Tag Archives: Personal growth

What Are You Looking At?

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If you’re like me, you’ve got dreams.  You’ve got stuff that you’re passionate about and goals you’re hungry to reach.  But it’s so easy to get caught up in the details of life that, before we know it, we’ve lost focus.  This is a constant battle for me.  The many “Urgent” things start to crowd out the few really important things.

The reasons for this are pretty straight forward.  – You’re sitting, minding your own business, focusing on something specific that’s important to you, but little do you know you’re being watched!  You look up, almost feeling the gaze of something predatory lurking just out of sight. You shake it off as nothing, double down on your focus and just when you’re making good headway – it pounces!  Someone else’s agenda!  Aaarrgghh!

The sad truth is that if you don’t have plans for your time, someone else does.  And their plans are almost never for your benefit.
#1 – You lose focus on what’s important to you when you allow other people’s agendas to steal your time.

Maybe you’re one of those chronic people pleasers.  You love people and see things you can do to help them.  You commit to do more and more because you want to make them happy.  It’s not necessarily that they are asking, you’re just offering.  You find yourself severely over committed and you just have too much on your plate.
#2 – You can’t get your important stuff done, because you’re too busy and over extended in the service of your fellow man.

Maybe you’re like me.  If I were a dog, I would be a sight hound.  Some dogs track by scent and some by sight.  I track movement.  I am a visual learner.  This doesn’t work in my favor when I’m trying to focus though.  Pop-up distractions are everywhere.  I may start off a Saturday morning with a pretty specific schedule of things I want to get done.  The next thing I know, I drove past a store that reminded me of something I wanted to get, or investigate, and pop-up by pop-up, my schedule gets blown.
#3 – You can’t get your important stuff done because of you yield to pop-up distractions.

Michael Hyatt often quotes his wife Gail Hyatt concerning purpose.  She says “People lose their way when they lose their why”.

The Why is super important with it comes to having the discipline to stay on track.  Our why is directly coupled with our vision.   2 Corinthians 3:18 in the Bible tells us that we are changed by what we see.  You may have heard the phrase If you can see it, you can be it.  This is true.   It’s also true that if you can’t see, you can’t become.  We see from both 2 Corinthians 3:18, and Romans 12:1-2 that what we see changes us.  Romans says that if we’re not intentional about renewing our mind with God’s word, we will default to being conformed to this world.

The word Conform here comes from the root meaning Union, and from an alternate word meaning A figure.  A figure is something you see.  United with what we see.  Changed by the image that strikes the eye – that’s what it means to conform.  When we renew our minds intentionally, we replace that figure with a new vision painted by God’s Word.  Keith Moore says it this way – We become what we behold.  This vision gives us guidance.

“People lose their way when they lose their why.”  – Gail Hyatt

The Bible says that Where there is no vision, the people perish. – Pro 29:18.
The literal version of that verse says that where there is no vision, the people are unrestrained.  when I think of unrestrained, I think of a horse’s bridle.  A trained horse can do remarkable things when it’s bridled.  The restraint of the bridle keeps the horse focused and it’s energy moving in a specific way.

When I was a little boy, we had a Shetland pony.  At night when it began to get dark, my job was to get a halter and go bring her in from the pasture.  It seemed like every night, as I would draw close to her, she would trot away from me about 20 yards and start grazing again.  This would happen over and over.  I eventually learned that once I got close, I would run up and jump “shot cowboy” style across her back, working the halter on from there. Once the halter was on, I could lead her and keep her on track.  After a few nights of that, as soon as I got that halter on her, she immediately started walking toward the house.  She eventually became so trained to it, that all I needed to do was get on her back and she would start in from the pasture.  The halter eventually became a trigger for her that it was time to do something else.

Like the halter, or the bridle, vision provides guidelines.

Vision gives us purpose

In Genesis, God invited Abram to look up into the night sky. Gen 15:5 – And He (Jehovah) brought him (Abram) outside and said, Look now toward the heavens and count the stars, if you are able to count them. And He said to him, So shall your seed be. (15:6) And he believed in Jehovah. And He counted it to him for righteousness.

God had just told an old man that the child coming from his own body would be his heir.  When Abram asked how these things would be, God used the sky to give Abram vision. Can you imagine how compelling that was for Abram?  God later used the sand in the desert to bolster Abraham’s faith, reminding him of the promise of the covenant – so shall your seed be.

This changed the way Abram thought.  It gave him faith to become what God had called him to become.  Vision gave him purpose.

Vision gives us priorities

It keeps us reminded of what really matters.  All of us get the same number of hours per week, and there are a lot of things we could be spending our time on. The truth is that for every thing you say yes to, you are automatically saying no to something else.  Our Vision helps us weigh out opportunity cost of saying yes to the wrong thing.  It helps us make decisions in line with our priorities, and by doing that, helps us alleviate the regret that comes from making a bad choice and wasting our time. Vision gives us priorities.

Vision gives us passion

It becomes clear that one of our most important things we can do is to find ways to keep what’s important in the front of our mind.   There are several ways we can do this.

