[Accept Problems] [Believe the Best] [Cast Off the Negatives]
Bad things happen to good people - as well as bad people. Also, frequently more bad things seem to happen to good people rather than bad people. We have only to looking on the pages of the Bible to find ample proof that being close to God does not protect you from adversity; indeed, adversity is often more severe for the child of God than the unbeliever. I suppose there are many reasons for this, but then this is not a theology section. What is important is not why bad things might have happened to us - the cry, "Why me, Lord!" Indeed, why not me? Why shouldn't bad things happen to me - just look at the horrible things that befell Jesus Christ! What is important is not why bad things might happen to us, but rather how we deal with these bad things. We should not question, why me? Rather, we should try to learn how to take advantage of the bad things that has happened to us in some fashion. As Jenson points out, the Chinese have a saying that, "Crisis creates opportunities." People become their own boss and succeed at their own home business when they lose their formal 9-5 job. People come to the Lord when they experience severe adversity and trials. Remember that God does not really care so much about the amount of adversity He allows us to experience; rather, He primarily cares about our coming to Him.
There are frequently two ways to interpret adversity; the optimistic way or the pessimistic way. There were once two farmers who had adjoining farms, and who experienced similar trials with their farming as their farms were in close geographic proximity. When the sun shone brightly, the optimist would say, "Isn't this glorious weather? It's beautiful. The sun's shining. It's healthy for our crops." The pessimist on the other hand would say, "The sun's too hot. it's killing our crops. It's scorching our land."
When it rained, the optimist would say, "Isn't this wonderful? Just what we needed." However, the pessimist would counter, "No, it's too much! Our crops are going to be ruined."
Many of us are eternal pessimists - we constantly search out any beauty for the single flaw, ad in so doing frequently ruin our appreciation of that which is beautiful and wonderful in life. Furthermore, it is frequently true that if you believe things are bad, you will most likely create a bad outcome. As the Nobel Prize wining author Isaac Beshevis Singer noted, "If you keep saying things are going to be bad, you have a good chance to be a prophet." People who are pessimists tend to view their world fundamentally different from optimists. They believe they're at fault somehow for all failures at least to some degree, while taking less credit for successes. Furthermore, they blame their own failures on undesirable circumstances. They might say, "I'm not very smart," or "I can't do anything right." However, optimists tend to have a significant sense of personal control, while pessimists have a feeling of helplessness and despair frequently leading to depression and further failure.
Much of learning how to be happy in life concerns how to deal with the problems that inevitably assail us. We are beset with difficulties and challenges from the moment of our birth when we take our first breath, until the day we take our last. And yet, we spend so much time and effort trying to avoid problems and difficulties rather than learning how to better how to deal with them.
[Learn from your Mistakes] [Choose Joy] [Take Risks]
Ultimately, what you make of your life deals with how you handle the inevitable problems and challenges that come your way. Often, the most you try to make of your life, the more challenges you accept and hurdles you try to overcome, the greater the problems will be that beset you at every turn. "Life is difficult" reads the first sentence in Scott Peck's The Road Less Traveled. Peck asserts that you need to accept the fact that life is full of challenges and difficulties in order to begin to learn that you can discover joy and growth through your problems. We learn from our struggles when we discover that "it is in this whole process of meeting and solving problems that life has its meaning." Peck further notes, "problems are the cutting edge that distinguishes between success and failure .... It is only because of problems that we grow mentally and spiritually.
Modern culture, however, teaches us that happiness in life can only be achieved through the avoidance of pain; we do everything possible to escape pain and discomfort. Clyde Reid noted in his book, Celebrate the Temporary,
"One of the most common obstacles to celebrating life fully is our avoidance of pain. We do everything to escape pain. Our culture reinforces our avoidance of pain by assuring us that we can live a painless life. Advertisements constantly encourage us to believe that life can be pain free. {But] to live without pain is a myth.... To live without pain ... is to live half a life, without fullness of life. This is an unmistakable, clear, unalterable fact ... many of us do not realize that pain and joy run together. When we cut ourselves off from pain, we have unwittingly cut ourselves off from joy as well."
We all make mistakes - many of them, every day. The difficulty is to try not to make the same mistakes over and over again. We need to learn from our mistakes in which case our mistakes become a teaching tool enabling us to progress to greater challenges. Alternatively, if we make the same mistakes over and over again, then we are doomed to failure and disappointment. I am reminded of those who try to succeed at a task only to fail for some reason. The logical procedure would be to try to learn from your mistakes, make alterations in your procedures, and try your task again. Failure to make changes will probably guarantee failure, as would not trying again. However, most people either fail to learn from their mistakes, or they fail to try again. I am reminded of attempting to succeed in business. Generally, you don't succeed the first time; there is a great learning curve that must be accomplished before success comes your way. Part of this learning may be the failure of one, or even more than one, business. While failure might hurt the pride, it should not prevent you from learning from your business errors and try again. Success at one business will often wipe our all the previous failures.
