

My Favorite Children’s Picture Books

03.24.2018 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // 4 Comments

“Read to your kids,” parents are told over and over again. Choosing books in favor of T.V. or other sorts of entertainment is surely a no-brainer. But does it matter what you read to them? With all the reading campaigning that goes on, it would seem like any combination of words and pictures bound together […]

Categories // Beauty, Family Tags // #beauty, #books, #charlottemason, #children, #homeschooling, #parenting

What is an animal that is not nocturnal?

11.30.2016 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

My three year old turned to me, and asked, urgently, What’s it called when an animal is NOT nocturnal? Hmm. I don’t know. That’s a good question. He paused for a few moments and, maybe one day when me and Nicholas are big we can go and find a dragonfly. And then we can ask […]

Categories // Beauty, Culture, Soul Tags // #beauty, #livinginthepresent, #technologyproblems, #wonder

Is Every Girl Beautiful?

04.01.2015 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // 3 Comments

Every girl is beautiful. So say the many ad campaigns of the body-positive movement in an effort to end the epidemics of eating disorders, self-hatred, and low self-esteem among girls and women. And I agree. Every girl is beautiful. Every human being is beautiful. I believe we were created, and we are thereby works of art — […]

Categories // Beauty, Culture Tags // #beauty, #femininity, #findingmeaning, #women

If Computers Replace Mozart

02.06.2015 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

I recently watched a video that compared human composed music with computer composed music. I was sure that the computer music would be robotic and easily recognizable. I was wrong. The computers made symphonies just as the humans made symphonies and most people (including me) couldn’t tell the difference between the two. And this terrified […]

Categories // Beauty, Culture, Soul Tags // #beauty, #findingmeaning, #mozart, #music, #technology, #technologyproblems

Embracing the King of Prussia and Other Chaos

11.05.2013 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

Ever since I’ve had music on my computer I’ve had very detailed playlists. I have playlists for every season, for various holidays. I have driving playlists, sad playlists, hyper playlists, mellow playlists. When it was necessary, I didn’t have just one breakup playlist, but three. A breakup playlist for wallowing. A breakup playlist for being […]

Categories // Beauty, Family Tags // #babies, #beauty, #motherhood, #parenthood, #stress

Why I Will Refuse the Hospital Gown

06.21.2013 by Elizabeth Hanna Pham // Leave a Comment

I’m not sure if there’s any item of clothing uglier than a hospital gown. It’d be one thing if they were plain. Maybe white, black- I don’t know. It seems like the little geometric designs just make it even worse. Or maybe it’s the boxiness. Perhaps it’s the over-modesty on the front side making you […]

Categories // Beauty, Family, Wellness Tags // #beauty, #hospital, #pregnancy

About Me

I'm Elizabeth. I'm a wife, a mother to three little boys, a writer, and a lover and seeker of the beautiful, the true, and the good. I am a believer in idealism-- that even amidst the chaos and the confusion, the exhaustion and the sadness of life there is always joy to be found, hope to be clung to, and a better path to be taken. I write my thoughts on this blog. A link to my fiction book is at the bottom of the page.

About The Name

“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.”

sons of God

sons of God

A short novella in which Lucifer talks about his dad.

View Book

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