  • One way I do this is my Vision Wall.  I have a cork-board in my home office that has things on it that I need to be continually reminded about.  I have pictures of ministers and charities that we pray for, and often support. The main thing is to have pictures, or some visual representation of your goals.  These need to be compelling.  They need to have some pull on you, so when you see them, they have a motivating affect on you.
  • I have a written out prayer on my bathroom mirror for my children.  I mumble through it while I’m brushing my teeth.  I also have Psalm 112, and 1 Corinthians 13:45-8 (Amp) on my mirror to read to myself while I’m getting ready in the morning.
  • I also keep a folder called Vision Images on my computer desktop.  This folder has images that I’ve gleaned from social media of all my brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews and various relatives and friends.  It’s sole purpose is to bring them to mind so I can pray for them.

By keeping vision before our eyes, it gives us the passion we need to move forward.  I once heard it said that there is no such thing as a lazy person, there are just people who have not been properly motivated.  I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know that when my vision is in my face, and compelling, I don’t have to drag myself out of bed in the morning, I wake up with my engine revving, anticipating the day.

Dig deep this week.  When it comes to your vision, where do you stand?  Does your vision motivate you?  Are you passionate about where you’re heading?  I encourage you to press the pause button on your life for a minute and reconnect with your WHY.

If this helps you at all, please share.  Also, if you’re not already getting these posts in your email, consider subscribing.

I appreciate you.

Art

 

Where Did The Time Go?

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My Life In A Graph.

This image is a graph I threw together to represent my life on earth.  I don’t know how long I will live but for the sake of the graph, I chose 94 years old.  Each block represents a week.  There are 52 blocks wide and 94 blocks down.  The highlighted portion shows the time that I’ve already spent.  The blocks that are not highlighted represent the yet to be lived portion of my life.

my-life

I got the idea for this graph, watching Tim Urban give a TEDtalk about procrastination (see link at the bottom).  Tim showed a similar graph for a 90 year old person.

While some might think this is a bit morbid, I think it’s important to measure these things because we as humans, have a tendency to drift and put things off until “Someday”.

Where did the time go?

Have you ever looked back at some important event in your life and suddenly realized how many years had passed since it happened?  Where did the time go?  It may seem like it was only yesterday.  We’re human. If we are not intentional, we will lose track of time.  That’s really what this is about…Time, and how we use it.

In Tim’s speech, he humorously outlines the difference between the brain of a normal person, and the brain of a chronic procrastinator.  While they both looked very similar, the procrastinator’s brain had one difference.  It’s what Tim calls the “Immediate Gratification Monkey”.

People everywhere living with regret.

One of the thoughts that I came away with after watching Tim’s talk was that there are people everywhere living with regret.  Why?  Because regret is usually what comes after procrastination has run it’s course.

Many things that we might procrastinate on are short term & temporary.  A report due to your boss at the end of the month, or a low interest rate on a loan.  These things are tied to time and have a relatively immediate consequence attached to them.  Even if you have to put in extra hours, do extra stuff, or lose sleep to get these done, you’re not likely to totally forget because of the consequences.

There are other things though, that are not tied to time and don’t have an immediate consequence.  It’s these things that cause so much of our regret.  These are the things in the “Someday” slot.  I wrote in a previous post about how I had asked my dad if we would ever go see Elvis Presley live.  My dad said “Someday”.  Just a few years later Elvis passed away.  Someday never came (see link at the bottom).

Someday!  

How many people had big dreams, dreams of traveling to some place they long desired to see, but in the twilight of their lives, they looked back with regret? They never made it happen.  Maybe they had broken relationships that they always intended to fix, or hurt feelings they always intended to forgive…someday.  Suddenly, they realized that it’s too late.  they are too old, their health is failing, or that other person is now gone.

These “Someday” issues often carry a far greater weight of regret.  The problem is that they are not tied to a short term consequence, so we don’t ever get to the point of panic over a deadline.  We will put off something that may be hard or painful to deal with, telling ourselves that we will deal with it eventually.  Eventually is a very nebulous, ethereal word. It’s not concrete.  Eventually is a synonym for Someday.  They both describe a realm where things go to never get done.

Chip & Dan Heath wrote a tremendous book called Decisive.  In chapter 11 they discuss the need for trip-wires.  They tell the story of a woman from Alabama who always wanted to visit Italy.  She had a chance to go once but because of work, she decided to put the trip off.  While she often thought about Italy, time slipped by. After several decades pass, her health deteriorated to the point that she couldn’t go at all.  The Heath brothers ask the question “When did she ‘Choose’ not to visit Italy?  Was it every day? Or never?  She surely never expected that her first decision to postpone the trip, would become a permanent one.”

Deciding by not deciding.

For plans like this, we need to install a trip-wire.  Something that would bring the choice to the forefront of our mind, forcing us to reconsider our plan, make it happen, or discard it.  We have to be intentional about these things because we have a tendency to run on autopilot a lot more than we know.  If this woman from Alabama could have put a time limit on her postponed trip, that said something like “If I haven’t visited Italy by my 38th birthday, I will either make it a high priority, or discard it”.

