I Believe.

The Plumb Line Movement.

Introduction

I hate introductions; they are usually so boring that I lose interest somewhere around the second paragraph and skip over the rest so I will try to keep this one short and sweet.  This book was inspired by a sermon I heard Dave Ramsey preach at the church I attended in Nashville, TN when I lived there. Mr. Ramsey is a radio host, financial author, and motivational speaker and his corporate offices are located in Nashville. Mr. Ramsey's sermon basically challenged folks to know why they believed what they believed with an urging to either solidify those beliefs or get new ones. I have said this a thousand times but we all have a plumb line (beliefs) by which we live and that plumb line either serves us or fails us. Given enough time we will all find out the results of our chosen plumb lines for life. The great thing about beliefs or plumb lines is that if they are not affecting positive results in a person's life they can be changed. We all have the freedom to choose what we believe and why; it is never too late to make adjustments. There are many folks out there who have chosen plumb lines that are failing them so perhaps it would be beneficial for them to explore some plumb lines different from the ones they currently believe and that is what I have done with I Believe. Warning: I do not want to be preachy but this book is written by someone who believes hook line and sinker in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

Throughout the book I have placed the word "Dare". That means that I dare the reader to try what is being discussed. It may be to eat only vegetables and drink water for ten days; it may be to play a listening game with someone; it may be to be brave and survey friends to ask them if they think any improvements can be made to the friendship; or it may be to ask someone for forgiveness that needs to hear it. Take the dares or leave them, the choice is for each individual to make.

I know that there are exceptions for every chapter of this book. However, this book deals with the majority of the general population and not the exception. I do not intend for the exception to take offense.

Finally, I find that most people are weak willed individuals and do not govern their own lives very well. If some people's lives were businesses and they were the CEO of their own business, it would go bankrupt in the first quarter. Every morning when we wake up we have a choice of how we conduct our lives and a choice of what our personalities will be for that day and more often than not, poor choices leave us feeling unfulfilled, dissatisfied with life, and longing for something more.  The majority of the population does not appear to be happy, peaceful, or satisfied with their own lives. They are searching for the easy way to weight control, a pill, a simple remedy to stay in shape, but will not quit eating too much. They are hungry for the Botox that will keep them looking younger but refuse to change their lifestyle so that they can get more sleep. They leave children to raise themselves and then wonder why gang activity is increasing. I could go on and on; the message is clear, the time is now, the path is lit.

My goal is to strengthen just one life, one will, with I Believe; to make the light go on in someone's head as the light went on for me one day a long, long time ago which gave me the power I needed to make positive forward motion changes in my own life.

Enjoy and get mad if so desired; mad enough to make life long positive changes.

www.sherrybach.com

Table of Contents

Chapter One:              I believe that the way a person thinks about something has to be modified in order to change their behavior regarding that issue.

Chapter Two:              I believe that most folks talk too much and do not have very good listening skills. Listening is a learned behavior and lives would be enhanced if it were practiced more often.

Chapter Three:              I believe that if people looked at themselves naked in the mirror (front and back) more often, they would be highly motivated to exercise.

Chapter Four:              I believe that one of the worst things about hell will be, folks will be forced to see what they would have become and what their full potential would have been if they had only believed, obeyed and trusted in a sovereign God.

Chapter Five:              I believe in, support and promote religious freedom for all, even the atheist, as long as it falls within the realm of the law; when religion takes a person beyond the boundaries of the law, it becomes criminal activity and should be prosecuted.

Chapter Six:              I believe that what a person gives away comes back to them.

Chapter Seven:              I believe that maturity can be measured by the ability to agree to disagree and move on without a negative effect on the underlying relationship.

Chapter Eight:              I believe that many people unintentionally look to other people to fulfill important deep- seated needs that can only be met by a sovereign God; this inadequate substitution always results in failure.

Chapter Nine:              I believe the fruit that comes from the tree will dictate what kind of tree it is.

Chapter Ten:              I believe that we all have a plumb line by which we live; that plumb line will eventually either serve us or fail us.

CHAPTER ONE

I believe that the way a person thinks about something has to be modified in order to change their behavior regarding that issue.

The drug addict believes that they need drugs.

The overweight person believes that they must eat.

The smoker cannot quit.

The adulterer could not help it.

The abused woman loves him, and so on.

There are mental pathways for why we believe what we believe and why we behave according to those beliefs. These pathways were set up long ago beginning with our first breath, and in some cases before our first breath. One by one, a day at a time, hour by hour, minute by minute, second by second, sight, sound, touch, smell and taste, each began building their own portfolio, commensurate to each experience whether positive, negative or neutral.

Our pathways were built just as a brick house is built, one at a time. Unfortunately, our system is more complicated than stacked bricks that can be knocked down and rebuilt into a different shape if needed and a brick is still a brick whether it is loose on the ground or set into an arrangement of other bricks. On the other hand our experiences once experienced can never be inexperienced, or knocked down and rebuilt into a different experience. If a person has an experience that is labeled "Car Accident" it cannot be knocked down and rebuilt into an experience called "Disney World."  However, keeping the integrity of the original experience, experiences often morph into a relative of the original experience or birth a new experience because of the original incident. For example, an experience file called, "First time date", can birth a file called, "First time I fell in love". A file called, "First trip to another country", can birth a file called, "First time I was mugged." So our experiences can be and often are associated with or tied to another cluster of experiences. On the contrary, no matter how many people look at a brick, or from what angle, it still looks like a brick. If it is a red brick, there might be variations in color from person to person, but that brick is never going to look like anything other than a brick. Nobody in their right mind can look at a brick and say it is a ball without being criticized.

Unlike the brick, our experiences look different from person to person, and no-one can look at another person and reveal what mental pathways are enclosed regarding a particular experience. The only thing another person can see is how a person conducts their life around their experiences. Even though mental pathways cannot be seen, actions can be seen, words can be heard, and physical contact can be felt. These observations will produce conclusions whether we want them to or not.

For example, if someone is in and out of jail all the time, it is assumed by folks who are not in and out of jail all the time, that there are some skewed mental pathways somewhere in the other person's head. We can see the actions of what someone believes, we just cannot see the mental pathways for how they came to the conclusions that dictate their behavior.

Understanding mental pathways is difficult due to the fact that even if two people experience the same thing at the same time, there will be two different mental pathways, sets of emotions, lists of reactions, and conclusions made that may or may not resemble each other. One person's sense of smell may be more developed than the others and so they will experience life events from a different perspective. Another person's sense of sight might be enhanced so that the same experience means something totally different to them. The old saying, "Don't judge unless you've walked a mile in my shoes" seems illogical to me, since we can never really do that; we can never really get inside another person's head. The only way someone could walk a mile in someone else's shoes is if they WERE them and that's impossible.

Compassion should prompt us to be more curious about why people act the way they do, especially our own children but the best that we can offer is to ask questions; go back to the beginning and try to find the story behind the emotions; uncover the mysteries, etc. This will at least get us somewhere close to understanding the reasons why.

Without understanding the reasons why, we cannot understand the conclusions. Without understanding the conclusions, behavior cannot be changed. So when people judge other people they are really judging reactions, emotions, conclusions, actions, etc. It seems to me that we should first try to understand the mental pathways, go back and investigate the reasons why before we come to a judging conclusion about another person even though we are all guilty of being judgmental from time to time. However, in my opinion, too much energy is spent on looking outward at other folks, when we should first look inward at ourselves. Working on ourselves would keep us plenty busy enough so that we do not have time to analyze and judge others but I guess it is easier for most to look outward and judge, then to look inward and go through the process of diagramming their own mental pathways to assess whether or not there are any that need to be changed. I enjoyed the movie "Monster" for this very reason. They went back and explained some of the mental pathways of the murderer and did an excellent job communicating her psychological track to the audience so that somewhere in the movie a light went off within the viewer's head that said, "If I had to endure what she endured, I might have snapped in the same way." This is compassion.

I'm not saying that all behavior can be changed by understanding the mental pathways of how the person came to the conclusions that dictate their behavior. There are times when mental illness is present and folks just snap for no apparent reason, even though there really is always a reason.  We may not know the reasons or the extent to which the person experiences what they feel. There are times when two children will be raised by the same parents in the same way and one turns out good, and the other turns out evil. I do not pretend to have the answers for these examples; they are what they are and need professional help. Instead, I hope to tap into the percentage of folks who are not in the unexplained category and enhance their life in a positive way.

We are a complex arrangement of pathways that seem almost impossible at times to figure out and years can be spent in counseling with little change in behavior, leaving those brave enough for self reflection to ask, "What the hell was I thinking?"

Picture a filing cabinet the size of a city, with drawers holding manila file folders; it might be functional if everything was filed in alphabetical order. Even though it would take a long time to find a particular file, if the person looking for the file had the knowledge of the alphabet, it could be done. Unfortunately, our minds do not alphabetize our experience files into neat organized filing cabinets.  What is inside these experience files anyway? Why is it important for us to know?

Imagine there is an experience file entitled: "Dog Bite - 5 Years Old".  We'll pretend that the person with this file had all five senses available to them so automatically there are five additional files under this "Dog Bite File" entitled: sight, sound, touch, smell and taste.

We are going to hypothetically assign some other files to these five senses files.  The sight file has this: a ferocious animal with an open mouth; the sound file: a dog growling; the touch file: pain; the smell file: dog breath; and the taste file:  salt from tears.

Inside each of those files would be additional folders filled with how each of our senses interpreted the experience, and all of the attached conclusions and emotions for each sense. Unfortunately, some of the compartments within the file may be locked and until the key is found that unlocks the door to that thought, what is inside the compartment will not be known. It is totally possible for someone to not know they have a locked compartment within an experience file. They may live their whole lives not knowing, or a life event might trigger its identity. Our experience files have the potential to look like lawyer's legal file folders with compartments within compartments.

For instance inside the pain file within the touch file within the dog bite file there might be this list:

Running fast, feet pounding ground

Falling on the ground

Pointed sharp piercing of skin

Severe ache or tightening as the body responded to an open wound

Liquid (blood) running/dripping on skin

Light headedness

Pulling on skin

Emotions are experienced before conclusions are made so after the brain develops the file this far at mach speed, it now assigns some emotions to the original Dog Bite file that might include:

Tired

Helpless

Danger

Abandonment

The brain takes all of the data and then develops conclusions for the Dog Bite file still running at mach speed; they might look like this:

All dogs bite children

Dogs are bad

Dogs don't like me

I feel helpless around dogs (not able to get away fast enough)

If I ever have kids, I don't want them to have a dog

My friends are going to abandon me when I get into a tight spot

All of this data collection happens in moments, sometimes seconds within a person's life.

Prior to the conclusions file, the information experienced has been somewhat objective. In other words, it could be seen, heard, touched, smelled, measured, etc. by the victim and/or by witnesses, especially if the incident was traumatic enough for a visit to the ER as this Dog Bite File might have been; in that case, the file would probably be double its current size depicting how the experience went in the ER. Were the nurses nice? Did the person have to wait forever? Was blood taken? Did the patient see any trauma while waiting, like someone who came in from a bad car accident? All of these sub folders would have been part of the Dog Bite file.

When our minds begin the process of creating a conclusion file we switch over from objective mode to subjective mode.  The information gets one-sided, personal, biased, even skewed; our opinions come into play, assumptions are made, suspicions are raised, old data is compared, used and reused; habits might prevail. Our conclusion files can be totally false even though we believe them with all our heart, false premises usually lead to false conclusions.

To make matters worse, let's say this person has a locked compartment in their conclusion file that perhaps they have never seen because they have never uncovered its pathway; they do not even know they have it. The locked compartment invisible to this particular person is called:  I feel helpless around dogs (not able to get away fast enough). I do not know how these locked compartments become locked. Perhaps life just happens and our brains prefer to forget the negative and remember more positive so it piles things up on top of the negative so that it is still there but cannot be seen like clothes on the bottom of a pile of laundry. Technically the blue shirt at the bottom of the pile is still owned by someone, they just cannot see it. I would imagine that if the blue shirt was left at the bottom of the pile long enough, it would be forgotten unless uncovered.

Here's a diagram of the file so far. As shown, the "Pain" part of this file is the most dominant so far and it is attached to the sense of touch. Keep in mind there can still be subfolders under each thing listed under "Pain".

Dog Bite - 5 Years Old - Diagram 1

The 5 Senses Attached To This File

Sight

Sound

Touch

Smell

Taste

Ferocious animal with an open mouth

Dog growling

Pain

Dog breath

Salt from tears

Running fast

Feet pounding ground

Falling down

Pointed sharp piercing on skin

Severe ache or tightening

Liquid running down arm

Light headedness

Pulling on skin

The Emotions Attached To This File

Tired

Helpless

Danger

Abandonment

The Conclusions Attached To This File

All dogs bite children

Dogs are bad

Dogs don't like me

I don't want my children to have dogs

My friends are going to abandon me when I get in a tight spot

1 locked compartment

Why would it be beneficial for us to diagram an experience file in this way?  Just as lawyers use their legal knowledge and the facts given to them about the clients they represent to come to a desired conclusion, our minds use the knowledge in our experience files to come to conclusions which determines how we behave and/or react on a daily basis. A person can understand themselves better by understanding mental pathways associated with past experiences. A key component to successful positive change is acknowledgement.

We are not done yet with the diagram for this "Dog Bite File" and it is already confusing; it is beginning to look like a nightmare. As someone who has worked as an Executive Assistant to CEO's for 20 years, I have been responsible for many filing systems both hard copy and computer generated. I can confidently say that an alphabetized filing system is one of the most important elements to success. If a file cannot be found when the CEO wants it, it is useless. If it is found and has 20 or more sub folders and loose papers just thrown inside that are not properly tabbed, labeled and organized, it is not going to be a good day for that Executive Assistant; CEO's hate looking stupid and they feel this way if they cannot find something.

