Tim Lane and Paul Tripp are Cooler Than Me

Has anyone else checked out the book “Relationships: A Mess Worth Making“? It’s a new one by Tim Lane and Paul Tripp, the guys who wrote How People Change and presented it at the training conference in Ballard this past weekend.

First thing I noticed about the Relationships book was its cover. Clearly they are trying to appeal to a younger and more street level audience.

Next, I flipped through the pages and noticed that they begin each chapter by quoting music lyrics. Not hymns. Not “Contemporary Christian” stuff. Legit stuff like Radiohead, U2, The Vines, Oasis, Wilco, and Bright Eyes! I just laughed out loud and said, “Who’d these guys get to do their research? Because they must have been listening to Seattle’s indie radio station, KEXP.”

Well, at dinner Friday night, I asked about this curiosity, expecting to hear their confession that they did a little “market research” for this one. Paul Tripp flatly replied, “yeah, Tim and I just pulled those out of our personal collections…” I thought he was being sarcastic, and I played along! To the point that I later apologized that I might have insulted him. He was serious! I back-pedalled :-)

He already knew the title of the new Wilco album, which was just released less than a week ago!

So anyway, I gotta hand it to them. They’re actually in touch. I don’t know why I’m so surprised. But it’s refreshing.

Oh, and Paul’s an abstract painter too. Check this out…