Tag Archives: advice
Aside

6/6/2012: The point of understanding

6 Jun

Thankful.

What a difference a year makes.

A day.

A moment.

This time last year I was in the ER with my beloved best friend, waiting for an ambulance to transfer him to a hospital across town. In the face of a life-threatening illness he was supernaturally high-spirited, an inspiration and utter mystery to his doctors.

Apparently he had multiple blood clots in both lungs and a painfully dangerous fluid buildup. After bringing him back from near flat-line, he was in and out of consciousness for a day and returned to the ER a week later.

Each doctor cheerily offered the comment that people usually drop dead from pulmonary embolisms, and the pain from his pleural effusion was a rare and lucky warning… So him still being alive was great.

They never figured out the cause.  Just so we’re clear on the gravity and awesomeness of what went down and up here…

Apparently pulmonary embolisms are usually caused by blood clots that form in your upper leg from sitting around too much, and/or being really overweight which messes with your circulation.  Sometimes clots even form because of a combination of an injury and bad circulation.  If a clot breaks free it can travel anywhere, like a tiny bullet inside your veins.  And if it hits heart, lungs or brain the effect, as our doctors dryly explained, is sudden death.

None of this had happened.  The clots disappeared just as stealthily as they came, never to return.

Crazy, right? Even crazier was that the moment it started unfolding we were both praying constantly, together and individually.  It was so dramatic and sudden we knew clearly where to focus, and it wasn’t on our confused and clinical doctors.  I can only imagine what it was like for him.

I was surprised by how hard it was for me.

The circumstances created a clear picture of how much I needed to heal and grow.  Apparently I had some silent killers too: My ignorant reliance on my best friend for comfort and peace instead of God; A dangerous obsession with being everything for everyone instead of myself for me, and for God.  I had so much to learn and, of course, no idea.

What a difference a year makes. A month. An hour.

Today it’s hard to believe it even happened, except for the painkillers and blood thinners left over.

His name, Ebenezer means stone of help in Hebrew, and he was always my rock. Even when it seemed he couldn’t offer support and comfort God used him to point me toward the true rock, our one unshakable source of peace, strength, comfort and joy.

I’ve been writing for a while now about how critical it is to change the way we think, our habits.  Thinking habits dictate the way we live our lives.

For me, it’s been a long journey to arrive at the place of awareness about how powerful our thought patterns are, and how at any moment the choice of peace changes everything.

Part of my journey had to include this pretty violent experience to learn me some things:

Sometimes God will put Himself in a context-clear space.  So you can see, He is your choice.  And the best one at that.  The context clarity  is that even with the best of care, with love, with family, money, shelter, food, friends, the outcome is in His hands.  Your spirit is in His hands.  

That clarity then simplifies everything else.  All the drama and urgency and worry and burden we attach to our everyday stuff washes clean of any weight, and falls in line under what’s most important.  When you get to the place where you have everything, but really all you need is prayer… You realize how backwards you were.  

Prayer is first.

Not the last, dramatic, desperate Hail Mary of a tragedy.  Prayer places you above all the stuff, and makes sure you’re always in the best place no matter what’s given to, or taken from you.  So every day you carry with you, the plan of attack that resets how you live, moment to moment:

What a perfect reset for what really matters: At some point we all have to realize it’s not about ourselves, our friends, family, our relationship, our money, our job, connections, opportunities, health, struggles dreams or even…

Our purpose.

As we buzz about our worlds, striving toward our purpose we act after we’ve thought.

And if for any length of time we don’t place God first in our thoughts and before every action…

Especially the little ones, we’ll look up and realize we covered a lot of ground and maybe, just maybe we were going in circles.  Or backwards.  Or struggled with every step.

Maybe, just maybe, someone we didn’t realize was watching saw and followed in our footsteps, or took the cue to embrace struggle when we didn’t mean for them to be impacted.

You matter.

Your spiritual, mental and emotional health matters.

You’re making a difference whether you intend to or not.

All those little conversations with God make sure you leave life, inspiration, and change for the better in your wake instead of mess, destruction, or confusion.

I hope your sights stay set high, always and that you live in the peace that comes with the right perspective on life.

Without God we have nothing. With Him, even when it seems you have nothing, you have more than anyone could ever lay hold to.

Thank God for every second of life.  Image

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The Power to Reset: What have you been training for all your life?

29 May

Have you ever noticed how powerful your mind is?