There are a lot of examples of this.  Has anyone heard of the band Van Halen’s stipulation in their concert rider that a bowl of M&M’s would be placed in the dressing room with all of the brown M&M’s removed?  I remember the first time I heard about that, I thought they were being ridiculous and difficult to work with.  It turns out though, that it was a trip-wire to quickly tell the band that the venue hadn’t fully read or followed the details of the contract.  It automatically put the band and roadies on high alert.  They would need to be extra careful about the staging, power availability & safety.

Moving forward.

It may be because I’m getting older, I don’t know.  I have been thinking a lot about my time.  I want to make sure I’m not just drifting.  I don’t want to let my dreams just float by and not live them because I let Busy get in the way of Important.

Where do you stand?  Is there something important to you, that the busyness of your life has crowded out?  Maybe it’s time to put it on the calendar.

 

Tim’s TEDtalk

My previous post Someday is never a safe bet.

Living In The Realm Of What Is, Not What Isn’t.

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When I was about eleven, my sister and I hatched a plan. My parents had divorced the year before, and my Dad lived three states away. We hadn’t seen him since before the divorce, and we missed him some kind of bad.

We heard that our grandparents were planning a trip to go see him. Our caper was simple, we would find a way to get to our grandparent’s house right before they left and we would stow away in their camper. They always had a camper and we were pretty sure they would take it on this particular trip. Our idea was that they wouldn’t find us until it was too late to drive back. You know, It would be a “Well, we’ve already gone this far”, kind of thing. It never quite worked out. We didn’t get to stow away in the camper.

A photo by Tim Arterbury. unsplash.com/photos/VkwRmha1_tI

Thinking back today, I’m so glad we failed. Eleven year old’s just don’t think very far ahead. When I think back on it and I think about all of the potential problems it would have caused, I just shudder. It would have likely cost everyone a lot of money and we would have ended up where we started. Also, it would have broken my mom’s heart and ruined my grandparent’s trip.  We were so focused on our Dad that we weren’t considering everyone else.

Recently I watched a documentary about Tony Robbins. It’s called “I’m Not Your Guru”. It chronicled one of Tony’s 4 day “Unleashing the Power Within” seminars. One of the people that Tony helped specifically, was a young woman who was there with her mom. This young woman had a fractured relationship with her Dad. I don’t remember what the issues were specifically, but I know he hadn’t been in her life for many years. One of the things that came to light was that she blamed her Dad for many of the difficulties that she had experienced. She felt abandoned. She traced most of the problems she faced in her life back to the fact that he wasn’t there.

Tony said something to her that stuck with me, and I’ve given it a lot of thought ever since. He pointed out that we have a tendency to fixate and obsess over what’s missing in our lives, and completely ignore what’s actually there. When it comes to our absentee fathers, we ascribe a value to them based on what we imagine would have been different, or better, had they actually been there. Everything from the rough neighborhood we had to live in growing up, to the imagined advantages that we never had because we didn’t have a man around to teach us man things.

When we obsess about the missing pieces in our lives, we hurt ourselves in many ways. I’ve outlined four that I had to deal with below.

  • When we focus on what’s missing, we ignore what we have. Spending all our time thinking about the Dad that left often blinds us to the Mom that stuck it out. When I think about the things my mom went through raising us, I am humbled. Against some pretty tremendous odds, she managed to keep us together. And it’s that more than anything else that gives us strength today.
  • When we focus on what’s missing, we develop a victim mentality. We look at our lives with a sense of powerlessness. Situations and circumstances are mostly beyond our control and we feel that we either have no right or no power to change things. This leads to the thinking that everything bad that happens to you is always someone else’s fault.
  • When we focus on what’s missing, we tend to become ungrateful. We tend to overlook the good that we have. We may unintentionally let all the negative overshadow the positive in our lives.  This includes all the people who never gave up on us.  The ones who stuck it out.
  • When we focus on what’s missing, we accept the limits of the wrong story. For many years, I thought that I couldn’t get ahead because my Dad left me without advantage. My friends and relatives who’s Dads were still there, helped them with things. Things like understanding money, basic knowledge of cars, work ethic, and knowing how to build and fix stuff. The first time my grand dad took me to the garage to work with him on my mom’s car, I had a revelation. I was not without help. I began to understand that I had a lot of the help that I thought I was missing. God just brought it to me by another route.

Tony Robbins made a strong statement to the young woman in the documentary. He said that if she was going to blame her Dad for the negative, she was also going to have to blame him for all the positive that came from it. She was going to have to blame him for the fact that she learned how to deal with problems. She was going to have to blame him for making her into a strong woman. She was going to have to give him credit for those things too.

Look at the person you are today. What difficulties or hardships in your past shaped you for the better? What do you possess today that you wouldn’t have had if you hadn’t endured your past? It’s time to focus on what is, and forget about what isn’t.

It’s time to re-frame the picture of our life, let go of the imaginary life in our head that never happened and give real thought to how we can move forward from where we are. Let today be the foundation for a future where we focus on possibilities. Not a foundation that’s haunted by the ghost of what wasn’t, but, at least in our minds, should have been.

