CategoryPersonal Growth

Look at Me

3 Min read

I’ve never felt okay ignoring people who are putting themselves out there for my protection. Several airplane flights ago I gave in tomy unease and started watching the flight attendants during their safety brief. Along the way I began noticing something peculiar…they never make eye contact.

This was confirmed when during a very rare first class flight (I’m usually in coach) I was clearly the only one among the 16 passengers watching. The attendant acted like a husband who wants to make sure his wife knows he is not looking at the attractive girl walking by. He looked in every direction but mine. (more…)

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Herbert Hoover on Prayer and Fishing

1 Min read

“Next to prayer, fishing is the most personal relationship of man.”

“To go fishing is the chance to wash one’s soul with pure air, with the rush of the brook, or with the shimmer of sun on blue water. It brings meekness and inspiration from the decency of nature, charity toward tackle-makers, patience toward fish, a mockery of profits and egos, a quieting of hate, a rejoicing that you do not have to decide a darned thing until next week. And it is discipline in the equality of men – for all men are equal before fish.”

“There are only two occasions when Americans respect privacy, especially in Presidents. Those are prayer and fishing.”

 

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Happiness Through (what you can) Control

1 Min read

Happiness and freedom begin with a clear understanding of one principle: Some things are within your control, and some things are not.  It is only after you have faced up to this fundamental role and learned to distinguish between what you can and can’t control that inner tranquility and outer effectiveness become possible. Epictetus

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Beautiful Teachings of Jesus

1 Min read

If I had seen a Christian living what Christ taught, then I myself may have followed and become a believer in the beautiful teachings of Jesus.  Mahatma Gandhi

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New Moment Resolutions: Why New Year’s Resolutions are Irrelevant

4 Min read

NOTE:  Originally posted on thepracticalCHRISTian.net

The New Year is a time of renewal reminiscent of the fresh starts each school year brought when we were children.  Starting fresh is intoxicating to those of us encumbered with a litany of bad habits and regrets we would like to leave behind. Overwhelmingly those who resolve to leave baggage behind each new year fail.  Most can make it a couple of weeks, a few for a couple of months, and a small minority past six months.

As the habits and regrets each day mount, we trod along hoping for another fresh start fix.   Like junkies we crave a fix and decide to move, or change jobs or one is forced upon us through the tragedy of divorce, fire, or death.  With each start we once again resolve to change only to fail again.  Our hope for the next new year renews and the cycle repeats.

There has to be a better way. (more…)

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Gratitude Unlocks the Fullness of Life

1 Min read

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today and creates a vision for tomorrow. – Melody Beattie

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Real Life

1 Min read

Real life isn’t always going to be perfect or go our way, but the recurring acknowledgment of what is working in our lives can help us not only to survive but surmount our difficulties – Sarah Ban Breathnach

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Don’t Invite Them In

1 Min read

“We cannot control the parade of negative thoughts marching through our minds.  But we can choose which ones we will give our attention to.  Picture your thoughts as people passing by the front of your home.  Just because they’re walking by doesn’t mean you have to invite them in.”  Gladys Edmunds

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Rise From the Pain

1 Min read

“I am responsible.  Although I may not be able to prevent the worst from happening, I am responsible for my attitude toward the inevitable misfortunes that darken life.  Bad things do happen; how I respond to them defines my character and the quality of my life.  I can choose to sit in perpetual sadness, immobilized by the gravity of my loss, or I can choose to rise from the pain and treasure the most precious gift I have – life itself.”  – Walter Anderson

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Energy Follows Thought

2 Min read

“Energy follows thought ”

These three words were my take-away from three days of leadership training. Not that everything else wasn’t good information is was just more of the same from previous training events. I probably even heard these three words in training before but it never struck me the way they did that day.

What a simple rule for Christians. (more…)

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