Like, it is not only your calculator and figure-it-outter, but also your filter, your feeling producer and processor, your body’s puppet master, spirit receiver and soul feeder.

Technically, nothing should get in or out, done or felt without your mind having the final say-so.

Tricky thing about our minds is, we’ve spent our entire life training it like an athlete would their body… But we had no clear plan, purpose or intention behind our mind-training.

Por ejemplo.

A sprinter knows they need to build lean muscle and strength to run at top speed, so they design their meal and exercise plans to build that body type.

A football player knows they need heft, speed, power, aggression, quick-thinking, strength and agility so they add to their plan the mental training of a warrior.

Athletic dancers (like gymnasts, synchronized swimmers, ballerinas, figure skaters, etc.) know they need control, flexibility, strength, speed, balance and grace… All of which are heightened with a certain body type.  So dancers typically train from a younger age to not only work daily to develop those physical qualities, but to shape their body as it is developing into the type needed for optimal performance.

They work closely with experts from an early age to develop the right tools, techniques, styles, and processes to succeed in masterfully controlling their bodies in executing this dangerous but beautiful art form without risking injury or death.

Blessed with a passion for using their gift, they are compelled to constantly hone and sharpen themselves.  But even the most gifted and passionate dancer knows their life can’t begin or end with their art: Art is an expression of life.

Our lives must be full, with an understanding of the beauty and purpose in being alive for any art to truly reflect meaning and depth.

Training begins young (between 5 and 10 years old) to let dancers get in front of physical development to shape and mold the body for performance.  That’s their choice.

Whether we like it or not, we begin our life-training the second we enter the world:  Peaceful birthing instills love early, a perfect breeding ground for emotional security and self-confidence.  Violent childbirth plants a seed of fear that can manifest in low confidence and insecurity.

Training starts so early for us, there’s a whole lotta stuff we had no control over or even interest in, that  got in front of not only our physical, but our mental and spiritual development.

We’ve been shaped and molded for life.

Just because we didn’t call it training or instruction doesn’t mean it didn’t do exactly that.  Passive or active, learning is still learning.

And it won’t stop until we step in and reset our training, redefine our patterns.

Which starts with figuring out how we were trained, knowing what our patterns are.  And, what’s that even mean, to train?

Train:

To direct the growth usually by bending, pruning, and tying
To form by instruction, discipline, or drill
To teach so as to make fit, qualified, or proficient
To make prepared (as by exercise) for a test of skill

Think about it: How were you trained?
Examples of life-training we don’t choose:
  • Family of sedentary over-eaters–> Training to develop and maintain an overweight body.
  • No boundaries/ privacy/ respect for individuality–> Training to violate, intrude, conform.
  • Focused on spending and extravagance–> Training to love materialism and poverty.
  • Exposed to abuse or violence (verbal/ physical/ sexual/ substance)–> Training to be abused or violent.
  • Emotionally unintelligent, non-communicative–> Training to be emotionally retarded, poor communicator.
  • Spiritually void–> Training to be unstable, purposeless.
  • Accepted and celebrated sexiness or lust–> Training to chase sex.
  • Surrounded by underachievers, or within a dysfunctional family, or a home lacking in love or spirituality–> Training to be a lesser you.
CRAZINESS.
Right?  And that is not an exhaustive list by any means.

But here’s the awesome thing.

No one, no matter how perfect their parents are, had a childhood 100% full of fun, learning, adventure, acceptance, spirituality, discipline, love and freedom.

That’s the training you need to become your best you.  Becoming you is not age-exclusive.

So do some soul-searching.  Some retraining.

Athletic dancers practice regularly.  So do you.  With every choice.

Try this exercise:  

Next time you face a decision, ask yourself “What training have I had to qualify me to make the best choice for me?”

If you’re like any other human, the honest answer is either:

(a) None.  Or,

(b) Dang. I might have been trained to make the worst choice.

Then, the fun begins.

All of a sudden you acknowledge you’re not bound by a training plan.

You’ve jumped past your limits and can get real.

You were made by design.  That means there’s a plan for you, and it’s good.  

You weren’t trained to think wrong, you were given a reason to study your design plan with its designer.

So pray to scrap all that bad training; To heal and repair all the damage it caused; To forgive and bless all your trainers and yourself; To give you the right training plan and trainers; 

To restore your thinking for your best you.    

 

 

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True thoughts: The truth is always simple, always good.

