Posts Tagged ‘focus’

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Pride will drive you crazy

January 11, 2011

I was teaching from Daniel last week. It’s always amazing how threads of thought come together. I’ve been pondering whether much of the trouble and strife we have in the country today is caused by pride and then I’m asked to teach from this particular book. My text was Chapter 4 where the king has a dream. He is troubled, but he doesn’t know why. No one can interpret the dream, until Daniel (who is about to be killed along with all other educated men) says, Wait. I can help.

Now, my daughter earned a master’s in psychology. Me, I am just a perpetual student–but not in schools. I’ve read most of Freud, all of Jung, all of the Bible (more than once), and a lot more. She says that a dream is just a bunch of random neurons firing over night probably dredging up random thoughts you’ve had during the day.

My studies (and personal experience to some degree) say that occasionally a dream is more than a dream. (Carl Jung, who studied these things and was much more wise than his followers, once said, sometimes a dream is just a dream. But then he studied a lot of dreams.)

When you are in a position of great authority, your thoughts are on things that are beyond everyday living. You are concerned with history, your importance, what people are plotting, and especially in the ancient world, God. Early leaders right up through the rulers of Rome and continuing into the Middle Ages’ kings and Popes would get the idea that they were, indeed, God himself.

So, the king is full of those thoughts–we would say full of himself, or maybe something soft, brown and squishy–and goes to sleep. He has a numinous dream–one from God. Paraphrasing Daniel’s analysis, “You’d better change your ways, or you’ll go crazy.”

He didn’t; and he did.

Later, when the king was restored to health, he praised God because he had experienced the mighty power of God.

Just so, do we all today–and all those loud-mouthed pundits on TV and radio, and so on–need to go through a season (or seven seasons like this king) of insanity before coming to our senses? Acknowledge your pride and turn your life away from it.

The best advice I’ve seen so far about this is to live only in the present moment without dwelling either on the past or the future but focused only on walking with God during this minute. If you are doing that, then there is no place for the ego to assert itself and get you into trouble.

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Focus On Jesus This Year

January 3, 2011

We did a lot of holiday driving. Visited one set of relatives in Tennessee for three days before Christmas, then drove to Florida on Christmas day. In the spirit of the season, I found a continuous supply of radio stations playing “Christmas” music.

Guess how many of these popular Christmas season songs mentioned Jesus. None. Well, one station played one traditional Christmas carol (song). So, I think in 16 hours of driving listening to Christmas songs, we heard Jesus mentioned once.

Do you confuse traditional Northeast US wintertime nostalgia with Christmas? (Think “I’m Dreaming of a White Christmas”, “The Christmas Song (chestnuts roasting)” and the like) How about all the Santa songs?

I’m sure that these bring back warm, nostalgic feelings from a distant childhood. But as far as keeping focus on Jesus–could be an entirely different season.

Now that Christmas is past and we’re beginning the new year, stick a note somewhere (on a calendar, your mobile phone, on a pop up window on your computer) with a memory jog to think of Jesus more often this year. It’ll help your overall outlook on life.

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Why are you pursuing Christmas

December 11, 2010

Have you thought about why you are rushing around, decorating, buying, composing wish lists, playing special music? Do you just do it? Of course, this assumes you are actually celebrating Christmas, I guess.

Walter Hilton has this great illustration in “The Ladder of Perfection.” A hound that runs after the hare only because he sees other hounds run, when he is weary, he stays and rests, or turns home again; but if he runs because he sees or is in view of the hare, he will not spare for weariness till he has caught her.

If you are going through all the effort and emotional swings of Christmas only because all your family and friends are or “it’s the right thing to do,” then you will be exhausted and weary. But if all you do is in the context of celebration of Jesus’ coming, if you devote this time as a period of renewing your focus on Jesus, if you share your joy, then you’ll not only survive the month, but you’ll thrive. And bring others along with you.

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All about Jesus or all about me

December 8, 2010

At Christmas time, we often hear reminders of focusing on the reason for the celebration. But that admonishment may be too vague. What is the reason for the celebration?

I’ll never forget the sign I saw in northern Indiana once, “Keep Christ in Xmas.” I don’t know if they were being cute or if they ran out of room. But I’d have preferred that they spell out what they were talking about.

I’m reading Walter Hilton right now. “The Ladder of Perfection.” Interestingly, the topic of the day was the seven deadly sins, first of which is pride. It is amazing how pride can get in our way. The way Hilton describes it, pride is thinking too much about me. I’ve heard people in the very way they describe events that it’s all about them. Listen. They’ll say, “they did it to me” or “she ignored me” or “the company did this to me” when, in reality, those other people probably didn’t really care about them.  Is your thinking about what you’ll give? What you’ll get? What you’ll do?

I’m reading more and more often about substituting service for giving and getting material gifts. Do it in the spirit of serving others. It’s not you, it’s them. Then, don’t boast about it.  Giving extra to missions it good. At this time of life, we are financially blessed. We can give to people around the world and spread much good. Make micro-loans through Kiva, or support Compassion International, World Vision or a local missionary who does good deeds to people and spreads the word of Jesus.

Make Christmas merry for others. And meditate on just what Jesus’ coming means for you.

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Work Your Way Out of Spiritual Darkness

November 15, 2010

After spiritual highs come spiritual lows. After Jesus’ baptism and vision came 40 days in the wilderness full of temptations. St. John of the Cross wrote “Dark Night of the Soul” describing the phenomenon. Happens to all of us. Sometimes we just don’t “feel” the presence of God.

How do you get over that feeling and get back to the with-God life? Thomas a Kempis writes that you should do good works. Modern psychologists hold that you should consciously act the way you want to be and feel, and it will come. I wrote earlier about looking for opportunities to start the day by doing something good for someone. It turns out that that is good for your soul.