What to do when you want to Get Even.

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Our good friends take us to dinner for our birthday. Suddenly, while we’re enjoying the food and the company, the waitstaff descends on us with a loudly sung song in celebration. It may involve horns, whistles and a funny hat. It almost always involves a dessert dish of some sort and a tiny bit of public embarrassment. We look at our dear friends after things quiet down and mutter “I’ll get even with you!”

Forgive social card background

Getting even. We all know what it means. Sometimes we use it jokingly, but often it comes from a place of being hurt, and it has become synonymous with retaliation. It usually means that someone has been hurt. One party has caused some sort of wrong or damage onto another.

Getting even comes from the idea that “Even” is the condition we all need to be in. In our interactions with one another, there is give and take. Even means scores are settled, debts are paid and we are on the level with one another. This is where we all attempt to live with each other.

For any number of reasons, someone may have done something that hurt us. Whether it resulted from an accident that they couldn’t fix, negligence that they wouldn’t fix, or a mean spirit where causing pain & trouble was the goal, you were the one who got hurt in the process.

Things need to be brought back into a state of being even. In natural man’s thinking, that means that a couple of things might likely happen.

  • Restitution. A person at the store accidentally backed into your car. Their insurance pays to bring things back to the way they were before the accident.The teenager across the street accidentally under-steers while backing out of the driveway and takes out your mailbox. They pay you to replace your mailbox.

    I remember the time I had to replace my uncle’s sliding glass door. I accidentally walked through it thinking it was open. It shattered everywhere. I payed for a new one. It was the right thing to do.

  • Revenge. Our legal system is based on a system of standardized and systematized revenge. People pay with portions of their lives based on how serious the crime was that they were convicted for. Stealing, first offense could get a sentence of one year of probation, while treason or terrorism could get the death penalty.One well known case of revenge was when Aaron Burr decided he had enough of what he considered Alexander Hamilton’s back room dealings. Burr challenged Hamilton to a duel. The duel resulted in Hamilton’s death.

    Revenge can even be something so small as back biting and gossip. You wouldn’t ever physically harm someone, but you’re going to make sure EVERYBODY knows what they did to you and how badly you were victimized by that meanie.

There is another road. It’s called forgiveness. Sometimes people can’t pay what’s owed. Revenge can be pretty costly. Usually when someone is the victim of revenge, they are pretty sure they didn’t deserve it. Then they might also retaliate, and then you have a war on your hands. Forgiveness is a better option. Forgiveness is the best way to get us back to even.

“The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.”
― Mahatma Gandhi,

What does it mean to forgive? When people truly forgive, they are pledging to give up their right to be offended or hurt. They drop it. You may have heard it said before, “I forgave them, but I will never forget it”. This isn’t true forgiveness.  True forgiveness is when we drop our claim.  That means not remembering…intentionally.

Webster’s dictionary defines forgive as:

  1. To give up resentment of or claim to requital for an insult.
  2. To grant relief from payment.
  3. To cease to feel resentment against an offender.
  4. To pardon one’s enemies.

In the Bible, the Greek word translated forgive in the New Testament is Aphiemi. (af-ee’-ay-mee). It means to send. In various applications it means to send forth. To send away. To yield up. We see this used 147 times in scripture. One notable place is found in 1 John 1:9. Where John writes – If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

“To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.”
― C.S. Lewis

If we are really dropping our claim, if we are truly sending our offense forth, sending it away and yielding it up, then we will not be holding on to thoughts of it. If we really forgive, we stop bringing it up, or using it as leverage when we’re angry.

When we want to get even, we want restitution. If we can’t get that, we might seek revenge, but if you allow God to work in you, He will give you a heart of forgiveness. Think about it, there was no way we could pay restitution to Him, and thankfully, He didn’t seek revenge.  Instead, He made a way where we could get back to Him when we couldn’t get there for ourselves.  He extended His mercy and grace toward us in Jesus.  He offered us forgiveness.  Through His mercy, He lifted us to a place of peace with Him, where we have no fear of retaliation.  Christ Himself payed our restitution. (Click here to know more.) 1 Peter 2:21 says that Jesus gave us an example that we should follow in His steps.

Instead of getting even, you can forgive. By forgiving, you are showing the mercy that God has given to you.  You are getting back to even with them.  Instead of getting even, we can say you are giving even.

Love you guys! Don’t forget to share.

Art

What is Honor?

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What does it mean to be honored? I did a google search for images of honor and several images were found of the U.S. President placing a medal around the neck of a soldier. We celebrated Memorial Day recently where we honor the memory of our fallen soldiers. A large part of the observance of Memorial Day is to show honor by decorating their tombs and grave sites, and showing reverence for their sacrifice. It would seem then that honor has something to do with medals & decorations.