15 May

I’ve been writing about recognizing how critical our thoughts are, and how we can embrace the fact that we are masters of our own minds.   Yes, this was inspired by an Adam Sandler flick.  And yes, at some points it was full Sandler.  But in between those points it drove home what happens when we relinquish control over our minds and ultimately our lives: Accepting the worst instead of fighting for our best.

Hopefully you’ve been reading along since early March, but if not these may be inspiring also:

Urgency of mind renewal

Importance of rest

Function of rest

Minding what you take in

Mastering your environment

The last post was about the importance of centering your thoughts… And now, we get into the how of all this.

Years ago, I was confronted with a dilemma: A conflict I needed to resolve.  It involved repeated trips to a car mechanic for the same unresolved problem.  FYI, in my former life I was a people-pleaser and perfectionist of the most exceptional kind.

So of course, I reasoned ever-so-politely with the mechanic to no avail.  I left in tears feeling helpless and abused.  Frustrated, I called my dad, who seems sometimes to revel in pissing people off, and whose approach to conflict resolution is more sledgehammer or automatic weapon than loving, reasoned debate.  He and my mom are peas in a pod in that regard.

He offered to go back to that dealership and tear them a new one.

As he fired himself up to help I realized the sledgehammer wasn’t necessary: Not for the situation, nor for me.  I realized I could deal with this conflict in my own way even though I had no model to look to.  I went back to the dealer and got what I wanted.  No hollering.  Just firmness, clarity, persistence.

Years later, my husband-to-be encouraged me in this, telling me to “stand your ground, speak the truth, and hold your peace.”  (He’s awesome.)  I’ve since added some unconventional weaponry like singing, hugs, prayer and service to the mix… More on that another day.

We don’t grow up with the models for how we should tackle life through action: No one is perfect.  And we don’t always have anyone there to explain to us how each thought leads to every action, good or bad: No one is a mind-reader.

Instead, we have models of the actions that come from someone else’s habitual thinking and mind in need of renewal: In our parents, teachers, professors, coworkers, lovers, friends, siblings, leaders, strangers and even characters in films, television shows and stories we read.

So where do we turn?

When you know this thinking thing needs to get right, and are ready to try, it’s not good enough for someone to point to the Dalai Lama, or Albert Einstein, or even Jesus… And instruct you to think like them, be like someone else.

That’s like telling someone stuck  in quicksand crying for help to look at the top of Mount Fiji and just move: “You can do it!”

Not only is the goal impossibly far away… Every move you make to get there pulls you deeper into your own habitual thinking.  The deeper you get, the less you can move.

Haven’t you ever gotten great advice and somehow, applied it the wrong way?  That’s because when our minds aren’t renewed they’re are a lot like malfunctioning machines: A virus-infected computer.  Nothing responds right.

That’s why lofty, seemingly unattainable advice without practical immediate steps may feel so discouraging.

A lot of the time, you don’t just need to see the mountain top, you need to grab a hold of something right next to you.

You need a bridge from where you are to where you’re headed.

That’s what this is about: You have everything you need already to get started, you just have to embrace that it won’t look like what you’ve seen before… But it’ll be good.

Try these simple daily steps for just a week and see whether your thinking, your life changes:

  • Ask yourself whenever you can:  Am I thinking about something that at the end, is good? Or bad?  And is it simple or complicated?  Truth, and renewed thinking is always good, always simple.
  • Every morning first thing, pray for protection over your thoughts.  Pray for newness, a new mind, fresh you.  Pray to see what your life is really, truly about: purpose.  And… Pray blessings for any and everything you hold negativity toward.  That could be the gubmint, media, a childhood frenemy… Even yourself.
  • Last, every day, read a proverb:“For gaining wisdom and instruction;
        for understanding words of insight;
    for receiving instruction in prudent behavior,
        doing what is right and just and fair;
    for giving prudence to those who are simple,
        knowledge and discretion to the young—
    let the wise listen and add to their learning,
        and let the discerning get guidance—
    for understanding proverbs and parables,
        the sayings and riddles of the wise.“

    Sounds good, huh?  Straight from the Bible.  I said it.  And refused to read, much less own a bible until a few years ago.  But I couldn’t deny the truth in proverbs, the simplicity of them.  Reading them daily helps to remodel your thinking around the truth.

Truth is always good, always simple.

Time to start thinking like it.

