Today I want to talk about one of my least favorite subjects - Patience. I really don't like the development process for patience but it is a very important quality. Now as I have said before, I consider myself to be a pretty good guy. Many times when I write, I tell you about something that happened in my life that hurt or something I did wrong. I do this because I want to try to help someone see a better way to think, live, be, do things. Hopefully, the people who really know me understand that I actually think pretty highly of myself. I think I am a good guy that has a lot going for himself. Am I conceited? I don't think so because I don't think that I am better than others, I just think I am a good guy.
That said, I want to discuss another of my character flaws today. In certain areas of my life I am extremely impatient. Most of you have heard me refer to the blog I wrote on the Box. I think it is the blog that has revolutionized my thinking more than any other I have written. In the Box, I discussed a different way to find a dating relationship. My thought (and I believe it is the right way) was that we should find people that we really enjoy being around. Start with being a friend and looking for a great friend in return. What if I got to know her on the inside? What if the first thing I noticed was her heart and how helpful she was to others instead of a body part? What if I appreciated the little things she does for me and really learned her instead of really learning how to get in her pants? What would that look like. I believe it will look like a relationship that is deep. I believe it will look like a relationship that books and movies can be written about. Do I think movies are realistic? Most of the time certainly not. But what would it look like to go deep? Guys, we stop way short of the good stuff about a woman and we are stupid for doing it.
Ladies this stupidity goes both ways though. What if you looked for a man that was more concerned with taking care of your emotional needs than your physical ones? What if you decided to wade out into the water a little and find a guy who really cares about you as a person and not just finding a guy that can take you to nice dinners or buy you cool stuff? What do you think would happen if you did this? You might wake up and find that you are in something worth having. It might be something really special. See, like I have said before, the girl I want is five more minutes. What do I mean? I want to be with a girl who is so special that when I wake up next to her in the morning, all I can do is stare. Knowing that I have to get up and go run, read my bible and go to work, I want to be so in love that I just have to stare and be with her for five more minutes. If I find that, I will have found real treasure.
So you might want to jump to the quick conclusion that I have to be patient as I wait for this girl to come into my life. That is certainly true but not complete. Now in my life, the Lord has blessed me and I can really do just about anything I want in my free time. This is really a blessing but it has caused me an unforeseen problem at the same time. I don't have to be patient for most things. So it was very easy for me to get impatient and want a relationship in microwave fashion. As most of you know I am recently divorced and I signed up for a couple of online dating things. Part of the reason I did this was because I was wanted to date (not at all like I said in the Box huh). But even as I filled out the profiles, I knew in my heart of hearts that I was doing the wrong thing. The Lord was constantly arresting me telling me I was making a mistake. So, almost as quickly as I started, I came to a screeching halt on those things. I deleted both of them. Now, I am not saying that there is anything wrong with online dating because I don't believe that there is. I am just pointing out that the Lord was telling me it was wrong for me.
The problem for me with patience is that in order for a friendship to blossom into a relationship, it takes time. You can't microwave a friendship or it will be like a plant that starts to grow but never has deep roots. If you look at a tree, the root ball can be bigger and go much deeper than the tree you see on top of the ground. So when you don't think you see any growth, just wait. Because that relationship may just be growing roots. You can't see those. The don't look like kissing or holding hands but they are the backbone of a successful relationship. For me this has been a very difficult process. While I know it is the right way to do things, it doesn't make it any easier.
The other thing that makes this process so extremely difficult are people. As a good friend of mine so pointedly noticed the other night, I don't have a lot of dating experience. This is a very true statement. Here is something I discovered about the dating world since I became single that makes my whole theory harder. Both men and women want to get to the physical part of a relationship too quick. I thought it was just guys but it's not. It's both. See, I think the thought process is if we aren't physical, he isn't interested and I will have to move on to the next guy.
I talked to a friend just recently. She told me about dating a guy who didn't immediately try to get physical with her and how she struggled with the concept. She said she was so used to having guys trying to move into a physical relationship that when a guy actually tried to talk to her and get to know her, she wasn't sure how to handle it. She told me that they spent hours on the telephone just talking and it is great. That was a different type of patience that she had to learn. Just because a guy isn't all over you within the first two weeks you date doesn't mean he is a bad guy. It might just mean that he is a great guy who actually respects you as a person not as a make out machine. Imagine the concept!
