Stealing from The Minion

Hello everyone.  Today I want to tell you about something that happened to me this week.  On Tuesday, my wonderful girlfriend and I went to eat dinner at a local Mexican food restaurant here in Fort Worth.  While we were in the restaurant eating, someone broke the glass out of my vehicle and stole my iPhone.  That's pretty mean right?  Well in the process there was some additional body work that needed to be done and it's in the shop.

I bet some of you are already a little mad at the person who did this right?  I was for a short time.  This brings me to what I want to discuss today.  Today's blog is about forgiveness.

I know of a person who holds grudges extremely well.  This person is not into forgiveness.   As a matter of fact, this person can bring up injustices whether real or perceived from thirty years ago and relive them just like they were yesterday.  Now this person, who I will call person A has held a grudge against person B for at least 40 years and when A brings up events that caused the hurt over 4 decades ago, it's as if it happened last week.  You can see A's blood pressure go up and A's face turn red.  You can see the tension in A's body and all the stress.

B, on the other hand is just living life without one care about all that stuff.  I can tell you that B hardly ever brings any of it up.  I learned a lesson from watching this.  Who was really hurt all these years by the events of forty years ago?  The answer is A.  A has been damaged for not forgiving.  Now the bible says that God can't forgive us if we can't forgive other people so we must learn to forgive.  But aside from that extremely important fact, it's important for us to forgive others who have done us wrong because it frees us from the damaging effects of holding things against them.

I know this can be very hard.  I was in a relationship once with someone who did something that they shouldn't have done and this hurt me deeply because it betrayed a basic trust that I had with that person (I don't think the person I am talking about reads this blog, so if you are my friend and reading this it's probably not you).  I could have held a grudge and I could have worn that wrong suffered like a coat full of spikes on the inside lining but the only person who would have gotten hurt was me.  The other person never even asked my forgiveness.  But I decided to give the people involved forgiveness because I didnt' want the hurt.

Now this is exactly what I did after the incident with my phone.  After about thirty minutes, I cooled off and started thanking God that no one got hurt, I got to spend an great evening eating with someone I love, and at the end of the day everything was going to be OK.  After I got done with the thankfulness part, I purposely, from my heart, forgave whoever stole my phone.  Do you know what happened?  It set me free from the weight of unforgiveness.

So let me encourage you right now.  If you are holding on to something that someone has done to you, forgive them and let it go because unforgiveness only hurts you.

And that's another Opinion of the Minion.

Be Where You Are

Today I want to talk about being where you are.  That sounds pretty redundant right?  Well the Lord really began to deal with me about this subject a few weeks ago.  As you all know I have this amazing woman in my life, D.  I love her a lot.  She's the right type of person for me because she's different than me in so many ways and I have learned so much from her.  We have had many conversations about this topic but she really brought it home to me a couple of weeks ago.  It was just a passing comment but sometimes the Lord will use those types of comments to speak to you and this was one of those times.

She is a first grade teacher.  Now I believe that God anoints preachers to preach but from what I have seen, I think teachers need more anointing than most preachers.  One day we were talking about school and she said it was a very demanding job because with twenty kids who are only six years old, she has to stay very focused on what is going on around her.  She said that is something she works on in her life - giving whatever you are doing 100% of your energy while you are doing it.  That was very interesting on a couple of levels. 

First of all, it gave me more insight into her as a person and I really enjoy getting to know her.  But it also made me examine my own behavior.  It made me ask the question - Am I giving what I am doing my full attention?

Now I have seen this picture for a long time in a different area of my life.  When I was married, I was not happy so I was always looking forward to the next thing.  I tried to look forward to going to play golf because playing golf was fun and it helped me cope with the unpleasant things going on around me.  It was sort of my way to escape from the real world.  But here's what I noticed.  When I got to the golf course, I would play a few holes and then I started looking forward to going out to dinner or the movies or something after our round of golf.  More importantly, I quit enjoying the round of golf and found my only enjoyment coming from looking forward to the next thing.