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Spotting: Maintaining a center for sober thoughts so your life is anti-venom

2 May

I think, probably the most annoying annoyance in the history of annoyances is when something you know shouldn’t get under your skin, does.  Like a person’s behavior.  Or a foul odor.  Colds.  Sometimes, the news.
Even worse is when you can reasonably convince yourself, you should have seen whatever annoying circumstance was coming, and prevented it.
Also known as recognizing you failed.  Or made a mistake.
Big, small, noticed or unnoticed.
Everyone does it.
Maybe it’s failing an important test.  Or maybe it’s forgetting to respond to a casual text message.  Or maybe it’s a life-changing decision you can never un-decide.
At some point, everyone is a failure.  Everyone a success.
And still we pore over how mistakes could have been avoided, better handled, and will be eliminated from our future.
As if any of that were possible.
It’s done.
Why do we discard all the good leading up to -and sure to follow- the mistake, in favor of some good-old-fashioned self-hatred meditation?
Not smart.  Dangerous.
When we mess up is when we most need encouragement, hope.  That’s when we feel low.  But instead of seeking, giving, receiving encouragement and hope we do the opposite.
There’s no balance, no stability in that.
Let’s check out the other end of the spectrum.
What if, for every single victory no matter how big or small, we dropped everything, and started repeating to ourselves how amazing and impressive we were?  Threw a day-long celebration, calling and spending hours sharing with everyone how incredible our accomplishment was?
When we succeed is when we need to be settled, feel grounded most.  That’s when we feel high.  But instead of seeking, giving, receiving settling and grounding, we do the opposite.
Not smart. Dangerous.
Digging a hole for ourselves when we fail, floating around on clouds when we  succeed, or living only to avoid or reach either moment…
Is a life out of balance.
Spinning, disoriented.
Dizzy.
Life is meant to be steady, sure, with consistent forward motion, perpetual growth, constant change, building energy.
Kinda like a dance.
We could learn from the way dancers spin, leap and soar so effortlessly.
Dancers use a technique called spotting to encourage balance and discourage dizziness when spinning:
Spotting happens in daily life when before we mess up or achieve, our mind is already settled, focused: on unchanging truth, right thinking.
That’s our head moving faster, so it is stable and at rest when our actions catch up.
When our body finishes its turn, or something happens in our life, our mind is already poised, ready for the next turn.
Spotting in our daily life is us being stable every second of every day, focused on the certainty of radical love, sureness, ascension, patience, safety, propulsion.  Peace.
Let’s develop the habit of spotting in our lives: Centering our mind, so that when life spins, we are focused, sure and anticipating the next turn.
Steady.  Sure.  Balanced.
First of all, how do you spot?
By getting and staying:
Marked by sedate or gravely or earnestly thoughtful character or demeanor.
Unhurried, calm.
Marked by temperance, moderation, or seriousness.
 
And how do you get and stay sober?
  • Know what is toxic to your environment, body, mind and spirit.  Prayer is the test when in doubt.  Learn, and relearn what is toxic constantly: It changes as you do.
  • Purge toxicity from your environment, body, mind and spirit.  Search for and eliminate it constantly: It shifts as your world does.
Now…
This does NOT mean you put yourself in some isolation bubble with a helmet, blinders and cone of shame as your constant companions.  That would be every bit as ridiculous, self-defeating, and funny as it sounds.
You were created to interact, to impact.
So the beauty of these tools is that when you practice them constantly, you become anti-venom.  How rad is that?  Superheroes all day long.
You bring purity, light, truth, balm, and clarity wherever you go like a healing oil slick… You disperse toxicity, and all the less substantial, thinner matter around you.

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Never under duress: Master your environment and mind.

19 Apr

I strained my back during dance class recently and am (sparingly) taking muscle relaxers and painkillers along with doing physical therapy… Which is another way to say I’ve been super drowsy and laying around a lot the past few days.  And after a shocking series of unexpected events, I realized how much my pain, grogginess, and medicine influenced my thinking and behavior.

As if I needed another reason to be convinced I’m in a season of recognizing and changing thought habits for the better.  I’m not fighting it though: Lessons come in all shapes, sizes and sources.

The last few posts here have focused on how important, functional and influential mental rest is; on recognizing the simple truth that what you feed your mind matters.

It matters what you’re taking in.  But also, once you’ve let something into your mind, the way you think, the habits you’ve developed over a lifetime can still turn something perfectly healthy into waste.