The job of the Executive Assistant is to make the CEO look good but CEO's are rarely patient people and want what they want when they want it. In order to be respected by a CEO, an Executive Assistant must learn to predict behavior according to what is on the CEO's calendar at the time. The respected Executive Assistant is always one step ahead of the game.  When a request for a file is given she/he is holding it in their hand already, or better yet, has already miraculously delivered the file to the CEO prior to the request. Yes, there are CEO's who will hold a good Executive Assistant in high esteem and treat them well, mystified by the fact that the Executive Assistant seems to have been given some higher power to perform their job.  When it comes to figuring ourselves out, our minds are the CEO sort to speak and success depends on whether or not we can be efficient Executive Assistants to the CEO.

During an event such as this Dog Bite File, our reactive minds grasp for past experience files searching for clues about how to react to certain situations, like an impatient CEO trying to avoid looking stupid. Our minds will use the knowledge available from our older experience files, if any, to react and/or respond to life situations, relationships, stresses, temptations, opportunities, etc.

Our minds do not care if the rest of the population thinks our reactions are normal, abnormal, or complacent, or if we have had the same reaction with negative results a hundred times before, it simply pulls the information available and acts quickly, usually before we have time to think. This is in part why teaching children positive habits early on is so important. If we react in a positive way out of habit, our lives will be much easier.

Once understood and with training, a person can predict their own behavior according to past experience files and if desired, change that behavior, or at least slow down the immediate reaction to situations enough to think it through and redirect thought patterns which will eventually change behavior as the title of this chapter suggests.

I urge the readers of this book to seek professional help with this task as I am not licensed in any way as a mental health professional, although I have studied psychology on my own for 35 years. This chapter is mainly a quick start to get wheels turning in a direction that will eventually help the reader to understand themselves better. If only one positive change is made a year in a person's life, that person will have made much progress in becoming a better person five years from now.

As can be seen by Diagram 1, experience files that may be causing negativity in a person's life may be difficult to interpret and a professional may be needed to facilitate a desired outcome. A professional who is credentialed to diagnose mental illness is the best choice. In my opinion a psychiatrist, who has studied the medical treatment of the psyche, is much better equipped to help a person change behavior, than a psychologist who has mainly focused on the understanding of the psyche. What is the point of having someone define a problem if they cannot help solve the problem?  However, it is not impossible or unreasonable to assume that a person is fully capable of studying their own behavior patterns and mental pathways, then making positive changes without professional help. I personally uncovered two locked compartments in my life without professional help, one in my late twenties, and another in my early thirties just by paying attention to what I was feeling and why.

In my late twenties, I was married with one child and then became pregnant with my second child…I would now have two children who had the same mommy and daddy; they would grow up as brother and sister and always have each other to lean on. It was at that moment that I realized I had resented my mother for making me an only child. I had never known this locked compartment and all of the attached emotions existed in my psyche. I would never know what it was like to have a sibling from the same mother and father as me. In addition to that, when I was nine, my mother had married a man with five children, all from the same mother and father, which was like rubbing my only child syndrome in my face as I grew up.

Understanding this locked compartment was the first step in letting it go and moving on, and now I relish in the fact that I have two half brothers on my father's side.  I also get to watch my own children grow into their adult lives as full siblings; this is as close as I'll ever get to knowing a full sibling, but because I understand the emotions and all of the attached conclusions now, this experience file no longer has any negative power over me.  I can settle down into knowing that it cannot be changed, that it is the way it is, take the necessary steps to disarm it, which included a phone call to my mother, then let it go.

Another locked compartment for me was unfastened in my early thirties when I discovered why I was vulnerable to the attention of men even though I was happily married. I'm sure there were folks who just thought I was a player, but that was never the case and research reveals that that is rarely the case when a woman behaves this way. There is usually some underlying explanation for her behavior that has nothing to do with being a player. Almost all of the time, I was not even attracted to the men who were showing out of the ordinary interest in me. I was bewildered by my own conduct as a man that I worked with paid special attention to me; I felt tempted to accept his affection. By this time in my life, I had become fairly adept at recognizing my own behavior patterns and was very curious about the mental pathways that dictate negative behavior and also curious about how to change them.  I asked myself, "Why am I even paying attention to this guy?"

My mother had been a single woman with a child who did not go out of her way to include my father in my world (that's an understatement), so after infanthood, my father was not a regular part of my life. I was vulnerable to attention from men because of the absence of my father's affection for more than a decade. I'm not talking about abnormal perverted attention that is mental illness, I'm talking about normal healthy affection a father gives his daughter that helps her develop into a healthy woman who knows what good affection is and how to trust a man.  Once I understood my own skewed mental pathway, I was able to reverse this vulnerability by acknowledging why I behaved the way I did and focus on my present relationship with my father, knowing that I would never replace what was gone or change the past, but that I could build on to the future. With this understanding, the behavior was totally disarmed; that is the goal with learning more about why we behave the way we do. The word "Disarm," is a verb and means to:  deprive of a weapon, to remove the fuse or other actuating device, to deprive of the means of attack, to relieve of hostility. We want to disarm those behaviors that keep us from reaching toward our full potential.

As a side note, during a conversation with my father in my forties, he revealed the fact that he had fought for custody of me but my mother just about went crazy in the head, so he finally let it go; just knowing that my father wanted to be part of my life and had tried to get custody of me, made a huge difference in this experience file and all of its attached emotions and conclusions even years after the fact; this was just icing on the cake for me. So, it is possible to continue to iron out experience files years later as we strive for positive forward motion in becoming better people.

Depending on how the Dog Bite experience transpired, the sense of sight in the "Dog Bite File" might look like this:

Dog chasing me

The grass/ground as I fall

Upper lip of dog curled above teeth

Blood/saliva

Other children laughing then running away

A stranger or neighbor running toward me chasing the dog away

Depending on how the experience transpired, the "Conclusion File" in the sense of sight file might be:

I cannot escape danger unless someone helps me

I always fall down at the worst times

Every time a dog chases me, they will catch me, and hurt me

My friends will abandon me when I need them most, when I need them to fight for me

Diagram 2 is incomplete but gives a glimpse of the complexity of our experiences and how they affect our behavior.

Dog Bite - 5 Years Old - Diagram 2

The 5 Senses Attached To This File

Sight

Sound

Touch

Smell

Taste

Ferocious animal with an open mouth

Dog growling

Pain

Dog breath

Salt from tears

The ground/grass getting closer as I fell

Running fast

Upper lip of dog curled above teeth

Feet pounding ground

Blood/saliva

Falling down

Other children laughing

Pointed sharp piercing on skin

Friends running away scared

Severe ache or tightening

Liquid running down arm

Light headedness

Pulling on skin

Sight Conclusions

Sound Conclusions

Touch Conclusions

Smell Conclusions

Taste Conclusions

I cannot escape danger unless someone helps me

I always fall down at the worst times

Every time a dog chases me, they will catch me, and hurt me

My friends will abandon me when I need them most, when I need them to fight for me

General Emotions Not Necessarily Attached To Senses For This File

Tired

Helpless

Danger

Abandonment

General Conclusions Not Necessarily Attached To Senses For This File

All dogs bite children

Dogs are bad

Dogs don't like me

I don't want my children to have dogs

My friends are going to abandon me when I get in a tight spot

1 locked compartment

Behaviors Associated With This File?

The possible behaviors associated with this Dog Bite file are also dependent on some other dynamics functioning within a person's head like:  coping skills, critical thinking, whether or not this person was loved and felt loved as a child, the collection of other experiences relating to dogs, etc. As I said earlier, our experience files have the capability to look like legal file folders filled with many compartments and hard to understand documents.

Exaggerated and hypothetical for the sake of example, some specific possible behavior patterns for the person who had the Dog Bite file may be:

There is no sense in getting too close to my friends because when I need them most they won't be there for me.

I am clumsy and a failure; I can't do anything right.

Dogs are going to chase me, catch me and hurt me so I might as well just allow myself to get hurt all the time.

I will purposely put myself in dangerous situations so that I can prove I can escape.

I must be a strong person.

I don't like smelling bad breath.

I over react when something sharp comes in contact with my skin or when someone tries to pinch me.

It might be interesting for the reader to take one experience and diagram it to better understand the conclusions dictating behavior surrounding that experience; a blank form is provided.  Dare.

Experience:  ______________________

The 5 Senses Attached To This File

Sight

Sound

Touch

Smell

Taste

Sight Conclusions

Sound Conclusions

Touch Conclusions

Smell Conclusions

Taste Conclusions

General Emotions Not Necessarily Attached To Senses For This File

General Conclusions Not Necessarily Attached To Senses For This File

Behaviors Associated With This File

CHAPTER TWO

I believe that most folks talk too much and do not have very good listening skills. Listening is a learned behavior and lives would be enhanced if it were practiced more often.

The art of conversation does not come easy for most people. Even though there are some who are naturally quiet individuals, this chapter is not about them.  The majority of folks are wired to want to talk while others listen to them. Becoming a good listener goes against our natural tendencies, but what feels good is not always necessarily the best choice. All things are permissible but not all things are beneficial. As a matter of fact if we acted on what felt natural most of the time without applying some type of self discipline we would discover that we are generally selfish, self-centered, non-sacrificial people who rarely think of others first. We would be sexually immoral, substance abusers, lazy, irresponsible, over-weight. I know this does not describe ALL people, and like I said before, this chapter is not about those folks who seem to naturally think of service before self.

Those of us who are not blessed with an innate ability to serve others have to LEARN to listen and our motivation for accomplishing this task should be so that we can become better friends, spouses, employees and parents and therefore improved people. I am of the opinion that believes we should be continuing to grow and mature as we get older. When we improve just one piece, we work to improve the whole. Notwithstanding medical conditions that deteriorate our lives, we should be wiser and more enjoyable to be around at fifty than we were at twenty. We should be better equipped to choose our friends, romantic partners, and potential employers/employees; make wiser business decisions; and understand our children more. Learning to improve our listening ability will help us do that.

At first, when we are born, it is our caregiver's responsibility to raise us up but then it becomes each individual's mission to raise themselves to higher and higher levels of self development going forward; why stop at eighteen? My goodness, I am so glad I am not the same person now, that I was at eighteen….I was selfish, non-sacrificial, a liar, cheater, stealer, user, and generally speaking I liked to be around others who were just like me. I imagine my conversations were very one-sided and I was probably not very good at listening.

If someone learns to be a better listener, how does that make them a better friend?  I recently ran into a friend at lunch. At first I was excited to see this person who I admit I had not known for very long. We both paid for our food and sat down together. This friend began to talk and after approximately fifteen minutes of non-stop listening on my part without being able to get a word in edgewise, I tried to justify the behavior…Maybe this friend is just excited to have someone to talk to I thought. I want to be a good friend, so I disciplined my mind to keep listening. After a half hour, my ears were getting fatigued and my mind began to wander wondering if this person was going to stop to breathe or eat the food that was getting cold; I had long finished my food. An hour passed and still no relief was in sight. The one sided conversation was frivolous; this person was not in crisis mode where they needed a good friend's shoulder but instead the topics were random and it seemed they had a commentary for every subject in the daily news. Every time I tried to say something I would be cut off by more talking. I felt my resolve draining to my feet and I began to want to run away as fast as I could. This person did not want someone to talk TO, they wanted someone to talk AT, which by the way provides absolutely no emotional connection for the listener and results in the listener hearing the sound of the Charlie Brown cartoon characters who, instead of saying comprehensible words just made "whant, whant" noises.  Why do people make and have friends that offer a reciprocal relationship? It is for the emotional connection. If a relationship is totally one sided, eventually one person is going to lose interest; conversations are exactly like that too.

When a volleyball game is played, one person serves the ball across the net to the opposing team. Then someone from the opposing team volleys the ball back across the net, and so on, and so on. This process is repeated until the ball is missed enough times to declare a winner. There are moments in the game when the ball will stay on one side of the net and be hit by five people on the same team before it returns to the other side, however, this does not happen all the time and the goal of the game is to always return the ball to the other side of the net…and so it is with stimulating reciprocal mature conversation.

The concept of the volleyball game should be used when having a conversation so that both teams (people) can participate and feel exercised when the game is over.  Imagine how boring and non-interested one team would become if the other team kept the ball on their side of the net continually; in addition this would look ridiculous to the observer. It is safe to say that a one-sided conversation is much like a one-sided relationship or a one-sided volleyball game in that most folks try to avoid them at all costs.

This theory can be tested with a short conversation. Experiment by trying to keep the volleyball (conversation) on your side of the net as little as possible and return the ball across the net quickly. People will be drawn to this type of conversation, although they may not know why, but it will be because they get to talk and have someone listen, returning the conversation to them to repeat the process which fulfills our fundamental need to be heard and understood. Furthermore, if what one person says is repeated by the other person before the conversation is returned, the feeling of being understood will be that much stronger. This will work to strengthen a friendship and people will subconsciously gravitate to the person who fulfills this need. On the other hand, it is highly likely that a long winded one-sided conversation will work to cause the opposite reaction.

Needless to say, after approximately ninety minutes of being talked AT, I came up with some lame excuse about why I had to leave to escape what was beginning to feel like suffocation not to mention the sheer exhaustion from listening that long. There were many things I would have liked to have shared with this person during our quote unquote "conversation", but was never allowed.

