Showing posts with label Power. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Power. Show all posts

Day 19: BLESS (Your Feelings Can Help You Choose)


Each day during The PURSE-onality Challenge: "A Holiday-Ready Heart" in October, Untangling Christmas by Karen Ehman and LeAnn Rice, will be our give-away prize!  

Enter via the Rafflecopter at the end of the blog post or click here to enter!

Day 14: TRUST (+ How Each PURSE-onality Can Get Day Overwhelmed)
Day 15: PATIENT (+ Practicing Now for Patience Then)
Day 16: NO RECORD (+ How to Have Grudge-Free Holidays)
Day 17: TRUTH (Each PURSE-onality's Take on Truth)
Day 18: PERSEVERE (+2 Cures for Procrastination)


Today's post comes to you as a vlog (below) and blog (scroll on down)!

 Can't view video?  Click here to see "Your Feelings Can Help You Choose" on YouTube!




Readers have given a ton of great input regarding the issues we seem to struggle with most during the holidays. These two comments represent a whole host of responses I received on this particular theme:

“Encountering and spending time with relatives and other visitors who have conflicting lifestyles and values during the holidays.”

“Difficult relationships with people who know how to “push our buttons” during the holidays!”

Since today’s verse is


I tell you who hear me: 
Love your enemies, 
do good to those who hate you, 
bless those who curse you, 
pray for those who mistreat you.
Luke 6:27-28 (NIV)


I thought today would be a good day to talk about how we can plan to BLESS those who have very different values and those who tend to “push our buttons.”


Mistaken Purposes of Misbehavior

According to Jane Nelson, author of Positive Discipline, our children’s misbehavior stems from attempting to fulfill four mistaken purposes:


1)  attention:  “I belong only when I have your attention or special service.”

2)  power:  “I belong only when I am winning or at least when I don’t let you win.”

3)  revenge:  “It hurts that I can not belong, but at least I can hurt back.”

4)  assumed inadequacy:  “I give up. It’s impossible to belong.”


Using My Feelings to Identify Others' Mistaken Purposes

I can quickly identify someone’s mistaken purpose by my own feelings in reaction to the misbehavior.  

Then, using my knowledge of the PURSE-onalities, I can choose -- through the power of the Holy Spirit -- how to respond in blessing, rather than react out of instinct.


When I Feel Annoyed

When I feel annoyed, the mistaken purpose is probably attention. This person is either a Sanguine or acting out of Sanguine weaknesses. I can bless them by responding with fun, attention, and approval. 

Of course, this is very counter-intuitive, because when someone annoys me, my natural reaction is to ignore them and hope they’ll go away!


When I Feel Undermined or Threatened

When I feel undermined or threatened, the mistaken purpose is probably power. This person is either a Choleric or acting out of Choleric weaknesses. I can bless them by offering them greater control, achievement, and appreciation. 

Of course, this is also counter-intuitive; when someone threatens me, what I naturally want is to put them in their place!


When I Feel Hurt

When I feel hurt, the mistaken purpose is probably revenge. This person is either a Melancholy or acting out of Melancholy weaknesses. I can bless them by facilitating greater perfection, order, and sensitivity. 

Of course, yet again, this is counter-intuitive; when I feel hurt, my instinct is to hurt them back or run and hide!


When I Feel Helpless

When I feel helpless, the mistaken purpose is probably assumed inadequacy. This person is either a Phlegmatic or acting out of Phlegmatic weaknesses. I can bless them by providing peace, respect, and a sense of self-worth. 

Of course, this too is counter-intuitive; what I want to do is motivate them to take action and quit whining!

Choosing to Love

Blessing those who curse us is counter-intuitive. 

 It's also a choice. 

 One we can make now. 

 So that when the holidays come around, God's love flows to us and through us.
Your Turn:

  • Which relationship might improve if you used your feelings about their misbehavior to guide your choice of response?
  • Which feeling is the hardest for you to experience: feeling annoyed, threatened, hurt, or helpless?
  • Anything else on your heart!

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Day 9: NEW (+ The Power to Get or to Give?)


Each day during The PURSE-onality Challenge: "A Holiday-Ready Heart" in October, Untangling Christmas by Karen Ehman and LeAnn Rice, will be our give-away prize!  

Enter via the Rafflecopter at the end of the blog post or click here to enter!
If I were to write a memoir, I’d title it All That’s Left.

I’d write it in three parts.



All That’s Left: Part 1

 Here, I’d tell the sad stories of all the people who have left me by 

  • physically moving away to other parts of the state, the country. 
  • breaking up with me. 
  • deciding they hate me.

Poor abandoned, rejected, left behind me.