Por ejemplo, a pessimist’s outlook vs. an optimist’s.  Or, the way you think when you feel angry or hurt, vs. when you feel happy and relaxed.  Or, the way you think when you know all the information vs. when you know only one side.  Or, the conclusions you draw when you think you’ve dealt with something before, when by definition it’s an altogether new experience… Unless you have a time machine.

The way we think is influenced not only by what mind-food we eat, but what mind-altering environment we find ourselves in whether we consciously chose it or not.

No matter how peaceful, enlightened, and spiritual you are, it is impossible to think clearly while hungry, drunk, sleepy, hurting, rushed, ill-informed, and angry about it to boot.

Along with being intentional about what kind of mind-food you take in, remember your environment matters, and you can choose it.  Be aware of what’s going on within and around you and exercise your control over it.

There’s a reason why contracts executed under duress can be considered illegal:  When you feel forced to make a decision, you are not in your right mind.

Everyday coercion is much less dramatic and much more frequent than you think.  Sometimes it’s thinking you won’t have time, or another opportunity.  Or that you can’t afford to do something differently, or don’t know how to.

Own your thinking.  Dictate what the ideal circumstances are for you to think something through.

You can choose not to feel pressured to act, feel, or make a decision on the spot.  You can choose to rest if you feel tired.  To eat if you feel hungry.  You can choose to relax and reclaim your peace if you feel upset.  You can choose to heal if you’re hurting.  You can choose to see a different perspective and uncover more information.

Sometimes all you need to see a situation clearly is a few seconds of deep breathing and a prayer.

Exercise: Every day, as often as you can, take a minute to interrupt your thinking-no matter how mundane or simple it seems- and just take inventory by asking yourself:

Am I calm?  Am I pressured?  What’s influencing me?  Are my choices limited?  

Then, remind yourself of the reality:

You are limitless.  You are free.  You are at peace.  You already have everything you could ever need.  In this moment, you are everything you can possibly be.  

We have years and years of habit built up.  Take steps every single day toward breaking them down.  Choose what you feed your mind, and choose what you allow to influence your state of mind.

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Habitual Thinking: A fruitful mind feeds on fruit.

4 Apr

An old(ish) Adam Sandler movie, of all things, got me inspired to write about: Habitual thinking and how life-changing it can be to simply change the way you think;  How important rest is; How rest influences what we do when we’re not resting.

Now it’s time for practical steps.

Trust me, everyone needs to change their thinking habits.  Every day.  First of all, most of us have a lifetime worth of bad habits built in.  That means we’ve trained our minds to work wrong for decades.

How our minds work: In my high school physics class our professor had us build Rube Goldberg machines.  It was awesome.  You basically setup a small(ish) machine that does a simple household thing like turning off a light.  But it starts with a single object that goes through a series of crazy domino effects. Ultimately, the object, once it’s finished bouncing, flaming, steaming and bopping around, causes the simple household thing to be done.

This is basically how our minds work: We take one thing in to get us thinking (image/movie/book/conversation/etc.) and a lot of different things happen in a chain reaction to produce an outcome (feeling/ action/ speech etc.)  But the way we think, our habits are based on whatever life handed us.

Yikes.

So typically, we all have maybe a few of these thinking machines: Us at our best, us at our worst, and us on an average day.  Those are our habitual thought patterns, or autopilot space.  And we use them automatically, because they’re convenient and we literally don’t have to think about it.

But let’s say those machines or habitual thoughts are causing problems, like emitting poisonous gas… Or horrible ideas?  Or self-sabotage, self-defeat?

Your mind should produce fruit, not waste:

Like our digestive system, what we put or allow into our mind has an effect.  Depending on what we eat or drink, we may gain weight, have an allergic reaction, become intoxicated, energized, sick… Or healthier, more fit.

Depending on the information and concepts we feed our mind, we may become heavy-minded or react badly to the point of being uncomfortable…  We may malfunction and get out of touch with reality, have racing thoughts, or even a mental breakdown however minor or major… Or become more joyful, more at peace, clear, brilliant.

With our digestive system our organs are pretty much always going to do the same thing with food and drink: Help our bodies sift through what we put into it and pass out waste.  We have to produce bodily waste and we can’t change that.

A fruitful mind feeds on fruit:

But our minds are different.  We can change the way our mind works so we never produce waste.

We don’t have to let in anything that creates a waste byproduct.

We don’t have to turn anything into waste once it’s let in.