The formal definition of conversation includes: interchange of thoughts/information; association of social intercourse; and dialogue. Imagine the dialogue of a book where one of the character's lines have all been cut out. How ridiculous would that be? The reader would not be able to tell what was going on or be able to follow the story.  Yet, when we fail to listen properly, we are guilty of eliminating the balance of a conversation.

This person approached me days after the incident with offers for lunch which I quickly declined. How I turned down the offer did not matter, I could be wrestling lions in Africa, saving swimmers from the sharks in Florida, or knitting a sweater for my Nana who passed away years ago, I did not care what I said or if it made sense, all I wanted was to avoid a repeat situation. I had no idea if the same long one-sided conversation would happen again but sadly I was not willing to take the risk to find out.

One of my favorite interviewers, Larry King, who has interviewed 60,000 people, once stated that he believed one of the keys to his success was the fact that he never talked about himself and I believe that that learned skill helped his career tremendously. Being interviewed by Larry King became a prestigious resume entry.  Unfortunately it did not help his skills for marriage. I think Mr. King was better at listening to people during an interview than he was at listening to his spouse as his seven wives and eight marriages attest. It is totally possible to be a good listener in one area of life, and a poor listener in another area of life. I pick on Larry King…Jay Leno does it…but having a successful marriage requires more than just good listening skills.

Dare:  It would be reflective to ask our friends what they honestly think about conversations with us. Do they feel like we are listening to them? Are they comfortable in speaking with us? Do we talk too much? Will they practice the art of volleying a conversation back and forth with us so that we can enhance our listening skills?

Another example of listening can be found in the speech development of children. In a certain percentage of children, during their natural cognitive learning process for speech development, usually birth to five years old, there is a window of time when their speech is stuttered or choppy.  They may say five words and then stay silent for fifteen seconds looking like they are searching for the next word in the air before finishing the sentence that they started. As a parent or caregiver it is important to just shut up and in silence allow that child to complete the process of speaking a full sentence by their selves from start to finish without being interrupted. I have no facts with which to back this up but I strongly feel that a child who is not allowed this process without interruption can develop a stuttering issue that lasts longer than five years old.

The other side of the listening coin is the folks who appear to be listening during a conversation but are not really listening at all. They don't have a clue what the other person has said and if they had to take and pass a test on it to save their lives they would die. Either they are constantly interrupting, or they have a lost-in-space glazed stare, shaking their head in agreement saying, "Uh huh" hungry for the next moment when they get to speak.  I think I would rather have someone who talked too much if given a choice between the two but I usually try to avoid conversations with both.

For the ones who act like they are listening, it's entertaining if not sadistic to play a game with these folks. During conversation, throw in a line like, "Then we buried the body down in the basement." See if they even notice or if they continue to shake their head in agreement and say, "Uh huh." These folks are so eager to start talking again they find it hard to listen. How can someone with zero listening skills possibly be a good friend?

This might be a good place to discuss the fact that we must take time outs from listening. There are times of recharging that need to occur with our minds. There are some who claim that overstimulation of any one of our senses leads to insomnia, lack of coordination, and lack of self-control, as well as many other negative traits. Maintaining good listening skills twenty four seven while the brain is being stimulated from every direction, television, social media, smart phones, etc. and constantly "on" is next to impossible. No-one can possibly continue the "on" position without revitalizing for very long; this is probably one of the causes of breakdowns with the rich and famous (even Jesus needed time to recharge). A standard gets set and they need to sustain that standard and so they go and go and go until they just drop. Taking time to relax will help a person to be a better listener. Dare.

A vehicle takes a person from point A to point B. Words take us down the highway of communication and if done properly, words take us from not knowing to understanding.

When I was a Program Assistant for the state of Montana Board of Investments, part of my job was to interview and hire the front office staff. One of the skills sets I assessed in the interview was to see how well a candidate could follow written and verbal instructions, which was crucial in order for them to perform satisfactorily in the position they were interviewing for.  It was amazing how many could not:  1.) pick up the green book; 2.) walk clockwise around the conference table; 3.) place the book back down on the table where it was before; 4.) leave the book opened to page 50; and 5.) sit down. It was interesting to note that some of the candidates were better at written instructions as opposed to verbal instructions.

The skill of listening is something that can be and should be taught early on by our caregivers but if they failed us on that level it is up to us to finish raising ourselves so that we can become better people. Let's face it, life seems easier when we know how to listen and can communicate with others more effectively.

I've heard of the drive through method of listening that some counselors use in family counseling. The method works to increase listening skills between the parties involved to increase the effectiveness of communication. Working on communication skills without working on listening skills is useless. Just as a customer orders food when driving through a fast food restaurant where the speaker reiterates back what the employee thinks they heard the customer order, the drive through method of communication makes people repeat back what they think they hear the other person saying in a conversation.

Here is a clip of a marriage counseling session between Ted and Mona where the counselor was teaching them the drive through method of communication:

Ted:                            I want to go to the ocean this year for vacation; somewhere warm.

Mona:                            What? You don't like spending time with my family in the mountains?

Ted:                            I didn't say that. I said I would like to go to the ocean this year for vacation.

Counselor:              Mona, repeat back exactly what Ted said.

Mona:              You would like to go to the ocean this year for vacation instead of spending time with my family in the mountains.

Counselor:              That is not what Ted said. That is what he said plus a thought from your own emotions. Try it again.

Mona:              You would like to go to the ocean this year for vacation.

Ted:              Yes, that is what I said.

Counselor:              Mona, now, instead of assuming you know how Ted is feeling and why, you can ask him why he wants to go to the ocean instead of the mountains.

Mona:              Why all of a sudden do you want to change our usual plans and go to the ocean?

Counselor:              Keep in mind Mona that the way you asked that question sounded like an attack and it will probably put Ted on the defense. Try again and keep your own thoughts and attached emotions out of it. Don't project onto him what you think he is saying or feeling, let him tell you how he is feeling.

Mona:              Why would you like to go to the ocean this year?

Counselor:              Good. That's better.

Ted:              Because three years ago you gave me a DVD for my birthday of ocean scenes and sounds and I loved it. I've been dropping hints ever since that I wanted to take you to the ocean so that we can be alone in a romantic setting. I even saw a bathing suit that would look great on you; we could sip margaritas. It has nothing to do with your family.

Dumbfounded, Mona stared at Ted. They had been fighting about this for weeks and now she felt like an idiot. She had been trying to get Ted to be more romantic for the past year which he was quite aware of because of counseling, but instead of listening to Ted, Mona was placing her own set of ideas on top of everything so that Ted's voice could not be heard. Remember the blue shirt at the bottom of the laundry pile? Or was it red?

Study the way a new language is taught. Study the way babies begin to speak. It is by repeating back one word at a time. As adults in a break-neck speed of life, are we slowing down enough to really listen to the people in our lives that we love? What an amazing gift we would give them if we would just shut up and listen…really listen! Stop adding words to what others are saying and hear what THEY are saying.

The last practical example in this chapter about being a better listener has to do with children.  The elementary need to be heard and understood begins early in life and is so strong that those who are not fulfilled in this way will keep searching for it until they find someone who seems to understand them, which does not always result in positive outcomes as any news broadcast will prove.

When a child falls down, cries and appears to be hurt does he/she hear, "Get up, you're ok." Or is the drive by method of communication used to let that child know it is cared for and that someone understands how they must feel? Telling a child to get up, that they are ok, is projecting emotions onto that child that do not belong to them but belong to the person speaking. This is an invalidation of that child's emotions which will cause the child to behave badly in the future, guaranteed; all that child wants is for someone to LISTEN to them and reiterate their feelings. Would it be too much of a sacrifice for someone to go to that child and say, "That must have hurt. Let me help you up." This simple listening validation will give that child a moment where they feel fulfilled of their need to be heard and understood thus helping them to become improved listeners in the future. This child will be better adjusted as an adult than the child who gets "told" how they feel.

CHAPTER THREE

I believe that if people looked at themselves naked in the mirror (front and back) more often, they would be highly motivated to exercise.

With clothes off, all of them, and a mirror in hand, face another mirror. Take a good look, front and back.  Dare. Are the images the best that they can be? Is there room for improvement? Are the images the results of healthy eating and exercising regularly? Or do the pictures tell a story of someone who ignores every medical doctor's advice to try to stay healthy and at a reasonable weight? Is there a denial problem, to the point where it has been years, maybe decades since the words naked and mirror were used in the same sentence? Some folks have not even seen what their own buttocks look like!

When we try to change the truth by denying its existence, we truly show how ignorant we are and at some point the truth will prevail; it always does. Remember the plumb line I talked about in the Introduction? It might be the doctor calling with test results or a spouse who is finally leaving, or the Creator who made us when we see Him face to face because we have died of a heart attack. Why not confront the truth now while there is still time? The truth is that our lives will be affected in a positive way if we eat right and exercise.  The quality of life for someone who is healthy is no comparison for someone who is overweight and/or out of shape. The available literature on this subject borders on overkill and still the mirrored images are not looked at or discussed by some, all because they do not want to recognize reality. The lack of acknowledging reality alone would cause a business to go under.

Ninety nine percent of people given the choice between dying today and living until tomorrow would choose one more day. In essence that choice is available to folks every day, hanging on a string in front of them, they just never exert the energy it takes to reach out and grab it; this is the ultimate example of laziness and will cost them big in the end.

A couple excuses people use for not keeping their bodies in shape are: I don't have time and it's too hard.  Why is it that after a person survives their first heart attack they all of a sudden have time to exercise?  What does this say about that person besides the fact that they are not very intelligent? After all, if they were smart, they would already know they were overweight and needed to lose weight right? It says that until they are forced to face reality they refuse to see it. If this person is in a marriage I cannot even imagine trying to get along with them. What other truths do they deny or cover up if they cannot look at themselves naked in the mirror and own up to the bitter truth?

If someone is taking good care of their self and still winds up having a heart attack, no fault should be placed on that person but that is not what I'm talking about in this chapter. The television show The Biggest Loser is a positive concept in that it helps folks lose weight and proves to the participants that they can have the strength and endurance they need to accomplish a big goal and I believe it helps folks to think differently about eating and exercise which in turn changes their behavior. However, imagine if those folks would have just spent some time and managed their eating and exercise habits better before, they would not have had to endure the difficulty of losing a hundred pounds, never mind losing a lot of time out of their lives.

This chapter targets the person who has ignored what is good for them, ignored the warning signs, and ignored their family or doctor's advice, without any thought given to the burden they will be on the people who will have to take care of them in the event they have a major medical problem caused by excessive weight, not to mention the costs of the medical procedures, tests, medical care they will have to have. These costs do affect every American in the form of taxes and/or everyday healthcare costs. According to WebMD and any other medical source visited, the more overweight a person is, the more likely they will have health problems.  Someone who is forty percent overweight is twice as likely to die prematurely as is a normal weight person due to the fact that being overweight has been linked to various medical conditions including but not limited to:

Heart disease and stroke

High blood pressure

Diabetes

Cancer

Gallbladder disease and gallstones

Osteoarthritis

Gout

Breathing problems, asthma

When I was an Executive Assistant at Memorial Hospital in Ormond Beach Florida, in the Diabetes and Wound Care Center, the Diabetes classes taught that even losing five pounds can make a significant difference in a person's overall health.

According to the Center For Disease Control, the costs associated with obesity in the United States were about $147 billion in 2008. The definition of obesity is a person who is at least twenty percent overweight according to standard medical weight charts.

Here are some accepted weights for women:

Height = 5'4" - ideal weight for a medium frame is 124-138

Height = 5'5" - ideal weight for a medium frame is 127-141

Height = 5'6" - ideal weight for a medium frame is 130-144

Height = 5'7" - ideal weight for a medium frame is 133-147

To find others just Google "standard weight charts".

For the excuse of "It's too hard to eat right":

Let me try to help…think of food in two categories:  Alive and Dead. Think of people in two categories: Alive and Dead.  The category of Alive food includes anything that was once living or on something that was living like a plant, in other words, it had to grow. Fruits, vegetables, and nuts all fall into this category. The category of Dead food includes anything that never grew, or was not attached to something that grew, or a food that has been processed so much that any association with something that was once Alive has been filtered out to almost nothing like Doritos, jelly beans, syrups, candy bars, and ice-cream just to name a few. Even though some of these foods have been made using something that was once attached to something Alive, like ice cream (milk) and Doritos (corn), these foods fall into the Dead category because they have had so much done to them or added to them that they provide no positive nutritional value whatsoever. The more Alive foods we eat the more alive we feel; the more Dead food we eat, well…

Dead foods should be eaten only on occasion if at all. Notice the difference between a piece of fruit or a nut, and a serving of Doritos? The nut had very little done to it since it was detached from an alive source; the fruit has had very little done to it since being detached from its living source, although chemicals are now part of all of the Alive food groups there is nothing we can do about that except grow our own food which some people have started doing.

Some folks claim that eliminating meat from the diet is a good thing; that is an individual choice. I am not a vegetarian and enjoy a good steak a couple times a month or the Chicken Bryan from Carrabbas's but I try to limit my meat intake.

If someone has developed the habit of eating too many Dead foods, they will have to change the way they think about eating and redevelop positive habits. It is very easy to get drawn into poor eating habits because it is the easier way and many of the foods provide immediate satisfaction because they taste good but it is not an impossible task to retrain ourselves into thinking smarter about eating. I encourage the reader to solicit professional help with this goal whether it is with a doctor or their own research. The book Toxic Relief written by Dr. Don Colbert is a great resource to change the way a person thinks about food and eating. There are many examples in Toxic Relief of patients who have reversed cancer diagnoses just by juicing fruits and vegetables for thirty days. One thing is for sure, most everyone eats too much and we do not need an expert to see that, just look around.