All That’s Left: Part 2

Here, I’d share my struggles of living with a scarcity mentality.  

  • Convinced that I had so little while others had so much.
  • My many “baditudes” holding me captive to conviction that I was missing out. 
  • That God was holding out on me. 

He hadn’t given me the abundant life I’d expected on a silver platter. 

 So I decided that for everything else, there’s my platinum MasterCard.

My garage still bears witness to how fully I bought into

All That’s Left: Part 3

Here, two key words are utterly re-defined.

All now means 

  • abundance. 
  • overflowing. 
  • above-and-beyond. 

Left now means 

  • remaining. 
  • still here. 
  • enduring.

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ
has become a new person. 
The old life is gone; a new life has begun! 

2 Corinthians 5:17 (NLT)

All That's Left: Parts 1 and 2 are the old life.

 It's gone.

All That's Left: Part 3 is the new life. 

 It's evidence that Jesus means exactly what He says when he offers:

And I will give you a new heart, 
and I will put a new spirit in you. 
I will take out your stony, stubborn heart 
and give you a tender, responsive heart.

Ezekiel 36:26 (NLT)


New Holiday Story

One of the issues we’ve struggled with the most is the commercialization of Christmas. 

We’ve felt 

  • surrounded by it. 
  • sucked in by it. 
  • overwhelmed by it. 

We’ve even found ourselves buying in to “the power to get” without meaning to.

But God is the Author and finisher of our faith.

If He can give us new life…

If He can give us new hearts…

...then He can certainly re-new a right holiday spirit within us this year!

A spirit that exalts the power to give far above the power to get.

 I suspect this will look different for each of us.

Our family is going to try spending-free, shopping-free Christmas gift-giving. 

But this is how the Holy Spirit is moving us, in this particular season of our empty-nester kids-in-college lives. 

The point isn’t the exact details of what we do.

The point is that He is recreating us anew!


Your Turn!
  • How have you bought into “the power to get” in past holidays?
  • In what ways has the “for everything else there’s MasterCard” mentality been master of your life?
  • What is something you sense God doing new in your life?
  • Anything else on your heart!


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Day 7: FREE (+ Reason Why #4)


Our Give-Away for Today!

Just Too Busy: Taking Your Family on a Radical Sabbatical

Just Too Busy is the true story of the Kraft family's head-on collision with busyness and the twelve-month experiment that changed their lives. When their children could recite the dollar value meals at McDonalds faster than their times-tables, they knew something was very wrong. So, instead of continuing their bad habits and fitting more into their schedules, they took a year off from all activities and learned how to be a family again. 

In this book, readers will laugh their way to learning the ten tell-tale signs that they are too busy and discover the symptoms for a common disorder known to moms today: A.D.D. (Activity Denial Disorder). Families will find simple ways to guard themselves from the temptation of constant distraction.


Joanne Kraft has a passion for encouraging women. A sought-after speaker, Joanne has been published in Today's Christian Woman, In Touch, ParentLife, Kyria, and P31 Woman Magazine. Her family is in the midst of moving from California to Nashville, TN. "Like" Joanne on Facebook and check out her website! 


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Why We G.R.I.P.E.

Continuing our exploration of the 5 goals of complaining+ (via the acronym G.R.I.P.E):

P = Power


Complaining is a natural language for taking CONTROL of a situation.


You’ve seen it happen. Everyone in a planning group is excited about a new idea that’s gaining momentum.


And then the lone dissenter speaks:  “It will never work!  Whose lame-brain idea was this?”



And what happens to the energy in the room? 


To the overall atmosphere of the planning session?
Swaying others to agree or intimidating people to back down are classic Choleric “I’m-in-control-here” power plays.