I lived that way for a long time.  So when I was with my friends, I was only partially with my friends because the other part of me was on to the next thing on my agenda.  That wasn't fair to anyone.  It certainly wasn't fair to my friends who were hanging out with me because they were giving me their full attention (at least as far as I could tell) but I wasn't doing the same thing.  But it also wasn't fair to me.  The people around me are all gifts from God and I wasn't enjoying the gifts that God put into my life.

Which brings me to another point.  I wasn't being fair to God.  He was placing all these great people and opportunities in front of me and I didn't enjoy them.  To make matters worse, I didn't appreciate them like I should so I didn't value them as high as I should.  That's terrible.  Now the reverse of this can also be true.  You can be so focused on some negative situation that it causes you to act the same way.

Now fast forward to the present.  While I don't really look forward like that anymore, there is another place that is just as bad.  I can be not totally present for no apparent reason.  A person that I work with brought that up to me yesterday.  He mentioned a specific incident where I was disconnected from a situation that I should have really paid attention.  A person needed me to be caring and considerate and I was mentally absent.  That is horrible and I have no excuse for my actions.  But it is something that I want to watch.

So what am I saying today?  Wherever you are, be there completely!  Thank you D for reminding me of this very important issue.  I love you.

That's another Opinion of the Minion 

Heart

Today I want to talk about heart.  When I was in high school, I was on the football team.  Notice I did not say I was a football player because I really wasn't but I was on the team.  Now we had a coach named coach S.  He coached the defense when I was in school and he was meaner than a junkyard dog.  Now I don't know if he is the first person I ever heard say this but I can see him saying it in my mind.  I can see him saying, "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog."


Before I get into this, I am NOT advocating dog fighting and that is NOT the point of that saying.  What it means is that sometimes you don't look at what a person looks like on the outside, you look at their insides.  Many times a football team can win a game against a better team just because they wanted to win more than the other team.  Because their hearts are consumed with winning and it grows to such large proportions inside, it comes out and they can win.

Not that many years ago, I was running 5K and 10K races and I was placing very well in my age group.  I even won a couple of times.  Now I am only 5' 7" tall and have short legs.  I was running against guys who had longer legs and had more of a runner's body.  Why could I beat them - heart.  I was determined that no one was going to work harder than me.  I wanted to be the best runner that I could be.  Interestingly enough, I never felt like I was in competition with anyone but myself.  I didn't see a guy who I thought was in my age group and try to out run him.  I just tried to do my personal best every race.  That attitude helped me to do very well.

So why am I writing this today?  Because I have seen several people who have given up on their dreams and their goals.  While I was on a recent trip to Seattle, I watched some kids playing hide and go seek in a park.  This one kid was taller and had longer legs that most of the other kids playing.  There were even some really young kids that he certainly could have out ran and tagged before they got to base but he convinced himself that he could not catch anyone and the first round, he didn't.  Why?  Heart. 

He didn't have the heart to run.  Is it really necessary to have a lot of heart and win one for the Gypper while playing hide and go seek?  Of course not.  At the end of the day, who won or lost at hide and go seek is totally irrelevant.  But let's look at a couple of other scenarios that are a little different.

Many of you know that I am a lawyer by training although I don't practice. It was the last semester of my final year of law school and my brother told me, "Don't quit.  You are almost there."  At that point, I was in the top part of my class and doing great.  Quitting had never entered my mind.  But what if it had?  Where would I be if I didn't have the heart to finish?  I wouldn't have a degree.  Some of you may be considering dropping out of high school.  DON'T QUIT.  You can make it.  Some of you may be considering quitting something else like a job or a relationship or something else.  DON'T QUIT.  You can see this through.  Remember this - Tough times don't last.  Tough people do.

So I will leave this where I started.  It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog.  You may be going through something bigger than you.  Remember that the you on the inside is much bigger that the you on the outside especially if God is on the inside you are bigger than the problem you face.

I've done it again.  I blogged myself happy.  That's another Opinion of the Minion.

GIGO

Hello everyone,

Today I want to talk about something I relearned just recently.  It's the concept of GIGO.  "What does that mean," you ask.  It stands for Garbage In Garbage Out.

