Week 4 – 7 – I quit!

I’m done! I quit! I surrender!

Enough of the hamster wheel! Running! Running! Running!

Around! Around! Around!

Same repetitive cycle over and over again.

“The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
– Albert Einstein

“… I have stumbled in ignorance and fallen into pools of self-pity.“
– Scroll 1

I need to take responsibility for myself and everything in my life.

It saddens me to admit that I have been blaming other people, conditions and circumstances for everything that did not suit me or that i did not like.

It has always been about anything or anyone except me. Things that happened or things people did. It goes on and on!

No more! Enough is enough!

I need to let go of the past! I need to forgive! I need to take 100% responsibility! I need to do the work! The hard mental labour! The physical work! The paper work! All the work! Whatever it takes!

Week 2 & 3 – Time management

Time, time, time!

Is it real?

Does it even exist?

Can it be managed?

We all get 24 hours each per day. What do we do with our 24 hours.

We cannot manage the time. It is ticking by second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour. Nothing we do will change that.

What we can manage is what we can do while the time that is passing by.

In other words we can manage activities, but not time.

We can manage ourselves.

Or we can neglect to manage our activities and therefore neglect to manage ourselves.

We can either take control of ourselves and our activities or we can allow external events to manage us and let time go by without using it.

Planning and scheduling. If it is not written, it is not true.

Today I begin a new life. Planning my new life. Scheduling my new life.

Week 1 – Purpose

Purpose:

“the reason for which something is done or created or for which something exists.”

“a person’s sense of resolve or determination.”

The question of all questions: Why am I here?

Wouldn’t we just love to know. Not just think we know, but really know. Exactly. In detail. Specific.

Do we have a choice in our purpose or has it been decided for us?
Is it universal or is it individual?
Does it stay the same or does it change with time?
What influences our purpose?
Where does destiny fit into our purpose?
Does your purpose have an expiry date?
What about dreams and purpose? Is it the same or just related?

We have to write our DMP, Definite Major Purpose, and these are some of the questions running through my mind. I have done this before and since previous attempts life has thrown me a few curve balls. Back to the drawing board. What do I hold on to? What do I let go?

Join me on this journey of self discovery and exploration…
Let’s see how deep the rabbit hole goes…

Week 11 – Life and death…

Life is very fragile. As far as we know we only get to die once. The question is do we really get to live? Do we ever really get to experience the good and the beauty in life? Do we value life? Do we value our own AND each other’s?

Life can be a lonely journey at times as we walk through the valleys and over the mountain tops. And at the end we get to die alone. And we get to face God alone…

I read a poem about a dash once…. –
It is the dash on our tombstone between the date that we were born and the date we died…
And the question is asked about how we spend our dash?

They say the only thing truly worthwhile in life are the relationships with the people we love. Why is it then that we kill one another? Whether physically in wars or silently and emotionally in our close relationships! And is that not the worst death to die? The silent death on the inside! The death that never gets a funeral or a tombstone! The death that can not be seen as the body still functions!

And what about real death!? Losing a loved one! Never getting to see that person again. And what if that death was prematurely? What if there was unfinished things that died with that person!? What about the things we wanted to say or do!?

Is that not the reason we should live every day as if it our last? Is that not the reason why we should love unconditionally every day? Is that not the reason we should make the best of every day? Is that not the reason why we should stop killing each other, whether physically or emotionally? Is that not the reason why we should value our own lives as well as the life or every other person? Every moment of every day!

May we make our Creator proud of the lives we live…

Week 10 – Growth is optional…

Sometimes life throws us a curveball…
Or presents us with a challenge…
OR rocks the boat…
Force us to move outside our comfort zone…
Presents us with an opportunity to grow!

Everything living that God created grows instinctively… everything except humans! For us growth is optional. God gave us the biggest gift ever by giving us free will. However with this gift came responsibility. We have the responsibility to use and apply our free will for good, but unfortunately we can also use and apply it for evil…

When challenged and under pressure we get tested. Our strength gets tested. Our character gets tested. Our integrity gets tested. Our faith gets tested.

