David McElroy

Autumn color was very late to arrive in Birmingham this year, but it’s starting to look beautiful in some places. We still have a lot of trees that are mostly green, but some are gorgeous shades of reds, golds and yellows.

On my way back to the office Wednesday afternoon, I stopped to take a few photos and a video to share with you. I wish you were here to see the beauty for yourself, but this is the best I can do.

The photo above and the video below were both taken along Alabama 150 near I-459 in the Hoover area of Birmingham.

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Thanksgiving has taken on an entirely different meaning for me lately. Three years ago, I was in the midst of intense love — something I thought was going to last for a lifetime. And then it was over in a flash, leaving me bewildered and hurt.

Each time Thanksgiving week rolls around now, it brings a bittersweet swirl of intense feelings — a remembrance of sweet love mixed with the bitter pain of loss. I’m not sure which feeling is stronger, but every bit of it is powerfully intense.

I was lost in my thoughts as I left the office for lunch today. Since it’s two days before Thanksgiving, few people are on campus, so the lobby was empty and silent as I walked through.

As I was about to step out of the building, I realized someone else was approaching from the other side of the lobby, so I absent-mindedly held the door as this woman approached. Then I noticed it was someone I hadn’t seen lately.

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Why is it that the seeds of some people’s destruction are found in their greatest strength?

I’ve been wrestling with this question for a long time now. As I’ve gone through a low part of my life for the past four or five years, I was under the impression this had been a very recent thought for me. But last week, I found a note from myself dated April 11, 2008. It simply read, “Seeds of destruction? Why is it that the seeds of some people’s destruction are found in their greatest strength?”

I don’t remember having this thought back then and I have no idea what prompted it, but it struck me strongly enough to write it down. Almost 10 years later, it seems as though I had half of an insight back then — and maybe I finally have the other half of it today.

For most of my life, I’ve been fascinated with personality and how it affects different people’s actions, but I think I’ve had something backward for all these years. In fact, I suspect most of our personality systems have something fundamentally wrong. We focus on our apparent strengths in order to allow us to “outrun this humanity” inside — the messy parts we are so ashamed of.

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