What we take in matters a lot.  What our mind does with it once it’s taken in matters even more.  If you’ve ever had a bad day that seems to start from the moment you wake up, or been swallowed by grief, you know exactly what I mean.  Everything, no matter how extremely wonderful it is, will appear opposite because of your mindset.

That’s what happens all day every day when your mind is wired to produce waste instead of fruit.

Rewiring it isn’t hard, but it does take persistence.

Mind-food:

The music, lyrics, TV shows, movies, articles, facebook and twitter info, people, conversations, books and gatherings we let in are all literally food for thought.  So what’s in your mind diet?  Why?  If it isn’t full of encouragement, honesty, optimism, you’ve opted into the McDonald’s version of food for thought.  It will not supersize your mind.

I know we’re passively fed information through advertisements, media, and our environment constantly but we don’t have to be.  Exercise some control over what you’re exposed to so the balance shifts positively, for just a day.  Feel the difference.  Keep it up.

The world seems full of terrible tragedies, hurt, and pain, yes.  But it’s really full of love, inspiration, joy, overcoming and miracles.  That’s not what we’re fed by the news, talk shows, music, or movies… Or even, sometimes, our friends and family.

You deserve to be uplifted every second of every day.  To be told how amazing and wonderful you are.  To believe how capable, and powerful you are.  To be fearless.  Unafraid of failure.  To be shown new and inspiring ways to be better, bigger, a more awesome you than you already are.

If you feel repelled by those things, why?

It’s just you.  You can fight it, but it’ll still be the reality of who you are.

Love on yourself.

Begin the fruitful process of changing your thought habits by changing your mind-fuel.  Then we’ll talk about making sure our thoughts always produce fruit.

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Set the Tempo: The definitive power of rest in every season

22 Mar

I’ve been writing of late about how damaging habitual thinking can be, how important mind rest is.  And yes, this all sprang from a life-control DVR concept in an Adam Sandler flick, Click.

Today we’ll talk about how rest affects what you do when you’re not resting.  Eventually we’ll talk about the other steps to breaking thinking habits and renewal.  It’s okay to wait.

Why do we look at relaxation and rest like it’s a luxury, distraction, or a sign of laziness instead of what it really is:  A necessity to survive, essential to thrive.  The root of your drive.   Roses are red, violets are blue, I write prose and rhyme too!

The quality of rest actually defines our movement.  Think about it.  Not so long ago I developed a habit of scheduling recuperation time… After vacation.  Where my mind was at the time, I went so wild enjoying this so-called rest I was more tired after.

The quality of rest defines our movement.  If your rest is really exhaustion, a fleeting escape from reality, a hot second before you jump back on the treadmill… That’s how you’ll work: Worn-out, exhausted, purposeless, random, never-ending, never progressing.

Limited. Frustrated.  Ineffective.

The quality of rest defines our movement.  Rest defines rhythm in music.  Literally, a song has no beat, no structure, no progression unless there are hundreds if not thousands of momentary rests between notes.  Allyoudhaveisonelongneverendingnote.  And spaces between letters are what help us understand.  Darn hash tags.

Let’s dance a bit in music analogy-land. Remember we’re still talking about mental rest and how it helps us to change our thinking habits, renew us, and drive our actions toward success.

Music is written with attention not only to lyrics, notes and  rhythm, but also to tempo.

A beat, or pause, or rest in music is actually a relative idea.  It’s not like a second in time, which is relatively absolute.  Ha.

The actual length of time that passes with each beat, or pause, or rest in the song is defined by the tempo.  The beats and notes themselves are set by the composer defining the song, but without a set tempo, the performer could get real interpretive with the performance.

That’s why for example, you could sing Mary Had a Little Lamb fast or slow and still recognize the song.

Composers knew this and also made it clear what they expected the speed to be, by setting the tempo.

Technically speaking, tempo is the number of beats per minute.  Just like our heart rate.

So one beat in a song with a really fast tempo will go by very quickly.  One beat in that same song with a really slow tempo will drag out longer.

The tempo sets the quality of rest.  In music, it’s universally recognized that songs with a faster tempo, are harder to play and sing.  They also tend to have a lighter mood, and the sound of a major key which generally sounds happier.

You have to know what your tempo is, for every season of your life.

Classical composers didn’t write one 3- minute song at a time.  They were more like screenwriters, setting a story over an hours-long series of scenes, or songs, or seasons.  And each song within these longer, epic works had a different tempo.  Tempo is defined at the beginning of the work, and as needed after.  If there is no notation about tempo, it’s assumed to stay the same.