And that my dear friend is where the opportunity to grow lies…
Unfortunately it is at that exact same point where the opportunity to fade away lies as well!

If we choose to dig deep inside ourselves to find our strength, to build our character, to act with integrity, to grow in faith, then and only then do we grow! That is when we choose to act responsibly with our gift of free will to do what is right regardless of the circumstance or challenge that we face; regardless of how hopeless the situation might seem; regardless of how we may feel; regardless of how long it may take to come out victorious on the other side!

However if at that very same crossroad if we choose to crack; show weakness in character; act without integrity; choose not to have faith in a better future; choose to shift the blame; choose distractions or addictions; choose not to act responsibly; choose the easy way out in the name of fun; choose to give up; that my dear friend is when we fade away. That is when we choose not to grow.

Fortunately for us, we get to learn from our mistakes and we get second chances. May we all choose wisely and grow; if not, may we learn the lessons from our mistakes and still grow!

“If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you”
James 1:5 NIV

 

Week 9 …….

I’m at a loss of words….

I’m at a loss of wisdom….

I’m on an amazing self discovery journey….

But at a loss of words and wisdom to share….

I heard somewhere: “If you don’t have something good to say, don’t say anything at all.”

Week 8 – When the going gets tough

Life is a journey! An unfoldment! An Experience! What a ride!

I once heard that if you want to make God laugh, you should tell Him about your plans!

We think we plan our lives. That is because we think we are in control. In a previous post, Week 6 – Control, I mentioned that the only thing we should be controlling is self! Part of self control is to listen to that quiet voice inside, the voice of God, however we don’t always listen to that voice. Sometimes we choose to listen to other voices! The wrong voices! Always with the best intentions, but the wrong voice!

When we don’t make the right choice to listen to the right voice we inevitably end up making mistakes. We make the wrong turns. We land up somewhere and we don’t exactly know where that is and how we got there.

The good thing about this is that there are valuable lessons in making mistakes. The sad part is we sometimes miss the lessons. This is when it may feel like we have reached the end of our rope! This is when it feels like everything is falling apart! And this my dear friend is when you tie a knot in your rope and you hold on! This is you surrender to the will of God and admit that you cannot do this on your own! This where you pray and wait for guidance and direction. This is where you ask for forgiveness for choosing to listen to the wrong voices. This where you keep quiet, be still and wait for the voice of God!

We live in a world filled with miracles, if we will only pause for a moment to observe them all around us. From the smallest to the biggest thing, if we only become quiet and still we will see the hand of God all around us!

In the unfoldment of my life, I have experienced a lot of miracles along my journey, therefor I have made the knot in my rope and I am holding on with every fibre of my being, admitting that I don’t have the answer or solution, trusting with expectation for God to deliver me with a whole bunch of miracles to take me to the next season of sunshine and blessings.

“Peace be still.”
– Jesus Christ – Mark 4:39 KJV

 

Week 7 – Will the real men please stand up!?

We live in a male dominated world. Right? WRONG. We live in a male EGO dominated world! Men in search of power and control, but as soon as the going gets tough they back out and look for something or some one to blame. And woman pay the price!

Where did it all start? Well at the start of course! Paradise! Adam and Eve! So we all know that Eve was the one who ate the forbidden fruit first. But what actually happened there? Adam was there all the time and Eve gave to him standing by her. And the result was knowledge of good and evil.

Now had Adam been a real man he would have protected his wife and told the serpent to take a hike, however he just stood by and allowed the serpent to mislead his wife. And when she gave him some of the fruit, again he did not object.

When God confronted Adam, what did he do!? He blamed Eve! And since then the world has been a broken place.

Eve has been walking around wounded and ashamed and Adam has been trying to be the main peanut in the pack without enough backbone to support his jellyfish cowardly existence.

Had Adam protected Eve as he should’ve, or even after not protecting her as he should’ve he owned up and taken responsibility when confronted by God, the world would have been a different place.