Monuments cropped

stocksnap.io

While we do show honor through medals & decorations, in most cases, what we are really honoring is an act. Usually an act of courage, valor, or bravery. Acts come from the inside of people. Consistent acts reveal what is in the heart in abundance. It is in times of long service, or service under high distress and danger that a person’s true character is revealed. It is in moments like these, when some people rise up to a level of true greatness, revealing qualities of exceptional leadership, bravery or self sacrifice. In the act of honoring, we are acknowledging in them a high quality that we revere and value. We are ornamenting a person because they have made a significant impact for good to those around them. They have made a difference.

When we look to scripture, we see in Malachi 1:6 God the Father is asking a question of the priests. He says “A son honors his father, and a servant honors his master. So if I am a father, where is my honor? If I am a master, where is my respect? You priests who despise my name.”

“I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to
succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have.”
― Abraham Lincoln

In this scripture we see both sides of honor. God says “If I am and Father and a Master, where’s my honor?” Implying that God expected to be honored and respected. The farther implication is that God expects that parents and masters (employers) are to be honored and respected also. (Ex 20:12. Eph 6:1-3. Col 3:22. 1 Pet 2:18).

Recently I saw a picture on social media of a man with his Bible on his knee and his hand wresting on it. In his hand was a lit cigar. I don’t remember what his caption said, but it was something like “this is church this morning”. This man’s father is a well respected minister with international influence. This man’s wife is also a minister working hard to grow her influence.

One of my first thoughts when I saw the picture was “Did his dad teach at home what he was teaching publicly?” Here’s why I’m bringing this up. This young man has what appears to be a successful business in town. At least in part, the success of the business is because his dad leveraged his own influence to help his son get launched. Many of the people who are following this young man on social media are doing so because of his father. Many of the people who saw that picture follow his father and whether people will admit it or not, this picture struck a blow against his father’s credibility. I will not say that it ruined it because his dad is a fine, upstanding man. I will say though, that it caused questions to be asked that would not have even been thought before the picture was posted. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The beginning of honor is to not cause shame (see The Road To Honor) .

Hypothetically, what if someone were considering asking this man’s wife to minister in their church, but decided against it because of this photo? I am not this man’s conscience. I am not his judge. My points here are based completely on the topic of honor and the apparent thoughtlessness of his actions.

“The most tragic thing in the world is a man of genius who is not a man of honor.”
― George Bernard Shaw

What is honor? Honor is to value as heavy. In the old days when barter and trade would happen, weights and scales were used to determine the value of things. Heavy usually meant better. Even in quality, heavy usually meant better built with more sturdy materials. When something was heavy, it was considered to be worth more. To honor is defined as value as heavy, Showing deference. A good name or public reputation. A showing of merited respect. High worth, and as a verb, a gesture of deference (bow).

The root word in Hebrew literally means: To cause to shine, to glorify or to add luster. This is the definition that I think of when I think of honor. When I think about my relationship with God, my parents & my leaders, I understand that I always need to be reverentially respectful toward them and to always live my life in a way that causes them to shine. I live to add luster to them. This is honor – and as you can see, honor comes from living from what they put into you. This is why poor choices bring dishonor and shame to them.

For me, the clearest example of honor was found in my paternal grandmother. She and my grandpa had been together for many years and raised nine children. When he passed away, she had a large photo of him framed and placed prominently on the wall in her living room. One Sunday afternoon when I stopped by for a visit, she confided in me that sometimes, when she was alone, she would talk to him. She also told me that she kissed that picture at night before she went to bed. This illustrates honor so clearly to me because of the way she honors his memory. She was showing how much she loved him and how heavily she valued him.

Honor is lacking in our world today. People hear the word and don’t understand what it really means. Because of this, they can’t do it and are suffering because of it. In the next few weeks, I want to go deeper into it and talk more about what it is, but also who we are to honor and what the benefits are because we walk in honor.

Understanding that to honor is to value, take some time this week to examine your life? Are you honoring those you should be honoring? Are you walking worthy of it yourself? Join the discussion by leaving a comment.

I appreciate you all!

Art

***Quotes above were found at:
http://www.goodreads.com

 

Does the “Who” change the quality or level of Love from YOU?

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Matthew 5:43-48 New International Version (NIV)

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor, and hate your enemy.’
44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.
46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that?
47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?
48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Back of Girls Staring into distance

Have you ever witnessed someone receiving special treatment because of who they are? Maybe the pretty girl buying popcorn at the movies didn’t pay full price.  All because the young man behind the counter was trying to get her attention.  When we think of special treatment, we almost always think of it in a positive way. It’s not always the case. I remember hearing a story about a boy riding the school bus, who was beat up by some other boys just because of his last name. He was certainly receiving specific and different treatment, but it wasn’t good.

People with disabilities receive special treatment to accommodate their handicap.  We change the height of toilets, sinks & put in ramps for wheelchairs. Sometimes they’re also treated differently out of sympathy. Those without disability may look at them sadly as if to say “You poor thing”.  I don’t think most people with disabilities like that. There’s a great TEDtalk about it here.

In the movie The King’s Speech, Lionel Logue insisted on an equal relationship with King George VI when they were working together. When Prince Albert became King, he became known as George the VI.  His full name was Albert Frederick Arthur George. While he was prince, he went by Albert.  Lionel called him Bertie. He even went as far as to say, “My castle, my rules”. Lionel knew that in order for him to be able to really help, When they were working, Albert needed to be a student. Lionel realized that Their sessions together needed to be based on who he was, not on the fact that his student was royalty.