Joy is not happiness. Happiness is a mere emotion that comes and goes with the circumstances. Joy is the continuously sustaining emotion that's rooted in the sense that you can handle anything that might come your way; in the sense that you are progressing the way you ought to be progressing (the need for goals?) and that you will overcome. Happiness is circumstantial; joy comes through trial, sorrow, grief, and confusion.
Jenson makes the following cogent observation about True Joy,
"Everyone wants to be complete and whole at the end of his or her life. The trouble is that we try to find this satisfaction, this wholeness, in the wrong ways. The way we realy gain completeness is to learn contentment regardless of circumstances. You need to have the same joy whether you're healthy or sick, whether your emotions are up or down, whether events are good or bad. This is the most meaningful, dynamic life that any person can experience. In fact, if you have to go more than three feet from wherever you are to find fulfillment, something's wrong."
"The way be become complete is by responding appropriately to problems over time. As I choose to embrase those problems as friends - to choose joy, to believe that things are going to work out, that there's a significant purpose for every difficulty, if only to make me be a better person - I develop patience. And as that patience is tested and perseveres through time and repetition, I gain completeness."
Sometimes, the Lord requires us to go through the deep waters of despair, hurt, and uncertainty. We wonder, "Why me?" - why are we chosen for this curse to fall upon us? What have we done wrong to earn this punishment! Life is certainly unfair, for in life the ungodly often prosper, and the righteous often go in poverty. But it is only through despair that we learn to comfort those around us who are also in despair; it is only through pain that we learn to comfort those who are in pain, it is only through poverty that we learn the true source of all wealth, it is only through knowing sickness that we learn to heal. Pain and suffering produce a depth of understanding and joy that cannot be described, for they allow you to overcome all things; when you indeed learn that you can overcome all things, that "He who is in your is greater than he who is in the world" (1 John 4:4), then you truly will learn the "joy that passeth all understanding."
We live in a risk adverse society - we try to do everything possible to avoid risk including insurance policies, risk management teams in hospitals, and low interest CD accounts in the bank which barely keep up with inflation. While foolish risk is certainly not to be condoned, likewise not to take calculated risk is certain to lead to stagnation and no advancement. Capitalism thrives on risk taking; great rewards can be achieved from proper risk management. One of the reasons why the former Communist world order has faded is that people under the old collectivist mind-set were not risk takers - and hence were not rewarded. These people have largely lost their vision of a better world, have stopped believing in themselves and in their country. Taking risks means being able to assume problems with the future hope of greater success.
[Self Affirmation] [Be Thankful] [Helping Other People]
The world is largely a negative place in which to live; you are constantly face-to-face with the negative. There is negative news on television, negative reinforcement from your family, and often negative reinforcement even from your friends. It is hard to be positive. And yet, positive we must be if we wish to see opportunities and successes in our future. It is a whole lot easier to be successful in life when you are able to see opportunities and have a creative way of problems resolution rather than believing you will never have a chance in life or that you are born to fail.
Believing the best - having a positive attitude toward yourself, toward life, and toward others - is largely a matter of attitude. Everybody has similar experiences in life. We all have our tragedies, our failures, and our shortcomings. Yet, it is how we chose to view these failure that determines our attitude - and it is our attitude that largely determines our success in all areas of our life.
You need to believe in yourself before you can hope to have any real success in life, and the only way to be self-affirming is to believe in personal significance (Achieve Personal Significance). There is a great story about - of all things - fleas. Fleas are very small animals that can be trained to do simple tricks but only if you can keep them from flying away. I was finally discovered that if you initially kept fleas in a covered jar, they would jump and jump, continuously hitting the top of the jar. They would eventually determine there was no way for them to leave the jar, and so the trainer could then take the lid of the jar off. The fleas would then only jump as high as the top of the jar, even though they could easily have jumped out of the jar - they had come to believe in their artificial limitation. Similarly, baby elephants are initially tied with a rope to a stake in the ground. They first pull and pull on the rope, but because of their small size are unable to free themselves. They come to believe in their limitation by this rope, even when they grow vastly larger and stronger. A full grown elephant can be kept on a small rope tied to a stake because they have come to believe in their inability to break the rope.
People are similar to the flea and elephant in the above two stories. We grow up in school while others impose limitations upon us. We learn we are too stupid, or not handsome enough, or not athletic enough, to be successful in the world. Children can be very mean to their peers, and I believe it is largely through this peer pressure that children assume limitations upon themselves. We chose to believe the limitations put upon us by our childhood friends, rather than shoot for the stars and assume all the potential which the Lord has given us. We are made to soar like the eagles rather than be tied down to the earth like the elephant. To a very great extent, success which we have in life is determined by our own mindset of how much success we will allow ourselves to have. If we believe in ourselves, that we can achieve what might be considered unachievable, then we might just be successful!