Lucky for us about 2000 years ago the Greatest Teacher, a carpenter from Galilee, our Saviour came along and showed us what a real man is. So we need to find our way to Jesus and be a real man who loves unconditionally, forgive unendingly and show the same undeserved mercy and grace that we all receive from God.

We need to be the men that our wives need! The men that will protect them, love them unconditionally, make them feel wanted, make them feel special, make them feel whole! And what is more is that we need to be these men to our first and own wives. Don’t leave your wife when the going gets tough! Especially not for another man’s wife! (And that is a hole discussion on its own!) Dig in, show some strength, show some backbone and be the man your wife and children need!

We need to be the fathers our sons and daughters need. The fathers who raise our children to be the next generation of strong families.

We need to be the men that society needs! The men who owns up to their responsibilities and make the world a better place. Society’s strength lies in strong families and we men are responsible for that.

“When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.”
1 Corinthians 13:11

Week 6 – Control

Control – The downfall of man!

Why is it that almost everybody wants to be in control and almost nobody wants to be controlled? Does it make us feel powerful? Does it make us feel important?

See, the thing is control is the cause of all things bad. No matter what your religion is, we all believe in good and bad. And in most religions the bad is called sin. Where does sin come from? According to The Bible it started with Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit. So what really happened there. Well a LOT happened there, however for the sake of this post I will focus on control. (not to worry! my next blog will be about everything else that happened that sad day in paradise)

So God gave them one rule! Just one! And what did Adam and Eve do!? They decided to take matters into their own hands; they decided to take control! Who is this Guy who created us to tell us what to do? To control us? And bam! There you have the downfall of the human being!

From there all other sin followed. From there on for the remainder of existence we try to control everything. We try to control each other, we try to control events, we try to control things we can not even control! Politics! Economics! Education! Religion! Heck we even try to control the weather!

The thing is, there actually is something that we can and should be controlling, however in general unfortunately it is the one type of control that does not get the attention it deserves.  It is the most neglected control. It is the control that if done right will change the world for the better. The only control spoken of in the New Testament…

SELF-CONTROL!!!

Before we try to control anything and especially any person or people we should first focus on and master self-control. We need to accept that we are never really in control of anything anyway. I am the proud father of three beautiful children and at best I can only influence my children, but control them!? No chance! And they are my own children!

If we should master self-control we will never find ourselves in the dreadful position of having to apologise for saying or doing something we regret as we act from a controlled self who thinks before speaking and doing.

So lets take up the greatest challange and start mastering the art of controlling self!

Week 5 – Deception

“If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change!”
– Wayne Dyer

We sometimes look, but don’t see. And sometimes we look at things from one perspective not keeping in mind that there may be more than one side to it. And sometimes we think we see, but do we really know what we are looking at….?

Now the easy part in life is when we are referring to objects; things; dead things…

However people are not objects. People are not things. People are not dead… well not all people. People are weird, wonderful, fascinating, interesting, fallible, emotional, irrational beings. We influence one another, we learn from each other, we depend on each other, we love one another…. we hurt one another.

“The prince of darkness is a gentleman.”
– Shakespeare

Life is an unfoldment and sometimes people come into our lives, seemingly at the right time for seemingly the right reason and things all of a sudden looks different…better…

Or is it really!? Due to the fallible nature of human beings we sometimes only show what we want to be seen and we only see what we want to see. We sometimes tend to put the best foot forward. We sometimes tend to present what is not even ours to present. We bend the truth, we use information shared confidentially to our advantage, we manipulate, we lie, we cheat!

And the worst of all is that we don’t just do it to one another, but sadly to ourselves! We live in a broken world and we need to be sure that we are not deceived by others nor ourselves.

“deception. : the act of making someone believe something that is not true : the act of deceiving someone. : an act or statement intended to make people believe something that is not true.”
– http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/deception

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?”
Jeremiah 17:9 KJV

Therefore we need to ensure that we look at everything and every one, including ourselves, from all perspectives to ensure that we don’t get deceived or misled.

“Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life.”
Proverbs 4:23 NLT