As believers, we too, need to make it a point to treat others based upon who we are, not who they are. In the verses above, Jesus points out how that in the world, the natural tendency is to respond to each other based upon who the other person is. Is he an enemy? Is she a friend? Is he rich? Is he or poor? Is she pretty?

All these things come into play when people are navigating through social interaction in this world. Not so with the church. Jesus said “Love your enemies & pray for those that persecute you”. We do this because we are children of God. Not for gain. Not to impress, or to exert influence, but because God commands it and it’s in us to do.

God loved us when we were His enemies. His love was made clear to us when we were opposing Him. God commends His love toward us in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (Rom 5:8)

If you are a child of God, the Love of God has been shed abroad in your heart by the Holy Spirit which has been given to you (Rom 5:5). This means that the Love of God is on the inside of every believer.  We just need to begin to mature in it.

Some might say “I really love God! He an I are tight! It’s just all those creepy people I have to deal with…I can hardly stand them.” Sorry – It doesn’t work that way. If you love Him, the main way it is shown is by loving people. Especially your brothers and sisters in Christ.

Even though the Love of God be in you, It needs to be perfected. In other words, you still need to develop in it. We need to allow it to grow in us and dominate our thinking , speaking and actions. You can have this love in you and completely ignore it. You can quench it. You can yield to your temper and feelings instead – when all the while, the Love of God is on the inside endeavoring to influence you. It’s up to us what we let influence us. The Love of God or our carnal feelings, desires & emotions.

So – we as Christians are to be governed by the Love of God inside us and let it flow out of us to those around us. We shouldn’t operate out of prejudice, favoritism, or selfishness. Rather, we can be resources and examples of God’s love in our daily life and make a real difference for others.

I want to encourage you today to yield to God’s Love. It may be hard if you’re not used to submitting to it. The more you develop in it, the easier it will come.

How can you put this into practice this week?  Is there a specific person you can intentionally love?

Join the conversation & leave a comment.

Art

How to respond to offence & meanness in others.

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Have you ever had a situation spin out of control and the next thing you knew, you were being verbally attacked by an aggressive person?  Maybe you locked horns with someone at work and it escalated into a heated argument. When it was all over and the dust was settling, did you begin to roll it over and over in your mind?  This is usually when all the logic rolls in.  You are suddenly awash with razor wit and remarkable cleverness.  It always seems that in the aftermath of these arguments, we have 10,000 come-backs.

The truth is, we are probably better off that we can’t access this cleverness in the heat of the argument.  Who knows what damage we could actually do.

This week I shot a video about this.  Jesus said offences would come.  That’s one of His promises that no one wants to receive.  What is the right way to deal with offence?  How should we handle ourselves when we’re in the thick of it?

I think we’ve all been in situations like this, and we have all walked away wondering if we handled it well.  I know that sometimes I have walked away certain that I didn’t.  This video gives us some guidelines for some appropriate ways to respond.

Remember –

  1. Forgive!  This has to be first.  This opens the door for God to move in our situation.
  2. Push the offense to the sidelines and ignore it.  There are people who bash me about being a Christian.  Guess what?  I’m not going to stop!  I have to push their opinions of me to the margins and ignore them.  I can’t let them hinder me from moving forward.
  3. Put your eyes back on the mission.  It was the joy that was set before Jesus that pulled Him through the cross & the shame and now He’s set at the right hand of God.  Your mission will pull you forward too! But you have to keep your eyes on it and not on the weights and sin that can slow you down and stop you.

What tips can you share that you have used to successfully deal with the meanness of others?   Please join the conversation.

Also – If you know anyone who would benefit from hearing this, please share.

Art

Three Tips For Not Hating Your Workout.

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It was a hot summer evening in a little town called Green Rock. All of us neighborhood kids were locked in a world class squirt gun battle that took place over about 3 hours and 6 different back yards. There were about 9 or 10 of us and there were no teams. It was truly every man for themselves. Elimination could come from anywhere! I remember running as hard as I could and leaping behind a dog house to take cover. I worked my way around my house to end up hiding beside my own front porch. I remember this because all this time, my head is dripping with sweat and my temples are pounding with each heartbeat. Was I in pain? Yes! Was I having the time of my life? Again-Yes!

I bring this up because I finished 2011 weighing in at more than 200 lbs. For my height that was too much. My healthy weight window is between 170 & 185. What really got me though was when I saw pictures from one of our family reunions. It was in the middle of the summer and we were at a lake. I saw myself in those pictures and did not like what I saw. It was my wake up call.

Badge photo from 2011

Badge photo from 2011

In December of 2011 we talked about buyout our own elliptical machine as our Christmas present to each other. While we were considering this and checking out different machines, a local fitness center ran a deal where you could join for $10/month. We went on a walk through and looked at all the available equipment. We decided that rather than buy an elliptical, we would just rent several for $10/month.