Let's think about computers for a minute.  We all know that two plus two equals four right.  Well what would happen if we programmed a computer to say that two plus two equals five?  If we did that, every time we asked the computer how much two plus two equals, it would tell us five.  And it would be wrong every time.  So what happened?  We put the wrong stuff in the computer and it gave us the wrong answer.  Guess what, it will consistently give us the wrong answer until we take the time to reprogram it.

So what did I relearn about this and why?  Well as you know, I normally talk about life and how to live it better.  I try to be very positive and upbeat about everything and most of the time I am.  Do you know why?  Because I try to feed on upbeat and positive stuff.  Now I'm not saying for one minute that I am perfect at it but as a rule, I don't allow my mind to feed on things that aren't edifying.

Now I can already hear some of you saying, "Well you must live in a dream world.  I bet your one of those people who can't see the bad stuff that is happening right in front of your face!"  Not so - I absolutely recognize that there is bad stuff going on around us.  But if I can't do anything about it, then I really don't want to hear much about it.  I stay informed about the issues to some extent but there have been more than one "crisis" that I completely missed out on because I didn't know it was happening.

Let me tell you one place I try to avoid - the evening news.  Do you know why?  Because it normally goes something like this: three stories about bad things happening to people locally, commercial, one more bad story, the weather, commercial, sports and then it's over.  What a waste.  I would pay money to see a news guy come on the TV and say, "Tonight folks, we really don't have anything news worthy to report so here is the weather (if you live in Texas in August, that's not necessary - we all know it's hot!) and the sports.  Now we are going to skip to Wheel of Fortune twenty minutes early."  Am I saying that you shouldn't watch the news?  Certainly not.  What I am telling you is to spend quality time focusing on good things in your life.

Let me tell you another example.  I have always had a can do attitude for the most part.  I believe that I can accomplish almost anything I set my mind to do.  For the most part, I have seen that come to pass in my life.  So answer this question - What do you say/think about yourself?  Do you say that you can't do it or that you are just too stupid?  The chances are you won't accomplish what you want because you are feeding yourself a lie and telling yourself you can't.  Here's the funny thing about a lie - If you say it long enough, you will start to believe it.  When that happens, you are in serious trouble.  Yet, on the positive side, when you confess that you can do it, you might not believe it at first but keep at it.  If you continue to feed your mind with the positive stuff, eventually it will come to pass.

I remember when I was 350 pounds.  I weighed that for several years.  Then one day, I started saying that I weighed 205 pounds and guess what - Nothing happened.  I still weighed 350 pounds.  I think I said I weighed 205 pounds for a year or two before anything changed but it did.  I finally lost the weight. 

So where did I have to re-learn the lesson?  Well, at the end of June of this year, the Lord instructed me to stop listening to country music and to listen to only christian music for the entire month of July.  Before anyone gets mad, I am not saying that country music is garbage but it is not as uplifting as christian music.  As a matter of fact, I still like country music and I listen to it a little now but the Lord was preparing me for a couple of trials that he knew I would face in July.  Both were definitely learning experiences for me.  See I needed to be extra careful what I was feeding my brain so that when the time came, I would be strong enough to handle what I faced.

Let me sum it up like this.  Your brain is an organ in your body.  What you feed it will definitely effect how it works.  Now I am not talking about physical food although that is important.  I'm talking about thoughts and words.  What you listen to and say about yourself will absolutely make a difference in your life.  So pay attention to what you feed it!  You're worth far too much!

That's another Opinion of the Minion

Don't Bury Your Head in the Sand

OK, today I want to talk about something no one else but me may have ever done - burying my head in the sand when there was a problem.  Now I am sure that you have never done that but I have and it has caused some damage.  But a little more on that in a few minutes.

This is an issue that I think everyone deals with on some level.  We would all like for the issues and problems in our lives to go away.  No one really likes to deal with them because they are uncomfortable and sometimes the things we have to face cause us pain.  Wouldn't it be easier if we just ignored them?  I mean won't they go away on their own if we give them enough time?  In my limited 41 years on this earth I would have to say no.  Problems don't go away on their own.

Think about having a homework assignment that you don't really understand.  If you don't do it, you are guaranteed to get a zero right?  That grade will hurt.  How about adults.  What if you are overdrawn at the bank?  If you don't deal with that problem, you can cause more checks to bounce.  That in turn, can cause your electricity to be cut off, etc.  Now these types of problems are concrete and fairly easy to see.