So let me try to wrap this up. For me, one of the hardest things I had to learn is patience, especially in relationships. This concept caused me much grief and several sleepless nights but the rewards are worth the effort. On the other hand, ladies you have to learn a different type of patience. If you find a guy who isn't all over you, it's possible that he is the real deal. It's possible that he just might be someone worth taking a little time to get to know better. Maybe he is a guy that will actually treat you the way you want to be treated.
And that's another Opinion of the Minion
Monday, September 12, 2011
Friday, September 9, 2011
A Minion's Good Judgment
Today I want to deal with the subject of judgment. Don't you just love to be around people who are always judging you or someone else? Those are my favorite types of people. Well not really. I very much dislike being around them. But let's talk about judgment for a minute. If you have ever been to church, you have heard the quote from the bible, "Judge not lest ye be judged." We have taken that to mean that when I am around someone who hurts me or does bad things to me, that I can't judge them right. I think this is very true. I cannot judge a person period.
But what I can do is judge their actions. It's OK to judge a person's actions. But what I think we really like to do is use judging a persons actions as a spring board to get to what is really fun - judging people. See I caught myself doing that here recently and honestly I didn't really even know I was doing it. But before I get to that, let me talk about some things its OK to judge.
Sometimes we are around people who use this don't judge people thing as a way to manipulate us and hurt us. All the while, they are saying that you can't judge them. What they are really saying is they want you to continue to allow them to treat you badly. That's not OK. If you are around someone who is constantly hurting you, their actions are wrong and that is what I am judging. I am not saying they are a bad person. However, don't let people manipulate you into doing what they want if it is wrong.
While I am at it, let me step on a few more toes. If someone comes up to you and tells you in a loving and kind way that they think you are behaving wrongly, consider what they say. I know some people who are very difficult to correct because they cannot take someone telling them they are wrong. I personally like to know when I am wrong (this is not an open invitation for you to correct me). Let me say that I only trust a few people to tell me I am behaving wrongly. Most of the time, I listen to my heart and the Lord will correct me where I need correction. Be thankful when someone does that for you, if you know they really love and care about you. For me personally, I don't want to go around being wrong. Have you ever had that dream where you are walking around in your underwear or worse and everyone is laughing at you? Well that's a little drastic but I think when we walk around constantly behaving wrong in an area, that is exactly what we are doing.
So let me tell you about the wrong kind of judgment. I know this guy who was extremely judgmental to certain people in his life. As a matter of fact, he really didn't like having them around. Why, because some of them did do things that hurt his feelings. Some of them did nothing to hurt his feelings. He was just judgmental. Now I don't know if he was ever judgmental outright to these people's faces but he certainly was in his heart. He didn't really do it on purpose but he couldn't separate judging a person and judging their actions. See some of their actions needed to be understood. In some ways they used him but didn't know it. So what did he do in return. He got mad and judged them personally. He considered himself a pretty humble guy. He didn't go around openly telling everyone that he thought he was smart or successful. He didn't go around showing off how much money he made or what he had (although many people thought this was the case). As a matter of fact, he quit showing people the cool stuff he got and he quit telling people about the cool things that happened to him because some people got jealous.
Regardless of what they did to him, he began to judge himself as better than them. Now here is where it gets a little strange. He didn't judge himself smarter, or more successful, or more educated than the people around him. That would have been too obvious. He judged worse than that. He began to see himself as nicer than them. He would look at his wife and see all the times that she did things that were not nice toward him and only consider the nice things he did for her. He is to this day a giver and began to feel that people took advantage of that. So he judged himself to be a nicer and therefore better person than many of the people around him.
OK let me give you three guesses on this guy's identity. Do you really need three guesses? Yup, you know it. This guy is me. It is a very humbling experience when the Lord shows you that you aren't really all that. Now I quit judging people before I started writing for the most part but I didn't realize that I was doing it. It's easy for me to hear people saying nice things about this blog and some of the other stuff I do. I even have a good friend who told me she thought I was a great guy. She didn't mean it as one of those blow off things. This girl really puts me on a pedestal. She sees things in me that I didn't know were there. As a matter of fact, there was a certain thing about the Minion that happened that shocked me. She said that she was surprised it took as long as it did. So guess what, the Minion isn't all that. I have already done this in private but I want to go on record in front of you and ask God to forgive me for being judgmental. That is truly a terrible thing to do and I am ashamed of it. If I have judged you wrongly instead of just judging your actions, please forgive me.