I had a slow start. The truth is that I didn’t like pushing my body. My body didn’t seem to like it either. I compare it to drilling with a dull bit. It’s hard, noisy, generates a lot of heat and yielded slow progress. I began to understand that if I was going to get there, I needed to stay with it. I made an agreement with myself. I would show up. My total commitment was -Just walk in the door. If at that point I turn around and go home, I kept my commitment. I knew that once there, I would work out because there was nothing else to do but that. I just wanted to make sure that I liked it enough to keep it up.

I would walk on a treadmill for 15 minutes and then do the elliptical for 15 minutes because I was trying figure out how I could get the best results, and I was trying not to get bored.

One day, a friend of mine from Bible school was there and we ended up next to each other on the elliptical machines. We began to talk and the next thing I knew, an hour had gone by and I didn’t even notice it. Not only that, but I had burned an amazing amount of calories and had gone more than 6 miles. As I was thinking about this, I remembered that epic squirt gun battle we had when I was in the fourth grade.

This brought me to the conclusion that my body will do what it’s told. The problem is with my mind. When my mind was distracted by a good conversation, or even play, my body would just carry on doing what it was told to do. My goal became clear. I needed to find a way to mentally make friends with the workout.

  1. The first thing I needed to do was set my goal. I wanted to lose 30 lbs. Then I began to work backwards from the goal. What did I need to do in order to reach it. That would depend on when I wanted to reach it. Then – how can I break this into manageable chunks? I decided that a pound a week was a good metric. I figured I could do that and not end up hating it.
  2. I have come to really like running on the elliptical machine. Mainly because I can do it with my eyes closed. It’s easier to daydream and distract yourself with your eyes closed. With the elliptical, you are hanging on with your hands. Running on a treadmill becomes awkward when you are trying to run and hang on at the same time. It’s important to be able to hang on when you are running with your eyes closed so you don’t get vertigo, lose your balance and invade the personal space of the person running next to you.

    Recent photo at the gym

    Last week at the gym

  3. I am also a big fan of the right playlist. I have a playlist on my phone that’s just called “Running”. I have chosen those songs based on tempo and energy. I find that I don’t actually listen to the songs as much as I just use them as a rhythm to keep up with my pace.  I also sometimes like to listen to good Bible messages and audio books.

Using just these few hacks have made the difference in me staying with it and ultimately begin enjoying my time at the gym.  There are many other things to consider when trying to get healthy and lose weight.  This post is mostly focused on ways to not hate the work-out.

What sorts of things do you do to keep yourself moving forward?  Join the conversation by leaving a comment.

How To Actually Reach Your Goals!

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Why does this matter to people? This breaks accomplishing goals into small incremental steps that help keep them organized and help give them clarity.

There are a great many resources for setting goals available to anyone with internet access. I have included three links at the bottom of this post that I have found very helpful. Each has a lot of useful information about goal setting.

Notes & phone on desk

Peter Drucker in his Management by Objectives philosophy created the mnemonic acronym S.M.A.R.T. for goal setting. It has been so widely used and circulated as a useful goal setting guide that you may already be familiar with it. The acronym is as follows:

S = Specific

M = Measurable

A = Attainable

R = Realistic

T = Time Related

We could talk about each of these at length but they are thoroughly covered in some of the links to great resources provided below.

One of the best books I read in 2015 is a book called Born To Win by Zig Ziglar. In this book Zig lays out 7 steps for setting goals and I have found them very useful. I don’t know if Zig Ziglar was the first one to write these down but his book is where I found them. I have found them to be very useful and when they are followed closely, they greatly improve the chances that you can reach your goal. Here’s a brief summary.

  1. Identify your goal. It’s important here while you’re identifying your goal to be specific. Your vision and dreams becomes much sharper when you are specific. Let’s say that you want to buy a new car. The car you choose will determine how much money you will need. The brand may be important as we know that some brands have a reputation for being durable while others don’t hold their value very well over time. Also, determining things like color, interior upholstery and number of cup holders may also enhance or limit your enjoyment of the car. It’s important to be specific in order to give yourself clear guidelines for the rest of the process.
  2. List the benefits. This is where you make it personal. How will this make YOUR life better. Continuing with the illustration of the car; If your old car has proven to be pretty unreliable and has left you stranded more than once, you know what it feels like. Imagine the comfort that will come from having a car you can depend on. Also, think of taking those trips in your new car and using the new bluetooth, syncing your favorite playlists on your phone to your new car stereo & not having to keep finding stations or changing cds. Listing the benefits will keep you energized to push through when things get tough.
  3. List the obstacles to be overcome. Some serious thought here can pay off big time. While you can’t always anticipate every obstacle, list each one you can think of. Once you have developed this list, you can then work toward solutions for each obstacle.
  4. List the skills & knowledge required. These are things that depending on your goal, you can either develop on your own or buy the skill by hiring someone.
  5. Identify the people or groups to work with. This can include potential mentors and also trade groups & clubs. In the illustration of the car, this may be choosing a credit union over a bank or investigating which finance company to use.
  6. Develop a plan of action. Very often we are held back because we don’t understand the inner workings of our problems and obstacles. This is the time to come up with an executable plan that will guide you toward your goal.
  7. Set a deadline for achievement. A deadline will help you to stay motivated. It will also help you to break down your action plan into organized steps that you can create a schedule around. This will help you stay organized and on track.

