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| Image: "Autumn Bouquet" by Tim Blessed, copyrighted photograph |
How are you? I am a happy man. I wrote a
lengthy letter today. I like knowing that all that has gone on before in my life prepared for what I wrote today, penning this missive.
For two hours, minimum, every day, for the past three years, I've written, without fail. Before starting this discipline, the nature of my work didn't require such effort.
But, writing for this blog and a previous one, in a different community, prepared me for what I wrote today. I like the fact that I'm still growing. We learn how to study by studying, to speak by speaking, how to love by loving and how to write, by writing. Nothing is a substitute for effort. We can't become the person we want to be by remaining the way we are.
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Just because I see something as bad, that doesn't mean that it is. Often, when we catastrophize, we are believing our feelings, yielding to them. There's a problem with that. The loudest voice is not necessarily the truest. It is just a feeling, not a prophecy.
I was inspired by a man I heard last Saturday. I thank him for his message. Life isn't all about "woe is me!" In the Old Testament there's a saying, "as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." If I want to be miserable all I have to do is think miserably. It doesn't take much.
What doctors don't tell us is that the meds given for depression don't eradicate the thoughts that cause it. Nope, the meds simply deaden its biological manifestations. That is an unacceptable solution. Why? Because the cause is not addressed, it is only masked. The problem with that approach is that the troubling feelings will return tomorrow, before taking the meds again.
Where's there is fruit, there's a root. Depression is a fruit. It reveals an unmet need. It's best rooting out the problem. Masking it with meds, drinking, internet addiction, gambling, sex or what have you, does not eliminate the problem that causes whatever negative disease that has us in its grip. We are simply trimming the bush of the problem. This blasted issue will continually need clipping. But, if rooted out, the incessant problem is resolved.
This is done by replacing the vexing issue with a new and better behavior, a healthy alternative.
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I've been under a lot of pressures. I'm thankful for my faith and the many years where I've seen God at work, not only in my life, but in the lives of many I know. God is not a figment of our imagination. He is real.
One thing however, we don't call the shots. We don't tell God what to do. Uh, uh. No, we don't. One of the key lessons in life is knowing that there is only one God and we are not it. When we are upset because He doesn't do what we want, we are making Him our spiritual bellboy. For more on that check out that link.
Life trains us for our future.
How About You?
1. What do you do to overcome fear?
2. How is your relationship with God? Is it where you want it?
3. Have you made God your bellboy, angry, when He doesn't do things the way you've told Him you want it?
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2 comments:
Dear Pablo,
WOW! Your writing this evening is very powerful, purposeful and intense - dynamic in emotion, in passion and intention. Whatever is going on in your life has lit the fuse of your heart, and it seems ready to explode!
Tonight I am grateful;
1. For my wife's Professional Landscape Architect Competition Results. She did not win, but as a novice to this discipline (she is an architect by trade) received rousing accolades from well-known, published experts.
2. That I could "let go" of warranted, nagging agitation toward ongoing, petty complaints from a small purchase, high-maintenance client. Instead of dumping them, I shall try to find a win-win solution.
3. My wife and sons (no less!) could hear a dynamic young lady guest speaker on her long and winding road from addiction to recovery, health, new-found love and happiness.
4. That John Mayer and Jason Mraz's new albums continue to uplift, inspire and move the soul, and that my sons inadvertently turned their old man onto them. Music truly bridges the generations.
5. That my Chinese Sushi Chef buddy, Jimmy, who rolls for employees of a global biotech company in South SF, comp'd me a beautiful, if not surprisingly spicy lunch when I stopped by on a sales call (strategically) at closing time!
6. That the magic of a 20 minute nap could rouse me from the coma of a 12-hour work day, so I could join some friends in planning a major event around the U.N. International Day of Peace next month.
7. That our late-blooming sons are finally coming into their own, and that their parents are finally letting go of the kite string!
Dear Carl,
Thanks for your feedback. I'm not aware how what I write affects others until I get comments like yours.
I bet you are proud of your wife!
You have more patience than me. I've learned, that unless I'm destitute, that working with unpleasant people is a form of underearning.
From your comments I've learned how much you enjoy music. Wow.
Isn't it great to receive unexpected gifts? I bet it made your day.
Ah, great reference, regarding your sons, the kite string. I wrote that post more than a year ago.
I really enjoy your enthusiasm. More so, I'm glad your family enjoys a harmony and is seeing progress---your adult sons are becoming the persons they want to be: kind and courteous while still adhering to their values, that's recovery of the major kind.
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