There is a story in the Bible in the first chapter of Daniel that might provide some encouragement. Daniel's request was for the official to test him and his friends by giving them nothing but vegetables to eat and water to drink for ten days and then compare their appearances to that of the young men who ate the royal food at the royal table. Dare. I can just imagine what the royal food consisted of, probably many different kinds of meat no doubt, and many choices of breads, that would actually be more like pastries. This makes me sad as bread is definitely one of my weaknesses and an area where I needed to learn to think differently and to practice more self discipline.

The food at the royal table would have been very high in fats and they would have had an abundance of wine as well. At the end of the ten days Daniel and his friends looked healthier and better nourished than any of the young men who had eaten the royal food and they said they were smarter as well. Is it possible to increase our intelligence by decreasing the Dead food we eat? Dare.

I do not look in my mirror while I'm naked and see the body I had when I was twenty; I am almost fifty! Let's get real and stick with reality in our thinking, things just are not like they used to be, but what I do see when I look in my mirror is someone who works hard at trying to keep in shape and tries to maintain a normal weight range and I feel confident about how I look at my age as well as the fact that I am trying to keep my heart healthy by giving it an hour of exercise at least three times a week, preferably five times a week.

There is room for improvement in my mirror images, I am not someone who starves their self and I enjoy cooking and eating very much. Reality is our goal here, remember? We are not trying to look like supermodels, but should attempt to look and feel the best that we can limiting medical conditions that may be brought on by excessive weight.

Remember that eating earlier in the day is preferable and will give a person more freedom as to what they can eat. If a person insists on adding Dead foods to their diet, they should be eaten early in the day as opposed to after six. The absolute worst time to eat is when the body is slowing down for the day.  Trust me; most Americans are not going to starve without that bowl of ice cream at nine o'clock at night. In fact, most of us could live for a couple days on our belly fat alone. Imagine the money that could be saved on groceries just by eating right?  In addition to looking better, a person who loses excess weight will feel better, have more energy, sleep better, spend less at doctor's offices and the hospital, and spend less for counseling. It is a proven fact that exercise is a positive outlet for stress and it is also proven that stress affects our health substantially.

It will take approximately thirty days to see positive results of any diet or exercise change, although Daniel saw results in ten days, so do not lose hope or give up.

CHAPTER FOUR

I believe that one of the worst things about hell will be, folks will be forced to see what they would have become and what their full potential would have been if they had only believed, obeyed and trusted in a sovereign God.

As anyone can guess by now, I am a believer in God. I am also a believer in the fact that God rewards those who diligently seek Him. I believe that we all have spirits inside of our physical bodies that will move on once our physical bodies die and those spirits will go to dwell with like spirits whether they be good or evil for eternity. However, I totally support freedom of religion as long as it falls within the realm of the law. Once religious activity falls outside the realm of the law it is criminal activity and should be prosecuted.  I believe an atheist should be granted the full right to believe in nothing if they choose that road. I do not support discrimination against those whose religious beliefs are different than the majority, or different than mine. I am a proponent of the separation of church and state.

I believe in Heaven but I also believe in Hell.  I've never been to either but I believe what I read about both in the Bible and that is my prerogative. So far, in almost twenty years, this plumb line choice of believing in God has not failed me and has done nothing but be a blessing to me. If the reader is not a believer in God and their life is perfect, perhaps the reader should skip this chapter because I am not going to argue the points of belief versus disbelief. If the reader's plumb lines have failed recently, or are not providing the peace and satisfaction they used to, maybe it would be better for the reader to continue reading?

Given all that, as the chapter title states, I believe folks who wind up in Hell will be forced to look at what they would have become and what their full potential would have been if they had chosen the road of believing in God their creator. This is a speculative belief on my part because it is not something that I can prove. No-one has come back from the throws of Hell and warned those he/she loved of the impending doom. Nobody has been given a second chance once faced with death or the likeness of Hell, to come back and do better. Or have they?

Just entertaining the thought that some will be forced to see what would have happened in their lives if they had just quit using drugs, or stopped drinking too much, had the strength to leave that abusive husband, lost twenty pounds, acted on the urging that they needed to write a book, reconciled with family members, gone back to school, etc. is almost too heavy to consider, but life and death are serious matters.

In Luke chapter sixteen of the Bible we have the story of the Rich Man and Lazarus.

"There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man's table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.

The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham's side. The rich man also died and was buried.  In hell, where he [the rich man] was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side.  So he called to him, 'Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.'

But Abraham replied, 'Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony. Besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.'

He answered, 'Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my father's house for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.'

Abraham replied, 'They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.'

'No, father Abraham,' he said, 'but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.'

He said to him, 'If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.'"

Those are some stubborn folks who would not even be convinced if a relative rose from the dead and told them to repent! How many people do we know that could possibly fit into this category?

The Rich Man was concerned for his brothers to repent. Repent of what? What were they doing that was so bad? Since nobody is perfect, each one of us whether a believer or not could come up a list of possibilities from our own lives of some things that we could stand to change that maybe are not propelling us in a positive forward motion.

The word "repent" is a verb meaning to feel pain, sorrow, or regret for something one has done or left undone; to be conscience-stricken or contrite; to change one's mind about some past action or intention in consequence of regret or dissatisfaction. The person who repents feels such regret or dissatisfaction over something that they change their mind about it. The Rich Man teaches us that after death is not the most efficient time to repent and change our minds about something; the time is now while we are still living. I find it fascinating that part of the definition of the word repent is have sorrow for something left undone and fits the Rich Man perfectly. He is now dealing with what he should have done but did not do while he was still alive.

For those folks that wind up in hell, how many examples will they be forced to look at where they left something undone. How many things in our lives, have we left undone? Can they be done now before we die? Dare.

The Rich Man has regret over the fact that he cannot warn his five brothers now of their imminent fate because he has no more access to them. This truly would be torment if we were forced to think about all the things we did not do while alive twenty four seven.  Did he ever want to warn them while he was still alive but just never took the time? Did someone warn him? Was the Rich Man afraid that he would be laughed at if he chose the road less traveled? Bet he does not care about that now. What made the Rich Man repent even if it was too late? Was it his discomfort in hell that he did not feel on the earth? Is it possible that God allows some discomfort on earth so that people repent while they still have time?  I believe deep down inside the Rich Man knew what he needed to do with all his heart before he died but was ignoring it, or procrastinating about it; maybe he thought he had one more day to get the job done…surprise!

The Rich Man now sees what his full potential could have been had he lived a different way. He could be in the arms of Abraham, comforted for eternity instead of comforted for the short time he was on the earth and he could have possibly changed the way his brothers thought about certain things which might have changed their behavior and resulted in positive forward motion.

Just like the Rich Man, I believe that those who wind up in hell will be able to see what their full potential would have been had they believed and obeyed God.  His word, the Bible, is the information that he wants us to know. Dare. He wants us to know this information so that our lives can have as few regrets as possible. He created us and just as most parents create their children and love them and want them to grow up wise and healthy, so does God want us to grow into our full potential. He has given us some instructions on how to do this.

Not without mercy for believers who ask for it when they fall short and we all do, some of his commands include:  do not take the name of the Lord in vain; do not commit adultery; do not steal; do not covet your neighbor's house or what belongs to him. He guides us in telling us that it is best if we do not lie, cheat, get drunk, do drugs or sleep around; he suggests we pursue what is good and right, help those less fortunate than ourselves, and continue to gain strength from his words and so much more that works to add positive energy to our lives.  Is He just telling us these things to have something to do? No. What is God's motivation for telling us what he tells us?  He is giving us his word because he loves us and wants us to reach our full potential, whether it be in family matters, with an employer, in business dealings, raising children, fighting for a good cause, etc., so that we can in effect help someone else to reach a higher potential.

He has also given each of us at least one talent associated with reaching our full potential. That God given talent is something that we do better than most, something that comes easy to us, something that when we are doing it, time passes quickly; and something we usually take for granted.  This talent does not provide frustration but instead cultivates internal peace.

It is not my intent to get too preachy, however, I cannot help but think of a scripture that relates to the topic of staying in shape which we have already discussed, that also deals with reaching our full potentials.  "Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price [the death of Jesus]; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's."

In other words, whatever a person has, their talents, their gifts, their families, any material things, the ability to see, hear, touch, etc. is all on loan from God. It is up to us how well and how much we use those things for good while we are yet alive. It is up to us to continue to strive toward our full potential. Was fear the enemy that kept the Rich Man paralyzed from reaching out? Why hasn't that waitress applied for a job in the office she passes everyday and wishes she worked at? What keeps a person safe in the same ole place instead of taking risks of failing to make a living doing something they are naturally good at and something they love? Why does that family member feel afraid to explore religious beliefs other than what they were taught as a child? Why is that atheist so afraid of giving up what they think is their security? Why do we allow fear to have such control over us? One thing is for sure, faith does not come to those who are not ready for it. Those who reject God will be forced to see what their full potential could have been.

What about the folks who have yet to discover what their natural talent is? Why haven't they discovered it yet? Are they too busy talking and not listening? A natural God given talent is something that a person was born with although God will help the person to refine the talent along the way.

For me personally, I truly believe that writing is my God given talent. I never thought to myself one day, "Hmm…I am going to become a writer."  No. When I was eight years old, I just did it; without thought, I wrote my first poem. I did not struggle to write it whatsoever. I used the guidelines provided by the teacher and just wrote it down. The words came as a gift and I wrote them down. That is how my whole life has been with writing. I have never known what some call writer's block; I have never struggled to write anything. The closest I ever came to feeling a struggle with writing was when I was in a co-writing session in Nashville to write a song that turned into a blank piece of paper disaster. The other writer was involved in a custody battle with his ex and could not concentrate on writing that day, so the struggle was with him not me.

I tell the story of remembering the look on my fourth grade teacher's face when she read my poem. She was amazed, her face showing astonishment, and I remember how good it felt to know that I invoked emotion in another person with my writing. One might think that was the moment when I discovered my God given talent. Nope. It was not until I was thirty one years old. I became a believer in God in November, 1994 after a life crisis made me consider there must be something bigger than me. Imagine that! I had starting writing a piece in September or October of 1994 that was turning into a book. It was not until the spring of 1995, about six months after I became a believer, when I became very excited to be writing a book and could not think of anything else.  I would sit at the computer for hours not caring whether or not I ate or drank. The sun would be going down and then I would realize that I had not eaten that day. I was totally engrossed in writing. I stopped and thought, "Maybe I have a talent for writing."  I had never considered it to be a talent before even though I had continued to write from the age of eight like a mad person, including poetry, plays, short stories, articles, songs to guitar, technical writing like instructions and public notices, or anything else associated with the jobs I held.  In fact, back when I was a teenager, I threw out stacks and stacks of things that I had written during normal cleaning routines; it makes me sick to think of it now.  I was a strange child who thought that writing plays, poetry and songs to guitar, studying classic literature and reading it and poetry of the most famous poets out loud was fun! All of this seemed like normal behavior to me, not behavior associated with a God given talent. The high school I attended in Kansas City, Kansas, created a composition class just for me because I was so advanced with writing. This was back in 1980 before individual fast track advancement ahead of the whole was considered normal practice. Still, I was clueless about my talent for writing.

If I had not been converted from atheism to Christianity, I do not believe I would have ever discovered my gift of writing and I would be among those forced to see what they would have become in Christ.

CHAPTER FIVE

I believe in, support and promote religious freedom for all, even the atheist, as long as it falls within the realm of the law; when religion takes a person beyond the boundaries of the law, it becomes criminal activity and should be prosecuted.

What good is a religion if the people who follow it have to be coerced to believe it? That is illogical. Until someone is ready to reach out for religion, they are not ready…plain and simple! This chapter may make some of the folks who call themselves believers and other religious folks angry, but hey, I'm used to that by now…I support Ron Paul, I voted for Ross Perot, I feel it is ok for believers to have a drink, and I hold Thomas Jefferson as one of my heroes, does that say anything? In some circles, based on those things alone, I'm going to hell. The good news is that nobody gets to assign my sentence but God.

There is a strong current among some believers that no-one should believe differently than they do. They want to crusade the world and make everyone like them. They believe that if a person does not believe the way they do, that that person is going to hell. They want to strip the rights of the atheist who believes in nothing; strip the rights via violence in the name of religion of those who obtain abortions; strip the freedoms of the people to believe whatever they want to believe and it makes me angry because without freedom we are nothing. It does not mean that what everyone is choosing is beneficial to them, but if someone wants to screw their life up, they should have the freedom to do so. So many men and women have fought and sacrificed for freedom and freedom seems to be eroding away; faith is just a small part of that whole. Note to self: I will need to practice discipline to keep my emotions in check on this one. Let's not forget those who have sacrificed, sometimes at the cost of life, for our freedom!

As someone who was an atheist for thirty one years I can tell anyone from experience that no matter how much someone would have judged me, and they did, or tried to convert me, and they did, during those years, I would have had the same reaction. I was simply not ready for faith, or God, or making sacrifices and I did not pretend otherwise.  I was perfectly happy and cozy in my little atheistic stick house until the big bad wolf blew it down; I probably would have stayed there if it had not been blown down. However, I must admit I did file some subconscious notes about those who did believe in God that I came in contact with. For the most part, my reaction to those who called themselves believers and who tried to evangelize me while I was an atheist was the same:  "Why would I want to believe the way you do? So that I can have the sorry life you have and be miserable like you? No thanks."