But what about some problems that are not so easy.  How about the tension between you and a good friend?  I once knew of two friends who both thought the other person was upset with them.  I knew that this wasn't true but because neither of them decided to face the problem head on and call the other, the situation took months to resolve when it could have been over with a phone call.

Now let me put this a little closer to home.  One of my children has had a problem for several years now.  This problem is definitely fixable but for years I did nothing about it.  I was afraid to admit that one of my children was anything but perfect when in fact none of us is perfect.  So because I would not let anyone label my child and accurately identify this problem, it has grown worse over the years. 

It is a tough thing to swallow - Knowing that my child has needed help all these years and because I buried my head in the sand to the whole issue, he is behind on getting it.  That was something I never should have done.  I have been able to face other issues but fear kept me from handling this one.

I encourage you to examine your life and see if there are anythings you need to deal with and resolve.  If so, pray about how to handle the situation and take the appropriate steps to resolve it.  When you do that, you will feel a weight being lifted off your shoulder.  That weight is the stress those unresolved problems puts on your body.  Remember this, Jesus said in this life you will have trouble but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.  If Jesus had trouble in his life (and he had a lot) and he tells us that we will, then we will.  It's up to us to recognize the issues in our lives and deal with them.

That's Another Opinion of the Minion

Hard Times

Hello Everyone,

Today I want to talk about hard times.  What are they?  Are we supposed to have them?  How do we handle them?

Well, as I have mentioned several times before I didn't like dealing with my emotions so I stuffed them in a box.  In the same way I didn't like dealing with the thought of hard times in life.  I didn't like dealing with hard things either because guess what - They came with negative emotions and I really didn't like that.

So what are hard times?  Well, it's interesting that the definition changes based on your circumstances.  I have helped a couple of kids with homework in the last six months.  Now to them, they were in hard times.  The deadline to turn the homework in was rapidly approaching and there was a lot to do.  Also, because they had never done a couple of these projects, it was even more difficult because sometimes they were unsure of what to do.  Because I have had a lot of school and done a lot of projects (and because we were talking about sixth grade stuff) it didn't really bother me so I didn't consider the situation all that intense.

That makes sense right because I am comparing where I am at 40 years old with where sixth graders are.  But let me tell you this.  I have also noticed that there are certainly challenges that come with being a parent that seem very hard to me.  Now my girlfriend, D, who is an amazing parent has already been through some of what I am going through and while she encourages me and tells me that I am doing a great job, some of these things seem easier because she understands them already.

Of course there are other circumstances that most of us adults either have faced or face now like financial hard times or the loss of a relationship.  All these things hurt.

Now I am sure this is obvious to you but I really didn't understand that all of these things are normal and a part of life.  Even Jesus said, "In this life you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world."  That was a revelation for me.  I hated conflict and trouble and did everything I could to avoid it.  I even buried my head in the sand a few times and tried to pretend that hard times didn't really exist.  I know you have never been as stupid as I was and I am glad. 

Very recently I went on a trip that was very hard for me.  The people I was with caused me a certain amount of challenges and I was definitely emotionally overcome.  Now nothing really bad happened but I didn't know how to handle several situations and there seemed to always be a situation to handle.  But, by God's grace, I was able to handle each one and with his help, I was told that I did a very good job.  So what do we do when hard times come?  The answer is pretty easy - Face the hard time and overcome it.  Like Jesus said, He has overcome the world. 

I heard someone say the definition of courageous is not that you are never scared.  The definition of being courageous is being afraid and doing what needs to be done anyway.  This week, I got an opportunity to face something that really had me worried.  Fortunately for me, the other person in this situation is amazing and we were able to work through what we needed to.  But one of the things that made me feel good about myself is that I didn't bury my head in the sand - I faced the hard time head on and with the Lord's help, we overcame it. 

Guess what - Every time you face something hard and overcome it, you grow.  So don't worry about hard times.  They will come.  But with God's help you can overcome everyone.  I will leave you with this - when you face a hard time and overcome it, the next time you see it, it won't seem very hard.

That's another Opinion of the Minion