Believing in our own personal value and significance, and believing in our own limitless potential will naturally bring forth a feeling of gratitude. Sometimes, if we are beaten down or have life experiences which are very unpleasant, it is difficult to be thankful - but we must remember that no matter how bad the circumstances, they could be worse. Also, the Lord never allows us to experience a situation without also providing the ability to be victorious. We just need to have faith - sometimes a lot of faith - but this is where we put out faith to practical use. It is always easy to believe in God when times are good, but perhaps we might have second thoughts about the beneficence of God when things are not going the way we would like.
Frederick Bucchner suggests that the way to live life to the fullest is by asking how fully we experience life during our normal day-to-day activities. Bucchner asks,
"Have you wept at anything during the past year? Have you thought seriously about the fact that someday you're going to die? More often than not, do you really listen when people are speaking to you instead of just waiting for your turn to speak? Is there anybody you know, to whom if one of you had to suffer great pain, you would volunteer yourself?"
Sometimes, living life to the full involves giving thanks - it's an attitude of gratitude.
Jenson suggests we should say,
"Thank you, God, for my life and my health. Thank you for my opportunities. And thank you for my problems."
Having a thankful attitude concerning everything in life - including our problems - will give us a proper perspective. It reminds us that everything - including our disappointments and challenges - can work to our benefit with the proper perspective.
If you want others to believe in you - you must likewise believe in them. One of the most difficult problems my wife and I have had to contend with is sibling rivalry among our four boys/m They just naturally follow a pecking order whereby the eldest picks upon his younger brother, while the younger brother in turn tries to destroy the self-image of the brother next in line. This is the natural order of children, I believe, and this must be altered either in childhood or later when they are an adult or they will be forever plagued with unhappiness. In order for people to love you, you must first love them. We must learn to see the good in people rather than the bad; to praise rather than scold.
[Reject Fears] [Root Out the Doubts] [Realize Your Possibilities]
Many of us are afraid to leave our comfort envelope because we are afraid of the consequences. Certainly, when stretching for the home-run, there are many bad things that might - and often do - happen. Many times, these bad consequences cannot be forecast or prepared for - they just occur. Still, it is usually impossible to achieve great things without first leaving your comfort zone. And this is where we experience fear. Fear is the emotion we often experience when coming into contact with the unknown. It is scary not to be in control of the situation always. And yet, how impossible it is to achieve greatness, or even your own personal goals - without first striking out and taking reasonable chances.
Jenson relates the story of a tremendously painful rejection that he experienced while a teenager. Apparently, while he wasn't high school, he sang his first solo in front of a group of several hundred people. While he was scared to death and his voice was trembling, he thought that he had done reasonably well. When he sat down he noticed that one of his friends was rushing to his side. Naturally, he thought that his friend was there to comfort him but his first statements to him once, "Jenson, you were so flat!" While this was all a comment from an inexperienced teenager, his words were devastating and they created a tremendous fear of singing in front of a crowd from that moment on. Three some wise counsel, he learned that if you were ever going to sing publicly again then he needed to read plays the pain that he attached to that activity with pleasure. Therefore, he continued to sing and even sang the lead in his high school musical in front of thousands of people. Though he was extremely nervous, he managed to do this performance well and while he worked at singing, the more pleasure he began to attached to the experience and his fear began to the data.
He then relates the experience he had with his daughter, Molly. He notes that Molly was fearful of her mother being away from her. This year manifested itself both emotionally and physiologically and handbills up and her mind in greater and greater proportions until finally began to be overwhelming. So his wife began to work on technology that Molly could use to change are thinking and thereby reject this year. The first thing they did was to help Molly begin to identify this fear. He asked her to visualize what went on and her mind when she thought about their leading. When she began to feel this emotion, she was told to jump up and say, "Hallelujah, my feet don't stink!" He was trying to get Molly to change her state, or the way she saw things when her mother went away from her. One way to change such a state of mind is to use the ludicrous.to change or state of mind, they simply help her to develop a state breaker. As soon as she said, "Hallelujah, my feet don't stink!" She started to laugh. Now she had a breakthrough with her problem. The next step was to get her to begin to attach pleasure instead of pain to her thoughts about their leaving. So they ask Molly to think of positive things in her life; music she enjoyed, colors that major happy, pictures that excited her, sitting in a certain chair. Then they asked her to focus on these while she thought about their leading. She then started to develop a positive, pleasurable attitude toward the circumstances of their leaving. The key with Molly, and for most of us, is to learn to handle fears in a tangible way. Until we learn to reject our fears then we will be inhibited by them from being all that we can atobe.
Failure at one task can often mean we believe we are a failure at all tasks - which certainly is not true. While you may not be a whiz at geometry, you might be able to write very well! Similarly, even though you might not be achieving great things at work, you are a great father at home. We must not generalize one failure or shortcoming to include our entire self being a failurethe
Finally, we must always remember that our emotions are always controllable - sometimes easier than others. If you fail at a task, or if some unforeseen consequence happens destroying all your plans, you are not an intrinsic failure. Your emotions are largely controllable; you are what you believe you are. Your brain is like a giant computer always looking for guidance as how to "feel" about a given situation. Any event might be experienced differently by many people depending on how they might perceive this event.