Most of the folks who talked to me about God, had lives that I did not want but luckily I encountered enough people who I figured out after I became a believer, believed in God and were halfway normal. I am sure without a doubt they prayed for me without telling me.  In looking back the funny thing is, these people, the ones who I admired or considered wanting to be like, never really talked to me about religion, they were just good to me, or good friends. I remembered some of those people after I became a believer and the common denominator between all of them was a peculiar but comforting smile…weird. I think the symbolism of the smile was that these folks had a confidence about what they believed, liked who they were and how their own lives were progressing. There was positive energy surrounding them and they knew it. They did not need to impose or project their truths on anyone else to be at peace with their religion.

When I was nineteen I had been living on my own for a year already and as an atheist pretty much did what I wanted, when I wanted, with whom I wanted, which was the plumb line I used for life that ultimately failed me when I was thirty…go figure! Ya…I was definitely NOT a genius.

I had been dating a guy who was very exciting. He would call me up at two in the morning and say, "Get dressed. We're going to Perkins for breakfast." This should have been a red flag to me but his spontaneity kept me on my toes and at nineteen years old I was an idiot and I liked it. He loved to dance and we went dancing often.  After about eight months of dating him, he began to talk about our relationship in more serious ways; marriage had come up in conversation. One of our friends that sometimes went out with us told me one night that Doug, that was his name, was married. I did not believe this friend so he argued his point and told me to find out for myself and just ask Doug. At first Doug said that he was getting a divorce; somewhere in the back of my mind that made it ok for me to date him (I do not know why this mattered to me with Doug because I had had an affair with a married man before while an atheist).

A couple weeks later at our friend's urging I confronted Doug again, this time he said they were separated. The third time I confronted him, he said they lived separately so that the kids could go to a different school. Kids? Ya, he had four of them and we had taken them out for pizza together a time or two. Come to find out and to make a long story short, Doug, who was twenty four, was not getting divorced at all, or even separated. He was still very much married with four children and his wife knew nothing about his current extracurricular activities.

Doug would take me to Perkins sometimes and his wife other times. Doug was the first one to buy me a Bible and took me to church twice; he would take me on Wednesday and his wife on Sunday. Need I say that my relationship with Doug was indeed a physical relationship?  Finally, one day I had had enough and honestly I cannot remember if I called his wife or if she called me but her and I met for coffee at Perkins, much to the surprise of all the waitresses who knew exactly what was going on with Doug. She was a nice woman who I now believe had dealt with Doug's infidelity before. We were concerned about one another, her and me. We confronted Doug together at their apartment where he almost had a heart attack when he saw us. I was asking him why he was treating his wife that way and she was grilling him about why he had lied to me.  Crazy! When I think back to some of the wild stuff I did as an atheist it's amazing to me I did not get shot!

I think I might have bailed Doug out of jail once before it all ended but shortly after this quote unquote…ahem…"intervention"….that was the end of Doug for me. I often wonder about him now that I am a believer and I'm curious about what was going on in his life back then. He went to church…did he really believe or was it for show? Did he have a sexual addiction? What happened to the children?

My point of telling the story is that this person was a believer who attended church and bought me my first Bible. How in the world could he possibly persuade me to believe what he believed? His life was more messed up than mine was as an atheist!

Some of the people who really made a difference in my atheistic life were like the older couple I rented my house from back in the Doug days. I found out after I became a believer that they were Christians. Funny, I rented from them for two years and did not know they believed in God but again I did take some subconscious mental notes. In my mind they showed me a piece of what God must be like if in fact he did exist although I was certain he did not exist. They never said a word about the guys I had over or how late I came home sometimes and their house was right next to mine so I'm sure they knew my lifestyle. I did keep the place immaculate which they liked; I was always drawn to cleanliness.

Once when a couple guys that I did not know had followed me home from some bar at three in the morning, I was scared and trying to lose them before I turned into my driveway, the older couple that I rented from offered me to stay the night in their home. I did not ask for that kind gesture they simply just came out at three in the morning to see if I was ok and offered never asking any questions about anything. Those kinds of people and the way they lived were attractive to me. I did stay with them that night and felt secure. Surely if there is a God, those who believed in him would help someone in need just like they helped me right? Was that the subconscious mental pathway going through my head back then without a word spoken on their part?

Those folks won a small part of me over by their conduct and although it took many people, many years, and personal tragedy for me to leave my high horse of thinking I was my own god, eventually I was converted from atheism to Christianity without coercion. That is the way it is supposed to work because when it works that way, it is sure to keep a person right where they need to be. I do not know where the mentality of, "everyone has to believe like me" comes from; maybe from fear. I guess people in their humanness are fearful of someone who is different. I believe the Bible and so that is the angle from which I write but it is ok with me if the reader does not agree with that. I relish in the freedom we have and since I do not want my freedom taken away to believe how I want to believe, I also do not want the Jewish, the atheists, the Church of Scientology, the Mormons or anyone else's freedom taken away if they believe differently than me. Some Christians do not get that; if one freedom is taken away, all of them are taken away.

It seems that with some believers their only goal as a believer is to see how many folks they can get to go to church so they can claim they saved twelve hundred lives and if they cannot say they saved someone, they feel like a failure, when in fact their focus should be reaching for their own full potential to showcase positive possibilities to those who are starving for something better who are undoubtedly subconsciously watching their lives. A true conversion can take years; the majority of folks who are brought into the church via the method of wham bam thank you dunk, do not really love God with all their heart soul and mind and wind up bringing their evil with them into the midst of the church and then leaving. This is not to say that all believers have perfect lives.

I think it would be more beneficial for us as believers to keep our mouths shut more often like the couple I rented from and focus on making positive changes within ourselves so that we looked remotely attractive from the outside to those who will have the eyes to see and spend time helping those people placed in our paths in their time of need.

Believers should be the strongest willed folks on earth, in the best shape from eating properly and exercising, the most respected employees, the best parents, positive energy driven, etc. We are in essence advertising a type of brand; a belief system and a way of life, trying to convince others that it would be beneficial for them to walk in the way we do not by hounding them, but by showing that it works; that there is peace with our Way, that blessings abound for those who diligently seek truth. We are spokespersons for the product. If a believer had to sell this product, their religion, without words, using only their lives, could they? If they cannot, then why would someone observing want to believe or follow that religion?

I'm sorry but someone trying to convince me to come over to their team when they cannot even govern their own life was not something I was willing to do back in the Doug days. God continued to pursue me diligently as I believe He does with all of us but it is up to us to have the eyes to see and the ears to hear. He placed specific people in my life at different times, and eventually allowed some things to happen that brought me to my knees.  Fortunately enough between the folks in my life like the couple I rented from and one friend who stood by me for a decade while I made fun of her weakness in believing in Jesus, I had enough positive influence to reach up for something better instead of downward in my time of plumb line failure.

One of my best friend's had a life that was actually the kind of life that made me think twice about wanting whatever it was she had. When the time came, and my plumb line failed me, I remembered her and her smile. I remembered how she would only occasionally, I'm talking twice a year and that was only after we had been friends for several years, throw out the possibility that Jesus could fix whatever I needed him to fix, then she would drop it and not say another word. The rest of the time she simply was a good friend and kept her mouth shut about all the things I did in my life that she did not agree with, except once. It was an unlikely friendship between an atheist and a believer that is still alive today, which was the inspiration for my fiction novel, "Pathos In My Pocket".

She held Jesus up by simply living what she believed without judging my life or me so that when I was ready and my plumb line of being an atheist failed me, a different possible plumb line was hanging in front of me ready for me to grab onto; she was not afraid of me because I believed different than she did. I did not know if it was the perfect plumb but I knew it was better than the one I had that failed. This friend made a point to let me see that her life was not perfect. Just because someone believes in God does not mean that every problem they ever had is going to disappear. However, her life was attractive enough so that I reached out for a life line hoping it would save me. What if I had not been shown another plumb line that worked by someone? What would I have reached out for?

Lest someone think that those crazy Middle Eastern radicals, and I'm not even going to pretend I know what they believe or why, are the only ones who force belief through illegal means and criminal activity, forced conversion was a key factor in the Christianization of the Roman Empire. All other religious practices at the time were thought to be demented and insane. Those who rebelled were often massacred. Actual laws were imposed which prescribed death for those who refused to convert.

I just do not get this. Not to beat a dead horse into the ground but forcing someone to believe a religion is like forcing someone to love someone else. How can that be considered love? How can forced religion be considered belief? So what? So they can threaten to rip off our finger nails or to chop our heads off and make us say, "Ya, I'm a believer." What a sadistic way to get someone to pretend to believe in a religion. Why? For what purpose? According to that method, how do you know if it's real? If a product is better than another, then the superior product should win, rightly so; if religion does not make a person and their life better than what is the point of believing in it?

Belief is a noun meaning the acceptance of something as true, a trust, or a confidence.  Forcing someone to believe a religion when they do not want to is nothing short of slavery. What does it say about the religion if folks have to be forced to believe it? Is it not worthy enough to be wanted? Maybe it is because those who have believed it have not shown those who don't believe it that their beliefs are worth believing?

If someone were held at gunpoint and forced to love me, which is illogical, I would rather not have love, than to spend the rest of my life wondering if someone else would have eventually fallen in love with me, simply because they were attracted to me for who I am, and not because they were told to or made to love me. Am I not worthy of true love? When we find religion we are falling in love sort to speak. We believe with trust and confidence that it will be a positive reciprocal relationship. It cannot be forced just like love cannot be forced. If it is, it is not religion. Let's stop being control freaks wanting everyone to think the way we do and allow folks the freedom to choose what they want to believe, the freedom to observe the products and choose the best one, and maybe somewhere along the line, our lives will be a positive influence in someone else's life providing hope in a time of need.

CHAPTER SIX

I believe that what a person gives away comes back to them.

It was nineteen eighty nine. I worked a high profile job as Program Assistant to the Executive Director of the Montana State Board of Investments, who answered to the Governor. I had a child and a husband who helped with that child in the mornings before I went to work where part of my job was to supervise the front office staff. One of the secretaries, I think Sandy was her name, was a single mom with two kids. I had written her up numerous times because she was perpetually late for work. I was very tenacious back then and wanted her to be able to show up on time. Everyone else was expected to do it, she should be too. I went to my boss with the collected data showing my justifications for firing her. He said with a prophetic smile, there's that peculiar smile thing again, "Maybe she just needs a second chance. Maybe she just needs someone to give her a break." This man knew I was an atheist and unbeknownst to me at the time he was an elder at the Presbyterian Church in town.

I respected this man tremendously as a person so I did not fire her but I continued to be frustrated when she could not show up on time for work. Flash forward to March, 1994. My husband had left and filed for divorce and I was now a single mom with two kids trying to get to work on time. I was mostly successful with this however, it was no easy feat. Guess who I thought of when I was struggling trying to make it in time? The mercy that we show will be bestowed upon us.  Consequently, the boss that I had at the Montana State Board of Investments could be placed in the same category with the folks I rented my house from who never talked to me about God but just showed me in several ways, that what they believed improved them as people and made their lives better.

The principle of what a person gives away comes back to them, has always fascinated me because I have seen it happen so many times, in my own life as well in the lives of others. It was a concept that I had seen demonstrated even when I was an atheist. This principle is not discriminate between believers and non believers.  Sometimes it takes years for it to flesh out but nonetheless, it always works. It is a principle that I tried to teach my children very early on. They would laugh now and roll their eyes I'm sure, but I bet they have seen it fleshed out in their own lives more than once and I hope they will try to teach it to their children.

During the decade of my thirties I worked for a not-for-profit hospital system in Florida, first as an Executive Assistant to the CEO, then Executive Assistant to the Director of Rehabilitation and finally the last two years as Executive Assistant for the Diabetes and Wound Care Center. The CEO had sold the company and retired. After a couple years with the new company many changes started happening; some of them were normal changes and some were just plain weird.

The normal change that happened with my job (I was in the Rehab department at the time- Speech, Occupational and Physical Therapy) was that they took away a secretary and doubled my work load. Those are the normal changes that one would expect to see during a buy-out. The bizarre changes included folks all of a sudden converting to a different religion for the sake of their jobs, leading prayer meetings, etc. I heard of an opening in the Diabetes and Wound Care Center, so I applied. My thinking was that it would be a more reasonable work load; I obtained the position.

It was my first week on the job and I was walking through the halls of the hospital when several people asked me, with a laugh, how I liked working for Marsha. I replied, "I just started; it seems like a good fit." To which they replied, "Well, she sure has run off a lot of good nurses around here."  Hmm, oh boy, what have I done?  For the first year it seemed like Marsha and I seemed to work well together, although I found some of her behavior odd. Still I tried to keep personal emotions out of it and just do my job. I forgot about those who tried to warn me about what I was in for with Marsha who was my immediate supervisor but after approximately a year, the weirdness began. I'm not sure I've ever worked for someone who was that incompetent to supervise people. She would do and say things that would make the rest of us in the department just shake our heads; they did not make practical sense. I do not know if something was going on in her life to where she could not concentrate properly or what, but everyone was talking about her behavior; she was very difficult to get along with. I did five years of research on mental illness for my second novel, Jekyll And Hide Me Not, which is based on a true story, and I suspect that Marsha was a disordered narcissist (NPD as it's called) whereby bi-polar behavior is just one of many symptoms, but that is beside the point.

Disordered narcissists like to target people who disagree with them, or who make them feel inadequate. Our Medical Director for the Diabetes program had taken an interest in my work and complimented me several times on my presentations. He wanted me to become more involved in the committee meetings and reports. I do not think Marsha liked this very much. Also, I think the new company was pressuring the directors to weed out older employees who were grandfathered in to the old benefits program by trying to make them so miserable they left, although I cannot prove that. After working there ten years I was making very good money, had excellent benefits, above average annual reviews, and was well respected throughout the hospital; there was no reason I should have been worried about my job.

