{"id":6004,"date":"2021-06-03T03:12:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-03T03:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=6004"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:35:01","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:35:01","slug":"essentials","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=6004","title":{"rendered":"ESSENTIALS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Yesterday I wrote about my funk and how I wonder if it might be depression. A dear brother in Christ commented:<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;<spanPalatino Linotype\", Palatino, serif;text-align: justify' style=\"background-color: #fff9ee;color: #222222\">I don&#8217;t know the answer to that question but I love you, brother. Make sure you&#8217;re covering the essentials (exercise, good diet, friendship, time with the Lord). If those are covered and don&#8217;t help, it&#8217;s worth seeking out a professional counselor.&#8221;\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">When I think about it, my deepest friendships are all associated with various stages in my schooling:<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\n<li><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">Pete in grade school and junior high.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n\n\n<li><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">Mike, Tim, and Scott in high school.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n\n\n<li><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">Mark in college.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n\n\n<li><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">Tim and Jamie in seminary.<\/span><\/span><\/li>\n\n<\/ul>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">I guess I have found it difficult to find and properly maintain and grow friendships since moving into the &#8220;married adult&#8221; stage of life. I don&#8217;t think I am at all unique in this respect. At least, not among men.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">(Somehow women seem to have an easier time of nurturing friendships even during &#8211; and maybe even\u00a0<i><b>especially<\/b><\/i> during &#8211; the busy, stressful, married with kids stage of life.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">How do they do that?)<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><span style=\"color: #222222\"><span style=\"background-color: #fff9ee\">Maybe I need to go back to school!\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday I wrote about my funk and how I wonder if it might be depression. A dear brother in Christ commented: &#8220;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6004"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6004\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6005,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6004\/revisions\/6005"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}