Hi, My Name is Cheri...
...and I’m a Control Freak
Once upon a time, there was a little girl who tried to be good.  I grew up knowing all the rules, and wanting to follow them.  
I was a “good girl.”
By my freshman year of high school, everyone expected me to be good, so I decided to aim for perfect scores on every single Geometry test the entire year.  With enormous effort, I pulled this off for two full quarters . . . until, in disbelief, I watched Mr. Vickers red pen mark “minus 1” on my “perfect” test.  I ran from the room, hid behind the gym, and cried for 2 hours. 
Well, that minus 1 may have knocked me down, but I was no quitter.   I decided what I really needed was a 4.0 GPA for all four years of high school.  Wouldn’t that be the ultimate in being a GOOD girl?
A Very Good Girl
In my journal, that October, I wrote: 
I’m expected to bring home good grades -- nobody seems to realize that I DO have to work for them!  They don’t just happen!  
I’ve learned not to expect praise for anything I do, but somewhere inside me the little girl still drops a tear or two when it doesn’t come.  I could let it get me down and just stop trying, but I still have to do my best for me -- a hard taskmaster.  
But, even though I’ve written all this, it doesn’t bother me a lot. In fact, I didn’t realize half of it before it came out of my pen!  I live with it, though at times, I am just a bit wistful.
What started out as a personal challenge became a drive to “succeed” at all cost.  And I defined “succeed” as doing lots of GOOD things and being very GOOD at them:  4.0 GPA, yearbook editor, Student Body Religious Vice President, plus community volunteer work.
Secret Control
What I didn’t know at the time is that my family needed me to succeed -- needed me to be a very GOOD girl.  All I knew was that I had a secret, and it was driving me crazy.
My older brother had “confided” in me that he was doing drugs.  Pot, heroine, cocaine, and others I’d never heard of.  And along with all the sordid details, came the dire warning, “but don’t you dare tell Mother and Daddy!”  That day, I picked up a burden far too great for a 14-year-old to bear.
Night after night I lay awake, wondering if he’d come home safely or if we’d get a knock on the door from a police officer.  Day after day for one long year, I struggled.  Keeping the secret didn’t seem to be what a GOOD daughter would do.  Telling my parents didn’t seem to be what a GOOD sister would do.  I didn’t know what to do, and I had nobody to turn to for help.  I felt so alone.
Finally, during one sleepless night when he still wasn’t home at 3:00 am, I slipped, and the truth came out.  My brother was so angry with me because I wasn’t supposed to tell!  My parents were so angry with me because I hadn’t told them sooner.
In my journal that day, I wrote:  
I really don’t know how to feel or what to do -- I’m sort of dead to it all, now. Somehow it doesn’t effect me, yet it must; I guess I’m shying away from the pain as long as I can.
And then, on a seemingly unrelated subject:  
I’m starting a diet today.
The Control Trap
And did I ever get “GOOD” at that diet.  Over the next year, as the turmoil of my brother’s issues raged loudly in the house, I quietly lost pound after pound after pound . . . and proudly became thinner and thinner and thinner.  My periods stopped.  My hipbones stuck out.  


My entire focus in life narrowed down to being GOOD at this one thing:  losing weight.
Well, I was so “good,” I was admitted to an inpatient Eating Disorder Hospital program with the diagnosis of Anorexia.  Six weeks of therapy, assertiveness training, and nutritional counseling had minimal effect. 

All I’d ever wanted was to be a “good girl,” and I was really good at this weight loss thing.  And I was no quitter!  I was not ready to give it up, yet -- maybe once lost a little more and hit my goal (85 pounds) but not before.


Controlled to Death


One night, after a particularly rough family counseling session -- “rough” because my counselor was once again pushing me to share my feelings with my parents, something a GOOD girl was not going to do -- I opened my Bible, hoping to read myself to sleep.  In Psalm 18, I read:
The cords of the grave coiled around me;
the snares of death confronted me.
This jarred me awake.  I realized this was me!  I was dying.  Anorexia was not just a diet. Anorexia was committing suicide...slowly.
In my distress I called to the Lord;
I cried to my God for help!
Really?!?  There was someone I could go to for help?  I was not alone?  I was in “distress” and I could call to God for help?!
The earth trembled and quaked,
and the foundations of the mountains shook;
they trembled because he was angry.
God’s response was dramatic -- he was angry, but not at me -- he was angry for me!  I read on and found that His version of “help” included lightning bolts, thunder, and earthquakes.  


I was WOWed!  Here was someone I could trust to really take control of my out-of-control life!
 


Rescue


And on that day, 27 years ago, this last line read as a personal note from God to this wistful little girl who just wanted to be good enough to be loved:  
He rescued me because he delighted in me. 
Not because of my perfect performances, not because of my 4.0, not because I was Religious Vice Anything.  
God delighted in me!  
God delighted in me.  
God delighted in me!  



From Very Good Girl to Very Good News

(Can't see image? Click here to download Romans 8:1-2)

The details of your life story no doubt differ from mine.  
Perhaps, in your own way, you’ve tried to be a “good girl." Good enough to be loved.  
Whatever your “once upon a time” has included thus far, God, "the author and finisher of our faith,” loves writing our stories of freedom. 
When we give Him control, our stories no longer dwell on condemnation.
When we give Him control, our stories celebrate belonging.
When we give Him control, our stories overflow with the power of the life-giving Spirit.
When we give Him control, we will have good news to tell and re-tell: our stories of how Jesus has set us free!




Try this today:  Write out your testimony of how Jesus has set you free. Share it by e-mail, on your blog, in our comments, and/or by reading it aloud to someone.



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