On a random day, Marsha called me into her office where a Vice President of the company was sitting as well. That alone made my heart start racing. She accused me of skipping a mandatory meeting and asked that I sign the paper she was handing me where she wrote me up. "First of all", I said, "I don't know who told you I skipped the all day mandatory meeting or why because I did not skip it and they're lying. Second of all, you can check human resources and see where I received my certificate because they have a copy, and last but not least, I'm not signing your paper and you can consider this my two weeks' notice."  I walked out of her office and went straight to human resources; I was hysterical crying and shaking. I thought that I was going to retire from that job. I reacted. Was I subconsciously hiding how badly she had been treating me lately and finally letting it all blow up?

It was during this time that I had been seeing my doctor for heart palpitations. My doctor could not find anything wrong after testing and equated the symptoms to stress. Funny! The heart palpitations went away as soon as the job went away.

I never found out what really happened, I think Marsha had been after me for awhile and I just did not realize to what extent. I knew that if I stayed she would make my life miserable, so I felt forced to give notice; I could have sued her and won. If I had it to do over again I would have asked to speak with human resources immediately and not given notice. Human Resources was very upset with Marsha because they clearly showed in their records that I attended the all day meeting, which I did.  Marsha did not get fired for this act right away, however, two years later she got hers and what she gave away came back to her.

Are we giving away mercy and grace wherever this life takes us? Better yet, are we giving away simple kindness and common sense? I do not know what was going through Marsha's head but it might have benefited her to ask me about the meeting before accusing me of not attending in front of a Vice President, or to check with human resources. Did she not know there was a way for someone to check out the bogus information she had supposedly received? Did she not know that somewhere along the line, the deed she was scheming was going to catch up with her? It always does; it always will. Did she not know that she would look incompetent in the end when it was found that she was wrong?

I have seen the principle of this chapter title work so perfectly so many times that it has helped me squelch judging others by sheer paranoia.  Judging is something we are all guilty of, but should be working toward eradicating from our lives. Surely as the sun comes up tomorrow, as soon as we start throwing judgment around at someone else, it will come back like a boomerang. I am not talking about the everyday kind of judging someone does when assessing where to take the kids to day care, or what job to take, or the kind of judging someone has when weeding out who to date and who not to date. I am not even talking about the judging that happens when someone finds themselves in the midst of folks doing illegal things and their better judgment tells them to leave immediately; that is more a judgment of a situation than a person. I'm talking about the judging of another person that causes our behavior to change in a negative way to where we mistreat that person in an attitude of immaturity and superiority with a sanctimonious air.

If we know that the words we speak and the actions we take are similar to boomerangs and will return to us in some form or fashion, would it change the way we speak or the way we act toward others?

Here is what a couple folks have to say about boomerangs:

"I suppose everyone tells little white lies. Quite often they're necessary to make someone feel better or prevent feelings from being hurt. Whoppers? No! That's dangerous and they'll boomerang."

Richard Chamberlain

"If malice or envy were tangible and had a shape, it would be the shape of a boomerang."

Charley Reese

I have a friend who claims that the majority of folks, who go around throwing boomerangs like they were throwing candy in a parade, are dealing with some kind of psychological guilt phenomena and so they try to take the focus off of them and project it onto others. I have never researched this theory specifically related to boomerangs but there is one example that happened to me that would suggest it might be true.

There was a woman who I knew at the church I attended years ago. Outside of seeing her in the foyer of the building twice a week, we had not had a conversation nor been involved in each other's lives in five years when I received a message from her on Facebook asking if I had walked away from the Lord. The message went on to imply that because I had a picture on Facebook of myself in a two piece bathing suit, I was going to hell. Keep in mind I live a few miles from the ocean in a beach town and a bathing suit under a sundress is my entire summer wardrobe just like the majority of the population in this town and the picture was not a provocative pose at all.

A short while after I blocked her on Facebook, it came out that she had been having an affair and her husband had found out; she was now getting divorced to marry her lover. Whoa! That is a little more serious than wearing a two piece bathing suit on Facebook. Look out! Boomerang!  It should be noted here that I did eventually receive an unsolicited apology from this woman which I humbly accepted. Dare.

Why do people feel they have a right to criticize or judge other people when they are not even involved in their lives?

CHAPTER SEVEN

I believe that maturity can be measured by the ability to agree to disagree and move on without a negative effect on an underlying relationship.

Recently I had the pleasure of doing some research on John D. Rockefeller. He was an American oil industrialist, investor, and philanthropist who lived from 1839 to 1937; to say that he was those things is an understatement because he was those things plus so much more. I am sure I have studied him before, but in looking at his life now through different eyes, I am amazed by how successful he became because he disagreed with many people including one of his closest partners. His thinking patterns were very different than the accepted popular way of doing things. I believe Mr. Rockefeller was an expert at agreeing to disagree and moving on and saved his energy to spend on other things more beneficial than arguing.

Rockefeller formed Standard Oil which grew to become one of the largest shippers of oil and kerosene in the country. Before the reader reacts and says, "Another one of those damn rich oil men", keep in mind Rockefeller built his company from nothing up and used domestic oil.  He was personally responsible for the eradication of the hookworm disease, changed the way businesses thought about incorporation, and created the first oil-futures market due to sheer necessity.

Throughout his life, he gave ten percent of all of his earnings to his church, and he donated millions of dollars to the Foundations he supported and had plenty of millions left over; he is the epitome of the title of Chapter Six.  He lived a long life two months shy of his ninety eighth birthday and died at his home, now called the Casements, in Ormond Beach, Florida, which is just eight miles south of where I live.  Even though I have lived in this area for twenty years, I had never been inside the Rockefeller home, which is now owned by the City of Ormond Beach, Florida, and open to the public. I visited there yesterday and was surprised by the modesty of the home considering what he was worth, even if it was just a winter home. In this geographical location, we have the mainland and the beachside; the two are separated by an intercoastal waterway that runs parallel to the coast about a quarter mile from the ocean.  The Rockefeller home is located on the beachside and sits on the east side of the river at the south side base of the Granada Bridge which connects the mainland to the beachside. The home is approximately one quarter of a mile from the beach just like the river. Supposedly, Mr. Rockefeller had someone research climates everywhere to find the most moderate year round climate before he built his home in Ormond Beach, Florida, which interestingly was the birthplace of speed (auto racing).

John D. Rockefeller is quoted as having said, "A friendship founded on business is better than a business founded on friendship."  Just knowing he felt that way gives a sense of his skill to agree to disagree and move on and not get caught up in "telling" people that what he thought was right, but in "showing" people what he thought was right; the old saying actions speak louder than words is true and powerful. If we waste energy and time telling people, there is not as much time to show them.

The word "Agree" is a verb. Some of its meanings include: to come to one opinion or mind; come to an arrangement or understanding; arrive at a settlement; live in concord without contention; to get along.

The word "Disagree" is also a verb. Some of its meanings include: to fail to agree; to differ in opinion.

So when we agree to disagree and move on, we are acknowledging understanding that two people have failed to come to one opinion about a matter at hand, but instead have chosen to live in peace without strife until the time that who is right and who is wrong can be revealed by the outcomes that will follow because of what they choose to believe.

Critical thinking tells us that if something cannot be proven it is useless and a waste of time and energy to argue about it. If the reader of this book has never taken a Critical Thinking class, I highly recommend it; it will simplify life.  Critical thinking can be defined as:  the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. Disciplined thinking that is clear, rational, open-minded and informed by evidence.

How many arguments have occurred because of different opinions that cannot be proven? Are these arguments effectual in proving points or are they a waste of time and energy, causing stress and sometimes lack of sleep on the participants which in turn causes negative effects on overall health? Eventually the truth will be fleshed out of each side of an argument. Unless a person is on a debate team or a lawyer in a court room, I do not see the point in wasting precious life time arguing about things that usually do not pertain to life or death situations.

I urge the reader here to simplify their life by practicing and learning to say, "We will have to agree to disagree on that and move on." Dare. Learn to really do it. Move on without malice or judgment allowing the other person their own opinion and respond in a mature adult fashion. So what if everyone does not agree? How foolish and immature to think that there will never be anyone who disagrees with us? On the contrary, we should expect it. What would our motivation be to want everyone to agree with us if not immaturity or lack of assurance in what we believe? When we allow ourselves to get all bothered by someone disagreeing with us, it gives the impression that maybe we are not strong in our beliefs or confident in where we stand and we come off looking like immature control freaks.

This does not mean that discussions should never take place about decisions in a family, marriage or place of business. Negotiation skills are different than arguing and not what I am talking about here.  Once an argument gets to a point where neither side can prove their opinion right or wrong, at that moment, the argument should be abandoned. If the opinions can be proven then by all means prove them but do not make the mistake of empowering a differing opinion to cause discord in a relationship; negative energy should never be rewarded nor should immaturity.

The word "Mature" is an adjective describing someone who is complete in natural growth or development; fully developed in body or mind; completed, perfected or elaborated in full by the mind. Obviously our minds control our maturity so the way we think is important. If we are adults we are supposed to have progressed past high school maturity into adulthood but I find that more often than not, adults have not grown past how they acted in high school when it comes to someone disagreeing with them. They yell, grumble, get mad, attack the disagreeing person's character, throw things, and sometimes even kill the person who disagrees with them.

"I'll show you. You disagree with me, so I'll murder you and prove I was right."  That does not even make sense and proves nothing other than the person is a murderer. How can the opposing opinion rise to the top if the opposite opinion is dead? Murder because someone disagrees with someone in my opinion is the ultimate form of immaturity. If we are ever going to realize our full potential, we must develop past this immaturity and leave it behind.

I would describe maturity as: efficiency of words or actions. Do our words and actions display maturity in that they are efficient in taking us where we want to be as people in an upward forward positive motion? Are our words and actions effective in others seeing us, remembering us, as mature individuals capable of being the CEO of our self without going bankrupt? Maturity is a vehicle that takes us from one point to another and can be efficient or inefficient.

The word "Efficient" is an adjective meaning:  performing or functioning in the best possible manner with the least waste of time and effort; having and using requisite knowledge and skill; producing an effect.  Whether or not it is acknowledged, our maturity levels are producing an effect with those who observe us, whether that is a spouse, an employer, a potential business partner, neighbor, etc. and our maturity levels are showing how efficient we are at running the business of our self.

Some are not only running the business of their self, they are influencing their children with the choices they make surrounding their disagreements which can and sometimes do become violent.  According to the US National Library of Medicine, witnessing domestic violence increases a child's chance of emotional or behavioral problems during childhood and entering abusive relationships in adulthood. In 2003 surveys, 10.3% of children lived in homes with reported violent disagreements.

On a much larger scale, historic disagreements in the news right now can be found in South Korea. There has been a long running dispute over the sovereignty of the Dokdo islets, a series of rocks in the Sea of Japan that sit between Japan and South Korea. Japan's ministry of education approves textbooks every year that say they have sovereignty of Dokdo and obviously South Korea disagrees with this. So for the sake of about ninety acres of volcanic rock that only has a thin layer of soil and moss, the two countries have allowed children to be in the middle of the argument for years. Instead of prioritizing what is really important, the children, and agreeing to disagree and move on, the two countries have chosen to stand their ground to try to prove who is right.  It seems to me in this case, a solution could be arrived at…why can't they just share the freakin rocks?

Another issue is that North Korea has plans to launch a satellite on a long-range rocket. The concern is that the launch is being used to test long-range missile systems that could be used with nuclear weapons. Both Japan and South Korea oppose the launch with Japan saying it will shoot down the rocket if it enters Japanese airspace.

Disagreements can become so large in proportion that they have the potential to wipe out an entire population. Wow! I sure hope we have folks making decisions for the whole who care more about us than proving their side of the argument. It takes a lot of maturity to back down from a position and appear weak but it is the one who takes into consideration the positive benefit of the whole and the big picture that is the strongest and more mature.

"Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures."

James 4:1-3

CHAPTER EIGHT

I believe that many people unintentionally look to other people to fulfill important deep- seated needs that can only be met by a sovereign God; this inadequate substitution always results in failure.

I was born in Connecticut to the female lead singer of a country cover band who dragged me around from place to place, gig to gig, bar to bar, from day one and continuing for the subsequent eighteen years. We lived like gypsies and I went to twenty four different schools before I graduated high school. To give the reader an idea of how often we moved, during my sophomore year of high school, which is nine months long, I attended four different schools. I recently discovered that my entire freshman year of high school and half of my sophomore year are not even listed in my transcript. My mother did not take the time to get my records transferred. Still, I had enough credits to graduate even without these records. I discovered early on that every security I ever knew could be taken away, but they could not take away my performance; being an excellent student regardless of where I was, propelled me into another world.