So let me ask you a question? Where are you being like I was? Where are you judging people? I bet that somewhere you are judging them instead of their actions. That has to stop. Do you like to sit around and talk about other people? That's called gossip and it's very judgmental. We have to stop that.
That's another Opinion of the Minion
But what I can do is judge their actions. It's OK to judge a person's actions. But what I think we really like to do is use judging a persons actions as a spring board to get to what is really fun - judging people. See I caught myself doing that here recently and honestly I didn't really even know I was doing it. But before I get to that, let me talk about some things its OK to judge.
Sometimes we are around people who use this don't judge people thing as a way to manipulate us and hurt us. All the while, they are saying that you can't judge them. What they are really saying is they want you to continue to allow them to treat you badly. That's not OK. If you are around someone who is constantly hurting you, their actions are wrong and that is what I am judging. I am not saying they are a bad person. However, don't let people manipulate you into doing what they want if it is wrong.
While I am at it, let me step on a few more toes. If someone comes up to you and tells you in a loving and kind way that they think you are behaving wrongly, consider what they say. I know some people who are very difficult to correct because they cannot take someone telling them they are wrong. I personally like to know when I am wrong (this is not an open invitation for you to correct me). Let me say that I only trust a few people to tell me I am behaving wrongly. Most of the time, I listen to my heart and the Lord will correct me where I need correction. Be thankful when someone does that for you, if you know they really love and care about you. For me personally, I don't want to go around being wrong. Have you ever had that dream where you are walking around in your underwear or worse and everyone is laughing at you? Well that's a little drastic but I think when we walk around constantly behaving wrong in an area, that is exactly what we are doing.
So let me tell you about the wrong kind of judgment. I know this guy who was extremely judgmental to certain people in his life. As a matter of fact, he really didn't like having them around. Why, because some of them did do things that hurt his feelings. Some of them did nothing to hurt his feelings. He was just judgmental. Now I don't know if he was ever judgmental outright to these people's faces but he certainly was in his heart. He didn't really do it on purpose but he couldn't separate judging a person and judging their actions. See some of their actions needed to be understood. In some ways they used him but didn't know it. So what did he do in return. He got mad and judged them personally. He considered himself a pretty humble guy. He didn't go around openly telling everyone that he thought he was smart or successful. He didn't go around showing off how much money he made or what he had (although many people thought this was the case). As a matter of fact, he quit showing people the cool stuff he got and he quit telling people about the cool things that happened to him because some people got jealous.
Regardless of what they did to him, he began to judge himself as better than them. Now here is where it gets a little strange. He didn't judge himself smarter, or more successful, or more educated than the people around him. That would have been too obvious. He judged worse than that. He began to see himself as nicer than them. He would look at his wife and see all the times that she did things that were not nice toward him and only consider the nice things he did for her. He is to this day a giver and began to feel that people took advantage of that. So he judged himself to be a nicer and therefore better person than many of the people around him.
OK let me give you three guesses on this guy's identity. Do you really need three guesses? Yup, you know it. This guy is me. It is a very humbling experience when the Lord shows you that you aren't really all that. Now I quit judging people before I started writing for the most part but I didn't realize that I was doing it. It's easy for me to hear people saying nice things about this blog and some of the other stuff I do. I even have a good friend who told me she thought I was a great guy. She didn't mean it as one of those blow off things. This girl really puts me on a pedestal. She sees things in me that I didn't know were there. As a matter of fact, there was a certain thing about the Minion that happened that shocked me. She said that she was surprised it took as long as it did. So guess what, the Minion isn't all that. I have already done this in private but I want to go on record in front of you and ask God to forgive me for being judgmental. That is truly a terrible thing to do and I am ashamed of it. If I have judged you wrongly instead of just judging your actions, please forgive me.
So let me ask you a question? Where are you being like I was? Where are you judging people? I bet that somewhere you are judging them instead of their actions. That has to stop. Do you like to sit around and talk about other people? That's called gossip and it's very judgmental. We have to stop that.
That's another Opinion of the Minion
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