What I appreciate about these goal setting tools is that when thoroughly thought through and followed, they remove so much of the guess work in reaching our goals.

What goals have you set for the coming year? Join the conversation & share your number one goal for 2016 in the comments.

Additional resources:

https://michaelhyatt.com/goal-setting.html

https://www.mindtools.com/page6.html

http://qz.com/160701/the-complete-guide-to-setting-goals/

Your Success Is Closer Than You Think.

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When I was younger, I was always looking for the magic bullet.  The truth, thing, event or person that would solve my problem. Then, presto – all the tumblers would just fall into place, the door would open, the birds would sing…Hello Easy Street!  If you are anything like me, you find yourself looking for the hack.  I like hacks, easy ways of doing difficult things.  I really like finding a better way to do almost anything.

Dart board bullseye

While that “Magic Bullet” idea may be pretty unrealistic, your success and victory are closer than you think. What if I told you that you could improve your life, build strong relationships and enhance important ones, now. You wouldn’t even have to pay separate processing and handling to get two for the price of one. While this is worth a lot, it’s absolutely free. Well, kind of.

How you might ask?

By doing what you know to do. That’s right. You and I already know that there are things we should be doing. We already know that there are things we should be quitting. We  already know that there are things we should be and should NOT be saying. How do I know so much about this you may be asking?  Because I deal with it too. But I recognize that we are limiting our own success and happiness in many ways because we are not doing what we know to do.

True, there are probably plenty of things you ARE doing that you know you should, but we all seem to have things that we either don’t want to do or we are simply afraid to do. Maybe we have a deep notion that we need to reach out to a loved one who has grown distant, but we’re afraid of rejection or making things worse. Maybe we are yielding to personal immaturity and are trying to punish a loved one for a past hurt. Either way, we really know what needs to be done, we’re just not doing it. It takes guts but…do what you know to do.

James 4:17 in the BBE says a Man who has knowledge of how to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.

You can even take it a step further by doing ALL you know to do.

When I was a younger man, I lost my license. Yep, the state said “That’s enough out of you”.  As time went by, it became a real problem in my life. I prayed about it but I also feared it. It was a big mystifying problem and I didn’t know what to do. I remember the night I got my breakthrough. I didn’t hear an audible voice but it was a still small voice deep down inside me.  Here’s what I heard, “Have you done all you can do?” I thought about that for a few seconds and I realized that there was really only one step that I could take that was small enough to actually take. That was to pay the $40 reinstatement fee. Everything else was just too big and scary. I knew that paying the reinstatement fee was something that I should be doing after I had resolved all the other things, but it was literally all I could do. So I did it!

A couple of weeks later I got a phone call from the State that had my license, asking me why I had sent them a $40 check. I told the lady on the phone that I didn’t know how to fix my problem but I was taking the only step I could see to take. She then began to unravel the whole problem for me and in just a few minutes, I had a clear road-map to get completely out from under the suspension and get my license back. It was just a few weeks later that I was able to go to the Department of Motor Vehicles and get my license. I know I’ve talked about this before but I just can’t encourage you enough. If it seems too big and mysterious, take that step that you can see to take. Begin doing not only what you know to do, but start doing ALL you know to do.

It helps me to break things down into steps. Steps allow me to make incremental progress and at the same time record little wins that help me keep my fire stoked.

  1. Decide. You need to make a decision that you will not hold back anymore. A lot of the pain and suffering that we experience is partially in our control. Often, we have the power to make it better if we would just quit holding out, waiting for someone else to make the first move. Decide to do.
  2. Pray. Ask the Lord for guidance. How should you move forward? He knows. Two things you can be sure of. If you are going to do it His way, Love will be in your words and your actions. And, you will do it by faith. You will not necessarily see immediate results. You will have to walk and stand by Faith.
  3. Make a list. Honesty Time! Write down the areas where you know you’re not doing all you know to do. It’s important because once you get it down, you can now start to make a plan of action. I will often write it down and then work backwards, asking myself questions & writing down the answers to get clarity about how to move forward. This also gives me something to physically mark off when I’ve followed through and completed a step. Great victories are compiled of lots of little wins

If you are dealing with difficult or broken relationships, YOU take responsibility to make the first move.  You may be surprised at how little it takes to make a huge difference.  You will at the very minimum be able to breath easier knowing that the distance between you and them is no longer because of you.  You have done what you know to do and ALL that you know to do.  Also, by acting by Faith, you are giving God an open door to get into your business and work supernaturally.

What steps could you take that would help you move from being a hearer to being a doer this week? I would encourage you to write down at least two actionable items & make it your goal this week to follow through and be a doer. Join the conversation & leave your comment.

Recommended reading = James 1.

I love our community and I look forward to more awesome interactions with you all in the coming year!

Happy New Year!

Art