During my eighteen years growing up around music I saw many things that children should never see; I experienced many things that children should never experience and I touched the dark side of this world. I can tell stories that would make the reader's stomach sick. Even so, as bad as my childhood was, the music somehow made it better as my autobiographical poem Mandy Monroe suggests:

Mandy Monroe

By Sherry Bach

Mandy Monroe was born to a woman who didn't have much sense

It was hard for her to get along growing up from the other side of the fence

With clothes too small, no social skills and not enough to eat

She was dragged around from place to place and set up for defeat

But no-one realized the strength she'd find from the music in her head

Quietly singing words in the dark as she lay in a borrowed bed

Songs were her constant and the solace that she'd need

To see that truth doesn't lie and to show her all she could be

She learned that memories better forgotten could be erased by a melody

And hard times could be easier if music was given the victory

So she sang:

Angel of evil, take your crushing blow

Go use it on someone else, I'm on to you and I know

The bad you sought has turned to good

You've got nothing left to prove

Stealing hope from my soul is something you just can't do

Mandy vowed to cling to the rhythm that gave her strength to breathe

She knew it would all work together but not sure where it would lead

As the meters flirted with the words and gave life to a new song

Mandy learned the path she was shown as a child was all wrong

Now she knew what she wanted but wasn't sure what to do

But she trusted through the music she'd figure out where, when and who

Then late one night she finally met, a man that she could trust

He's been by her side ever since and the gold never turns to rust

The music hasn't ended yet and in fact it overflows

From Mandy's heart to another, where it gives peace and grows

And she sang:

Angel of evil, take your crushing blow

Go use it on someone else, I'm on to you and I know

The bad you sought has turned to good

You've got nothing left to prove

Stealing hope from my soul is something you just can't do

There was something magical about the music; everything negative disappeared when it began. Observing folks while they were doing what they loved, seeing that passion come alive on stage, night after night, was a balm for my soul. They felt the emotion of what they were singing and they had whatever it took to convey that to their listeners. The way my mother lit up on stage was unbelievable; music was and continues to be the only connection I share with her because we are so very different.

When it came time for me to have my own children, I read every popular book under the sun about how to be a good parent because instinctively I knew I did not know; I read about thirty books total. Nowhere in those books did I find anything even remotely close to the way I was raised. This prompted a phone call to my mother. "What the hell were you thinking?" I asked her. I am proud to say that both of my children grew up in a stable environment, primarily one home, which is where I still live, and the only reason they changed schools was because it ran out of grades and it was time to move on….grade school to middle school, middle school to high school, and both of my children have attended college. One is in the United States Air Force and the other is working on a speech pathology degree.

As can be expected with growing up around the music business and in bars or clubs most of the time, I had a lot of deprogramming to do for myself as an adult and it took a long time. Unfortunately it was up to me to finish the job my mother failed to accomplish. To my mother's credit and with understanding of her childhood, which was so bad I cannot even imagine, she did improve my childhood compared to hers and she did teach me some principles that were positive energy producers in my life. Still, for many years I unintentionally looked to other people to fulfill important deep-seated needs within me, and I was always disappointed, heart-broken, and misled. I do not think that those people who failed me, intentionally set out to fail me, I just think they were incapable of giving me what I needed on a regular basis because of their humanness; they were an inadequate substitution for what I really needed and it failed. Again, false premises usually lead to false conclusions.

Searching for truth and finding the fulfillment I desired took approximately eight years once I was cognitively aware of the searching; although I believe that we spend every waking moment searching for what we need, we just might not be aware of it. I inadvertently hurt many people along that path and I am guilty of just about every sin imaginable. It was not until I was thirty one that I discovered a plumb line that I still use today which has never let me down in almost twenty years, although I have taken a short-lived wrong turn a time or two but not without personal growth and increased wisdom. Even when I fail while using this current plumb line, all things are being worked out to my good. There is no other plumb line under the sun that can advertise that!

As briefly discussed in Chapter One, I figured out in my late twenties that I looked to men to fulfill a need within me to be wanted and loved because of the absence of my father in my life; only God can truly fill that need but I did not know God at the time. Others can try to cover for God, but they are human and will often fail and most of the time they have their own best interest in mind and/or their own agenda; God has our best interest in mind ALL of the time. Imagine the trust that is gained by knowing this principle twenty four seven, and imagine the confidence that that trust builds within a person.

I looked to drugs for a brief time to fulfill the need of belonging to a group; I started smoking marijuana when I was eleven and quit when I was fourteen. I feel fortunate to have never tried harder drugs, but we were poor and if we had been rich I am sure that back then I would have tried anything placed in front of me or given to me; I never bought drugs or alcohol for myself, it was just always readily available for the taking.  Then at fourteen, I started drinking trying to fit in with the crowd I was hanging around; that only lasted half a year but at one point to reveal the level to which I was drinking during that time, I could drink a half of a bottle of peppermint schnapps without getting drunk. One of the good things about my childhood and moving around so much was the fact that I never had time to get hooked up with the wrong crowd for very long. I stopped hanging around that drinking crowd simply because we moved. In looking at how I was raised and the environment I grew up in, the odds said that I should have been a drunk, on drugs, hooked up with several men who had fathered several children that I was incompetent to raise, more than likely a prostitute, irresponsible, lying in a ditch somewhere and dead by the time I was thirty; God said otherwise. I truly believe that God holds special interest for the fatherless and that He chose to watch over me to prove a point….He CAN take a mess and make something beautiful from it.

Depending on what source is used, the list of basic human needs can be psychedelic, extensive, or simple. There is some wacky information available and a little of it sounds cultish to me but a United Nations commission came up with a list that seems fairly normal and determined that tangible basic human needs were as follows:

Food, clothing, shelter and sex

Protection and security

Knowledge transmitted from parents/community

Social structure

Avenues for self expression (verbal/artistic/musical)

Avenues for spiritual expression

The commission also listed psychological needs as:

Identity

Security in one's life

Control over one's life

Recognition, attention and credit

Fairness

It should be noted here that in our current society a lot of folks feel that they are losing control over their own lives because freedom is being eroded away, in addition to our poor economic times. It makes me curious about how that is going to affect us as a whole when they look back in history.

Maybe the reader would have fun coming up with their own list of what they think their basic needs are but knowing what I know about myself and other people thus far in my life, I came up with my own list of basic human needs:

Food, clothing, shelter - a person CAN live without sex

Feeling safe

A way to make a living

Connected socially

To love and be loved

I believe personally that if a person had these they could survive but…for the sake of this chapter we are looking beyond survival because anyone can survive; we want to propel forward in positive motion as far as we can go while we are on this earth. Taking that into consideration and assuming we do not have to settle for just our basic needs being met, I came up with a new list of needs:

Identity

Freedom

Confidence

Trust

Love

Understanding

Hope

Rest

Power

Strength

Victory

Peace

Forgiveness

Eternal life

Mercy

Grace

Salvation

Assurance

Comfort

Courage

Joy

Long life

Guidance

Protection

Success

Wisdom

How many of these do people subconsciously try to get fulfilled by other people or by other means outside of themselves? Eternal life for instance….I swear, if I see another older woman who has had plastic surgery to make her look twenty I'm going to scream. Do people really think that they will not die someday? That they can reverse the aging process? I hate to be the one to tell these folks, but the Second Law of Thermodynamics has not changed and will not change until God changes it.

When we are children, we look to our caregivers to meet every need on the long list and a caregiver should be able to meet most every need on that list for a child.  However, there is no way that any adult person could possibly fulfill all of these needs for another adult person. Somewhere between infanthood and adulthood we are to learn to get our needs met without the help of a caregiver.  When we look to others to meet these needs as adults, we are setting ourselves up for failure and placing too large of a burden on them and why would a person want another person who is no better than them, to take care of such an important part of life? Why risk failing in that regard? God has supreme rank and power. He is above all others in character, importance and excellence. Looking to someone else to fulfill deep-seated needs when God is waiting and willing to give all of the above is irrational.

My theory of why marriages are so difficult deals with this exact issue. People go into marriage with a subconscious, unspoken list of expectations. When those expectations are not being met, discord is borne. The focus is on what the other person can give when we should be looking inward at ourselves and outward to God to meet the majority of our needs allowing Him to work and grow us to become better people which will in effect decrease our dissatisfaction with things of this world. I believe that is why marriages lasted longer back in the day; folks went into it with only a few expectations. The guy's expectations were that the woman would provide sex, provide children, and cook and clean. Period.  End of list. The woman's expectations were that the husband would provide protection, financial security and children. Period. End of list. Folks were happy just to get those needs met and figured anything beyond that was icing on the cake. One of my favorite movies is, "So Dear To My Heart", an old Disney classic that my kids really liked growing up. At one point the Granny is trying to console the little girl who is crying because a boy went back on his word and it hurt her. The Granny tells the girl, "Don't go settin your heart on the day dreams of men folk." Back in the day, I believe woman were smarter about men and their expectations of such. We should be settin our hearts on things above not on things of this world.

Now a days we expect spouses to be the person who knows us, the person who knows what we want, the person who knows what we need, emotionally, physically, mentally, spiritually, and intellectually.  How in the world can someone do that for us? It is a lose/lose situation before it even starts. In essence, we are expecting a spouse to be God; they may be something special but they are NOT God. Our media makes us think that these superman people really do exist; shame on us for buying into that lie.

Just a side note:  My favorite author is Charlotte Bronte. In her book The Professor, the professor is rumbling on about thinking of what kind of woman he will spend the rest of his life with. I have thought since reading this book that if we all had this maturity level when considering who to marry, we would all be better off and society would be a healthier place.

…"Then I respect her talent; the idea of marrying a doll or a fool was always abhorrent to me: I know that a pretty doll, a fair fool, might do well enough for the honeymoon; but when passion cooled, how dreadful to find a lump of wax and wood laid in my bosom, a half-idiot clasped in my arms and to remember that I had made of this my equal--nay, my idol--to know that I must pass the rest of my dreary life with a creature incapable of understanding what I said, of appreciating what I thought, or of sympathizing with what I felt!"…

It takes about two years to really get to know someone, so why do we meet someone, decided we like them before we even know them, get all tangled up together emotionally and physically and then two years later wake up one morning and think, "Hmm…I don't think I like this person very much." Seems to me we should take the time to get to know someone and then if we still like them after two years, then get all tangled up in the sheets. The opposite does not even seem logical; if we are talking about running a business where we are the CEO of our self, a decision to first get tangled in the sheets, then decide if we like someone, would be considered incompetence and we would be fired.

The Irish Playwright and prolific writer, George Bernard Shaw, who was the only person to have been awarded a Nobel Prize for Literature AND an Oscar, said, "We have no more right to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it." When it comes to our relationships with other people, whether romantic or not, do we contribute as much to the happiness account as we withdraw? Or are we overdrawn?

I believe that "Identity" is one of the most important human needs because with identity comes many other underlying benefits. When a child is taught to know who they are, they also know what gives them joy, comfort, how to build confidence, what they like, what they dislike, what they are good at, what they are not good at, etc. An adult with a strong identity seems to be able to look inward and know what needs to be done even if they need help finding the answers.

I do not know why this seems to be so prevalent in our society today but I find that many people do not really know who they are; they struggle with their own identity. Maybe there is just too many lies available that they do not know what to believe? They look to others to tell them how to act, think and feel. I suppose it is easier to have a weak identity than to be introspective and know who we really are; maybe that is why folks get lazy and do not grow in this area? Consequently, folks with weak identities are drawn to those with strong identities because I truly believe that even though someone might have a weak identity, they subconsciously desire a strong identity. Be careful! An adult with an identity crisis can suck the life out of another adult with a strong identity at mach speed and envy always leads to hate.

When I began to do some research to list some scriptures regarding our identity as believers, I ran across the site listed next to the word "Identity" below. Almost every other word on the long list of needs above becomes realized just by knowing who we are. If we allow God to give us an identity, it seems that everything else falls into place. Unfortunately, some look to others for their identity. Some even think that when they find a romantic partner they have found salvation; their soul mate.  An adult may be able to meet some of these needs some of the time for someone else, but eventually, the ball will be dropped and the person needing ________ (fill in the blank) will be left unfulfilled. Why go with a 40% success rate if a 100% success rate can be achieved? I'm not willing to settle for 40% in my life. In the words of Charlie Brown's sister Violet, "I want all I got coming to me. I want my fair share." I will look to God to fulfill the majority of my needs, and if I choose to be romantically involved I will keep my expectations low and realistic because they are human just like me.

Identity - http://www.persevering.org/perceiv.html

CHAPTER NINE

I believe the fruit that comes from the tree will dictate what kind of tree it is.

If someone is planting an orange tree and is fully convinced that they are going to harvest apples, they will be of all men most miserable. It is somewhat entertaining, if not sad, to read conversations on blogs between those who feel that eventually through the process of evolution, an orange tree could somehow produce apples; I would have loved to have had them as a client when I was selling furniture at my commission only job years ago. I know that there are things like the peacherines which are a cross between a peach and a nectarine, but the peacherine is still considered a fruit in the peach family and a nectarine is just a peach with a recessive gene for fuzz and is still considered a peach.

Try to identify these fruit trees by looking at them before they are ready to harvest:

If someone were a horticulturist they may be able to tell what kinds of trees these were prior to the production of fruit therefore predicting what type of fruit was forthcoming. They would know what kind of fruit would be produced by assessing the shape, color, size and characteristics of the leaves on each tree; the leaves give indication of what is to come. The rest of us sorry folks would have to wait until we see the fruit, then and only then would we be able to tell the type of tree.

Horticulture is the art, science, technology, and business of intensive plant cultivation for human use. Horticulturists are agricultural scientists who work with plant propagation and cultivation with the goal of improving plant development, yields, quality, nutritional value and resistance to insects, diseases and environmental stresses. Their work is very involved and intricate and is the main reason we can enjoy fruits and vegetables from our grocery stores. Hug a horticulturist today!

As I researched horticulture, it became clear to me that the best horticulturists are the ones who have been immersed in this world of green and bright colors for a very long time. I trust that someone without a passion for fruit, vegetables and plants could go to college to obtain a degree in horticulture and perhaps work a successful job in that industry, but when people really need to know the answer to a tough horticulture question, or need to solve a problem, they will turn to those who seem to be experts on the behavior and characteristics of trees and plants; someone who has made it their life to know the intricate details.