Rest in each tempo, or season is by definition, different from another.

If you know your mind controls your actions, and your mind is set to preferences you didn’t assign… And rest is the first step toward renewing your mind…

If rest is what brings structure and order to your life, and defines how well you work when you stop resting…

If rest is relative, with the length of time defined by you according to the tempo you’ve set for your life… And if your life is your most epic, dynamic, world-changing work ever …

Why would you live like rest is an annoying and distracting glitch on a recording of a bad pop interlude?

Recognize how big this is.  How definitively powerful rest is, to your action, movement and how free you are to define it.

Remember how non-negotiable it is for you to claim it.

 

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Habitual thinking: Resting so you can recreate, refresh, renew

15 Mar

I called myself vegging out, watching an Adam Sandler movie recently and ended up feeling like I was in a wildly entertaining master class about habitual thinking…  Inspired by a DVR control and a lot of banal humor.  So, I wrote about how habitual thinking is not in our best interest.

The movie (Click) centered around a DVR controller the hero (Newman) used to try to make his life better, only to find it just memorized his flawed patterns and kept repeating them no matter how much they hurt or what he wanted.

When we tune out, even a little bit, of our own thought processes we become robotic, leaving the best outcome to chance.  I talked in the other post about some pretty common ways most people go on thought default without realizing it, and why that’s not our best.

In the movie, when Newman realized this he was like, “Wait a minute!  So what do I do when this remote just follows my patterns over and over?”  Apparently, he went on autopilot.  He was physically there for his life but mentally, emotionally and spiritually vacant.

Yikes.

That’s what happens to us too… But there’s no blockbuster film distributed to warn others against similar behavior.  And just imagine… If we haven’t been giving life our very best, how awesome would it look if we did!?

We can unlearn bad thought habits, learn good ones and make them work for us instead of against us.  Just like any other habit, we are used to doing it before we decide whether we should.  When we take back that first choice, we can get our very best out of the most important control panel we’ll ever have: Our mind.

This didn’t just happen.  We’re trained for years to become habitual thinkers.  We’re conditioned to execute without thinking about thinking, based on a number of things:  Childhood, information, relationships, education, income, environment, health, physical needs etc.

That’s why before you realize what’s going on, you do certain things.  Maybe you rub your head.  Maybe you laugh joyfully.  Maybe you scream in pain.    Smile with love.  Flip your hair.  Hit in violent anger.  Maybe you do something you don’t think you’d do again if you had time to think about it first.  Maybe you do something amazing you didn’t realize you could.

How?  How do we begin learning good habits?

First and foremost, we rest.

When you’re physically exhausted your body shuts down. You fall asleep.  But first you get drowsy, and start moving less, conserving physical energy.  When we’re mentally exhausted our minds shut down.  But first our thinking gets hazy, and our mind starts moving slower, thinking less.

We can’t take in, receive, refresh, renew, restore or revive ourselves without being rested for the long haul first.  And that doesn’t mean you disappear forever, shirk responsibility, or check out of your life.  Your life is your magnum opus: The greatest work you’ll ever do, and like any epic musical arrangement, the song can not exist without rest.  Our minds can’t function without rest.

We can’t function without mental rest.

Intentional rest taken to refresh and restore is actually productive:  Taking a mental rest actually helps create form and order, not laziness or disorder.

Think about it in terms of classical music: Can you imagine how endless and predictable music would be if every song were one note or even one harmony, sustained forever? That’s our mind without rest.  Music is changing tones, shifting harmonies in time.  And those shifts, if they never have a rhythm of any kind attached to them, have no sense of structure or meaning.

Rhythm is defined by the amount of space between notes, the space (however fleeting or long) between sounds.  That’s our life with intentional renewal and refreshment, produced by rest.

Mind rest is critical.

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Never alone: Always in love.

14 Feb

HeartRomance begins with you.

Love on yourself today and everyday, so your relationship reflects healing and wholeness now and in the future.

Relationships are not two people completing each other.  They are two hearts reflecting two spirits, enhanced.  So the condition of your spirit is magnified.

If it isn’t right alone, it will just be worse with someone else.

Relationships are not two people using themselves up in an attempt to offer fleeting earthly symbols of love for each other.  They are two friends, walking, running, dancing, resting, and stumbling together down the path of life, learning, changing, loving, and drinking in the glory as they go.

If the journey isn’t more important than the destination you’ll end up attached and lonely all at once.