You are not saved through your works–God’s grace takes care of that. You don’t want to be like the early American Puritans who held that God picks some and not others. You don’t know if you’re one, but you don’t want the community to know that you’re not in the chosen, so you act like you are. No, those are false trails.

It’s simply that you can’t trust emotions. You have accepted God’s grace. But you just don’t feel it every day, every minute. What you do, is look for that first opportunity to do something good for someone. As soon as you do, then it’s easier to do it again. And that will help you get your focus back on God–where it belongs.

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Focus on Jesus

November 1, 2010

“My child, do not trust in your present feeling, for it will soon give way to another. As long as you live, you will be subject to changeableness in spite of yourself,” says Thomas a Kempis. Ever wonder why you can go from happy to sad to joyous to envious to angry–sometimes all within an hour or two? Wise people have pointed out to us for millennia that this is the human condition.

Sometimes we think that we are free from constraint to do what we wish, when in fact we are at the mercy of our passion. Benjamin Franklin, one of the American Founders, once said, “If passions are the driver, let reason hold the reins.” That was wise, but  still a little lacking. Sometimes our reason exists to justify the desires of the passions. We know that from buying decisions. Suddenly we desire something–a new car, expensive dress, whatever. The desire was probably driven by advertising or from someone we know who got one. Then our brain begins to start figuring out the rational reasons why that purchase would be good.

Thomas a Kempis concludes the chapter saying, “The eye of your intention, therefore, must be cleansed so that it is single and right. It must be directed toward [Jesus], despite all the objects which may interfere.”

Ponder that. How can you keep your focus on Jesus, and through him, God?

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Give Up Desires Find Rest

October 30, 2010

Tomorrow is Halloween (I’m not sure in how many countries, but certainly here). As strange as it may sound, this holiday has become the new starting point for the Christmas gift rush. We have had a day for years called “Black Friday,” which is the day after Thanksgiving in late November. That was the traditional starting point for Christmas shopping. Called black in reference to the accounting ledger where black is positive and red is negative. Retailers would make or break their year on that day. Now I’m seeing newspaper articles (probably planted by PR people from retailers) about a new Black Friday as Halloween.

Part of my reading today in Thomas a Kempis was this phrase–give up your desires and gain rest. I know that for the next two months we are going to be facing a barrage of advertising designed very carefully by people trained to tap into various desires of human beings. We will suddenly find ourselves wishing we had this or that trinket, gadget or huge gift. The day before we didn’t even know it existed.

I spent a lifetime studying and contemplating freedom. Is it living without constraint? Many people think so. And act is if there are no constraints on their lives. But are we aware of all the constraints that are often hidden within us? The Desert Fathers, early Christian contemplatives who studied these things most deeply, defined an entire hierarchy of constraints within us that we may not even realize. Desire is one. Will you live the next two months as a slave to your emotions and desires which are whipped into a frenzy by advertising geniuses? Or can you step back and recognize these for what they are and retain your focus on your with-God life?

That is where you find freedom–and rest.

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Why worry what others say

October 29, 2010

I often find myself in small groups or conversations where people want to talk about other people. What they said, what they meant, will they go to heaven, what’s wrong with them in the smallest, goriest detail, and on and on. I have no problem praying for others–do it all the time, well, er, at least often. But where does concern end and gossip begin? Where does idly worrying about others end and loss of focus on my own life begin?

Thomas a Kempis, writing in The Imitation of Christ, says, “Do not trouble yourself with idle cares. What matters this or that to you? Follow Me. What is it to you if a man is such and such, if another does or says this or that? You will not have to answer for others, but you will have to give an account of yourself. Why, then, do you meddle in their affairs?”

My last post talked about paying attention to others. When you meet someone, listen to them, listen to their name, observe their features and attitudes. Care for them and listen. But then don’t go away and talk about them to everyone who will listen. And worry over a comment they may have made. Don’t interfere with your own salvation and walk with God.

Your focus must be on the present. What matters is what you and God are doing now. Don’t worry about the past or the future. Don’t worry about what others say or think. When you’re with them, love them. Don’t obsess over them.

 

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Listen, Observe, Care about others

October 28, 2010

Jerry Lucas brought his traveling memory show to Sidney, Ohio this week. He has a calling from God to develop his techniques for memorization to change and improve education of people. One session dealt with remembering people. Lucas’ unique contribution is to turn everything you need to remember into pictures based on the theory that you remember tangible objects better than concepts.

However, his system has a few basic components apart from the memory aid. These are things you should be doing anyway. First, listen. The famous baseball figure/philosopher Yogi Berra once said (so the story goes), “You can hear a lot just by listening.” Where is your mind when you meet someone and you are given their name? Is your mind on them, your attention focused on them? Or is your attention more on what you are going to say to them? So, first pay attention to the person you are meeting. Listen as they say their name.

Next, observe. What do they look like? Notice unique things about appearance or facial characteristics. In other words, pay attention to them.

The thing is, Lucas works very hard at remembering. He puts a lot of energy into it. He has a list of people that he needs to remember. He reviews the list, which by the way has notes on appearance, the picture he formed to remember them and other notes. That’s not a bad idea. You might think it’s a lot of work, but only the setting up of the list is hard. The reviewing only takes a few minutes a day/week. I have over 2,700 names in my contact database. I don’t do the picture thing that Lucas developed. But I review the entire database periodically. Some I’ve never met, but if I have, I try to picture them. That way I remember.

While I was thinking about this process, I started to reflect on the example of Jesus. He had the ability to focus on the person, even when they interrupted him while he was on the way to do something else. He could take in everything about a person. How do you think he did that? By giving complete attention to the person he was with. That’s a good example to follow.

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