One such person was Liberty Hyde Bailey, an American horticulture scholar who died in the 1950's. He said this about horticulture a few years before he died. "Strictly speaking, there are few horticulturists. The details are too many to allow any one person to cover the entire range. It is only those who look for principles who survey the whole field. Practitioners must confine themselves to rather close bounds. Consider that no less than 25,000 species of plants are in cultivation [probably more today], each having its own requirements."

Compare horticulture and the production of fruit thereof, to people and their production of a type of fruit in their lives. For a believer God would be the head horticulturist; for a non-believer, I do not know who their head horticulturist would be? Just as fruit and vegetables like oranges and tomatoes can be rotten, infested with insects or disease, or perfect and great tasting, so is the fruit produced by people in their lives. Great tasting people fruit might include: good friendships, great job performance, respected as a father and husband, talented, no criminal history, responsible, a good problem solver, etc. Rotten people fruit might include: cannot keep a job due to poor performance or insubordination, irresponsible, alcohol and drug abuser, criminal record, a father to children without financial support, etc. In essence, the production of fruit in one's life is either profitable for gain or constitutes a loss just like the business of growing and selling real fruit.

In addition to being the CEO, and the Executive Assistant, we have to be an assistant horticulturist too of our own lives; nobody is going to do it for us and nobody but God knows us the way we do and as Liberty Bailey said about the plant species, we each have our own individual requirements.

Every day we cultivate some type of tree that produces fruit whether it is good or evil. Just as we can look at a tree that is ready for harvest and tell what type of fruit is on its branches, so will others be able to look at our lives and see the fruit we have cultivated by sheer observation. What will they see? They might even be able to predict the future according to what fruit has already fallen off the branches.

There will be times when even though we work hard just as an orange grove owner might work hard to grow the fruit just right, something we have no control over like a hard freeze might set us back, or we might be ill prepared for an infestation of insects that we did not see coming. According to the Associated Press, 2007 was a struggle for the $9 billion citrus industry in Florida as temperatures plummeted below freezing several nights in a row. The fruit growers try to protect their crops by watering systems that protect delicate fruit with a glaze of ice, but winds of thirty miles per hour can disrupt this protective covering method which is what happened in Florida in 2007. The fruit's juice sacs start to rupture if they are exposed to freezing temperature for too long, and they become slush-filled rotten orbs. At that point the fruit loses its characteristic that defines it as fruit, the juice sacs, and it becomes something else.

Side thought: I am surprised that nobody has come up with a protective system that is more efficient than what is currently being used. After all, we can send a man to the moon! I think about this with tornadoes as well…it would seem to me that we could develop some type of vertical spiral apparatus similar to what goes into a jet engine but on a larger scale, that would cork screw into the ground far enough so that it could withstand five hundred mile an hour winds (or whatever it would need to be), so that when a tornado came by and hit it, it would spin and create energy. There are plenty of tornadoes in tornado alley to randomly place these devices so that sooner or later one of these energy producing spirals would be hit. It would probably spin enough energy for the entire city for an entire year. As someone who has lived in Florida, I have enjoyed the space shuttle launches just as much as the next person, but I wish we would spend more money on exploration here on earth!

Just like the slush filled orbs of ruined fruit, there are things in life that can make our attempt at positive fruit difficult which can even cause some slushy damage in our fruit but if we prepare, embrace and rally through the trials, growth and increased wisdom can come from it. Rotten fruit can yield lessons learned so that we will do better with the next crop. The hard ships and pit falls of life are sometimes many and the answers are not always readily available, but one thing is for sure, a continual cultivation of reverence for God will produce the great tasting fruits of knowledge and wisdom…guaranteed. Those are not my words, so do not judge me, they are His, so judge Him. Technically, we could take the list of needs from chapter eight and place it here to signify the fruits that might be evident in someone's life if they trust and obey God…interesting correlation…that was unplanned.

For a believer, we are to be growing specifically in the fruits of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control on a continual basis, but not everyone believes in God so how do they produce positive fruit? Would it be beneficial to them in their life to produce profitable fruit similar to the fruits listed for a believer even though they do not believe in God? If so, why would it be beneficial? There are many reasons and it has been proven that if a non-believer practices the principles taught in the Bible they will be more successful than if they had not, but here is just one reason explained:

According to Quintessential Careers who have been empowering job seekers since 1996, one of the skills that is most sought after by employers is, surprise! "…The ability to listen. Successful communication is critical in business." It takes patience to become a good listener. In addition, the top listed personal value an employer looks for in a candidate is honesty and integrity. It takes self control and goodness to be honest. If we look at these two qualities alone, listening and honesty/integrity, it would be safe to say that an individual looking for a job would need to be strong in these traits and have the wherewithal to maintain them if they wanted to keep their job regardless of their religious beliefs. So we can add listening and integrity/honesty to the list of an example of a type of positive fruit a person can have in their life that can be witnessed by others.

CHAPTER TEN

I believe that we all have a plumb line by which we live; that plumb line will eventually either serve us or fail us.

Whatever plumb line a person uses for their lives is visible to others and others know by observation whether or not that plumb line is working or not working for the individual using it.  Earlier I discussed the fact that we all have the freedom to choose any plumb line that we want to use for our lives as long as it falls within the realm of the law.

If my next door neighbor wants to set up a statue of Mickey Mouse in his front yard and bow down to it fifty times a day, he should be allowed to do so as long as it falls within the realm of the law and I should not think it odd that my neighbor does not believe or live the way that I do. In fact, we should expect others to be different from us and individuality should be embraced.  Instead of imposing or projecting our beliefs onto other people we should only worry about and be confident in our own plumb line of life; except in the case of raising children. When we raise children, we ARE projecting beliefs onto them by teaching, at least until they reach a certain age.

The majority of people spend way too much energy worrying about what other people are doing and thinking and whether or not they think it is right. In the words of Hank Williams, "…cause if you mind your business then you won't be minding mine."  I find that I have enough trouble keeping myself straight, never mind trying to assess someone else's plumb line. Besides, remember that everyone's plumb line will either serve them or fail them, so eventually it will be evident how everyone is doing with their chosen plumb lines; time always reveals truth.  Even atheists have a plumb line for how they live…they might try to claim that they don't but even if a person believes in nothing, the choice of nothing is still a plumb line…only dead people do not have plumb lines.

This chapter and its title sums things up. If we corral all of our beliefs and the reasons why we believe them and lock them into one pen that would be our plumb line for how we live, but just like animals that are shut in for a time but then set free, so can our beliefs be.

Ever since I was a child and saw my first plumb-bob, I have been fascinated with the instrument and the plumb lines that they determine. I'm sure if an adult had been watching me when I first caught glimpse of my first one, they would have thought something was wrong with me; I was mesmerized for a long time, just like when I saw Nicole Kidman at Starbucks in Nashville. She and I made eye contact, Keith and she were leaving, I was walking in, and I could not look away; I swear I could not look away. I do not know if she has trained herself to pull people in with her eyes, probably in her line of work she has, but there is something about her eyes that is captivating; I literally felt powerless and I am not gay, so do not go there. Let me apologize now in case Nicole reads this and sees that I have equated her eye contact to a plumb-bob; I mean it in the most endearing way Nicole. Just for the record reader, that woman is SO much more beautiful in person than in pictures it's not even funny.

To know that a plumb-bob can be hung and the plumb line established that points directly toward the earth's center of gravity is amazing to me and I cannot help but think, where do our plumb lines for life point? As an atheist, mine pointed straight for hell. If a building were constructed using our plumb lines for life would it stand straight reaching to the heavens or would it be crooked? What is even more incredible about the plumb-bob is the fact that this instrument, which has been used since the time of ancient Egypt, still functions the same way it did then. In our world of ever changing technology and lives lived at break-neck speed, it is comforting to know that the simple yet efficient plumb-bob still does what it did a thousand years ago.

Theoretically all plumb lines hang alike and presumptively all plumb-bobs, like squares and levels are equally accurate.  Unlike the plumb line developed by the plumb-bob, our own personal plumb lines for life, which are developed by us, can be flawed and detrimental to our well being. When plumb lines fail, they SHOULD be changed and I am personally grateful that they CAN be changed when they are not profitable. One of my favorite Bible verses is: All things are permissible, but not all things are beneficial.

Some folks are fortunate enough to be raised in a home where wholesome values are taught and positive characteristics are developed that yield positive life results; I was not. Still, there is no such thing as a perfect parent/caregiver and unfortunately, many of us are left to fend for ourselves, groping around in the dark until we find something to grab onto that makes sense whether it is due to trying to overcome negative parenting or whether we have selfishly, foolishly or inadvertently made choices that have led us down a dark path.

It seems that there are many attendees in the room where the party of failed plumb lines is being held. Abraham Lincoln, Socrates, Winston Churchill, and Thomas Edison all had plumb lines that needed adjusting at the beginning of their careers. Thomas Edison was fired from his first two jobs for being non-productive; I think he changed his plumb line somewhere along the way. Henry Ford failed a thousand times and went broke five times before he found the right plumb line. Hank Aaron went 0 for 5 his first time at bat with the Milwaukee Braves; I believe he changed his plumb line. Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper editor because he lacked imagination! For real? Perhaps in this case, the newspaper editor needed to change his plumb line? Later on Disney refused to hire Charles Schultz. I do not know what that was all about but obviously somewhere along the way Charles Schultz changed his plumb line and decided to just work for his self. As a creative person who would like to be able to make a living doing what I love (writing), it is encouraging to me to know that there were others who struggled with their own plumb lines in regard to creativity but prevailed until they found what worked.

We need to keep this in mind, not only do our plumb lines sometimes need adjusting but also the plumb lines of the folks we come in contact with throughout the day might have plumb lines that need adjusting. As a writer, I love the example of Dr. Seuss…twenty six publishers rejected his first book; years later I bet the publishers wished that they had changed something about whatever plumb line they were using to decide whether or not to sign an author.

Probably one of the most notable plumb line changes in my life time has been that of Steven Tyler, Aerosmith's Demon of Screamin, as he is known. His plumb line of drug use began early on for which he was kicked out of high school; it was a sign of what was to come in his adult life. "I was looking for any excuse to get high." During a concert, Tyler would go off to the side of the stage to snort cocaine out of what looked like a cup full of soda with a straw in it. There was no soda inside the cup and instead of sipping, he would snort. Although Tyler feels that back in the popular days of Aerosmith, drug use helped the band keep up the gruesome schedule of playing every state nine times within seven years, he is convinced that, "There's no end to that [drug use]; it's death, jail or insanity."

Unfortunately Tyler's fall from the stage in 2009 which he blames on being high, is on YouTube for the world to see; a video recording of a piece of history where someone can view for themselves a real example of a plumb line in someone's life that is not working.  Tyler recently told Ellen Degeneres that he does not want to go back to that place that held him, meaning drug use, because, "That place lost me my kids, a marriage, and my band. It's for real and I take it serious."  Personally, I believe that Idol has helped Tyler in that it would be publicly embarrassing, more so than just falling off of a stage, if he were to be high on the show and make a fool of himself….that is a good thing; anytime we have help keeping a valuable and profitable plumb line in place, we should be grateful.

What is it that gets someone to change a plumb line that is not working? Fear? Maybe in some cases. Better yet, why do people fail to change a plumb line that is clearly not healthy for them? Steven Tyler had a bad motorcycle crash in 1981 that took almost an entire year to heal from; it was a major accident. Although he went into rehab in 1986 and maintained sobriety for twelve years, he fell back into the old plumb line again. Was God trying to get his attention through the motorcycle accident? Did that motorcycle accident begin a rolling out per se of a new way of thinking for Steven Tyler that helped him get off drugs and stay alive? We know that changing the way we think does not happen overnight just as the way we think was not developed overnight.

"…and the Lord said to me, Amos, what do you see? I answered a plumb line. The Lord replied, I will test my people with this plumb line."

Amos 7:8

References:

The Daily Bible (In Chronological Order) New International Version

The Nelson Study Bible - New King James Version

Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary

WebMD

In Touch Ministries

Wikipedia

Brainy quotes

US National Library of Medicine

World Politics Review

http://www.persevering.org/perceiv.html

Dictionary.com

Quintessential Careers

Time Magazine

Associated Press

YouTube

Dave Ramsey's sermon at Fellowship Bible - January 29, 2012

Pull up this hyperlink, then search by teacher choosing Dave Ramsey

http://www.fellowshipnashville.org/media/messages/weekend-messages/

Answers to the tree table:

Orange Tree

Apple Tree

Lemon Tree

Grapefruit Tree

Mango Tree

Lime Tree

Author websites/interviews:

www.sherrybach.com

http://www.youtube.com/user/sherryabach

http://www.authorsden.com/visit/author.asp?id=121251

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nK9P6heWgSU

About the Author:

Ms. Bach began writing poetry at eight years old and songs to guitar at fourteen. She has been published by Montana Magazine, The Direct Buzz, Country Weekly, and The Magazine Of Country Music. Pathos In My Pocket, is Ms. Bach's first fiction novel; Abundant Christmas is her first children's book geared toward children between the ages of eight and twelve; Jekyll And Hide Me Not, Ms. Bach's second novel, is based on a true story and fleshes out Narcissistic Personality Disorder in a way that has never been done before.

As a child born to the female singer of a country cover band, Ms. Bach spent eighteen years around music and became an integral part of the behind the scenes activities including marketing, song selection, audience response, and the successful interpersonal relationships necessary for anyone involved in the music industry.

An atheist for thirty one years, Ms. Bach was converted to Christianity in November of 1994 and never looked back.

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Table of Contents

Introduction

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

References

About the Author