So to everyone every day, who celebrates love with the simple act of thinking, nourishing, cleansing, smiling, caring, changing, listening, giving, feeling, trying…

For themselves, others and the world especially when these, the easiest things seem hardest to do and at that moment for that reason, matter most…

Thank you.

I love you.

‘Cause you’re alive and that means you’re worthy of it.

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Meddling: Confusing selfishness and selflessness at someone else’s expense.

13 Feb

Everyone’s been there before:  A loved one is headed down the wrong path, and while you see the cliff at the other end -Be it weight, relationship, abuse, health, career, attitude, family- no amount of signing, screaming, or creative redirection seems to matter.

They pick up speed.

And one of two things happen.

1) You desperately throw yourself at them in some grand gesture/ intervention/ conversation/ act/ etc, essentially hoping to tackle them to the ground before they reach the edge.

Or.

2) Having reached the place where you think nothing you can do will matter, you stand down in silence/ acknowledgment/ distance/ severance/ anticipation of a mediator, essentially hoping to opt out of the violence to come.

Either of those scenarios may be exactly what that person needs, or may be the exact opposite.  But too often, we make this judgment call ourselves both in spite of and because of the risk: Believing that if nothing else, we have to do SOMETHING.

Hoping when it’s all over, both you and they will know and appreciate that you didn’t stand by idly while they self-destructed.  Which by the way, doesn’t usually happen.

Remember.

You cannot change or control anyone’s actions, feelings, or thoughts.  You can do what God’s placed you here to do: Shed light on the right path, communicate the right direction to take.  But a person’ vision has to be intact and their eyes open, ready to receive communication clearly.

Communicating isn’t just about what’s going on with the communicator spiritually and personally, and what they share.  It’s just as much about whether they can reach their audience.  That means where the audience is spiritually and personally, and what the audience receives, matters more.

If a communicator is not understood, communication has failed.  Doesn’t matter how perfect the message was.  It was not received.  That can happen for a number of reasons that have nothing to do with the communicator.

So why meddle? For the sake of some earthly scorecard of friendship intervention?

If someone says they don’t want to talk about it, doesn’t tell you what’s wrong, doesn’t ask what you think, or show up to listen to you wax poetic on a related topic, that’s not code for communicator challenge 350:

They are not ready to listen to you.  Don’t take it personally.

Forcing an unsolicited, uninvited opinion -poorly disguised as a lamp to someone’s feet- is skipping past the first, easiest, and most important indication of whether your message will be received:  Availability.

No one else can make that decision but the receiver.  Not their spouse, sibling, coworker, therapist, pastor, or best friend.

The receiver alone determines their availability to receive.

Human interaction is a decision.  Forcing it at any point is a violation and will do more damage than good.

So be mindful of with whom, when, and how you choose to share your input, thoughts, ideas and opinions.

Be clear on whether you’re sharing as investment into a meaningful exchange, or begrudgingly speaking on deaf ears for the benefit of your conscience.

Be aware that often, pain can make it difficult for someone to clearly communicate what they need.  Know the difference between a cry for help and a demand for space.  Hint: A cry for help will include them making themselves available on some level for such help.

Be discerning of whether, regardless of the words or posture they choose, someone is truly ready to receive.  This isn’t static: Folks may shut down in the middle of an intense conversation.  Don’t go on autopilot and bulldoze through that critical moment.

Be sensitive.  If someone seems to suddenly become upset/angry/etc.  there’s an 80% chance they are.  And a 100% chance it has nothing to do with you, and everything to do with how they received what you’re sharing.  Explain they seem (insert emotion here) and ask if you’re misinterpreting that.    Ask if they want to revisit the conversation another time.

Once you or someone else becomes emotionally unhinged, the exchange has turned downhill.  Everything shared and received is done through a filter that obscures meaning and intent.  Opt out.

Or if you must push forward do so because you’re prepared to minister to someone from a place high above where emotions fall apart.

Do not worry that if you don’t say anything or intervene when you believe you know best, something will go wrong that you could have prevented.

That’s confusing selfishness and selflessness at someone else’s expense.

There is only one God capable of intervening, and He either put you in position to deliver a message for another to receive, or He didn’t.

You will know the difference: He ain’t stymied by communication challenges.

Release judgment and fear and let folks live and make their own mistakes.  Your meddling may force them to fail a test designed to strengthen them.

It’s not your job to fix anyone, and logging failed attempts for the record doesn’t help.

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