Soulshine

I’m giving a series of talks at a church in the Phoenix, Arizona, area this week. The theme of the talks is “Feed Your Faith, Not Your Fear.” Last Sunday I spoke at all of the services to promote my series of talks this week. I overwhelmingly received positive feedback from the people in the pews— with the exception of one curmudgeon. He walked up to me outside the church, verbally insulted me, and then threw his ugly theology into my face. I was gracious and told him that I was willing to agree to disagree with him, but that his personal attacks weren’t going to change what I know is right in my heart and conscience. He walked away grumbling. I had already planned to go to the nearby Arizona Renaissance Festival that afternoon because I had free time before the evening service. And as I drove to the Festival, I left that man and his arrogant negativity behind. It was a first for me. Once I arrived at the Festival, I never once thought about that man or his abusive behavior...

Carol Burnett may be an American comedian, but she’s spot-on right with this quote. It’s not a joke. In Recovery, we learn that we are solely responsible for our lives. If we’re happy, it’s because we have taken ownership of our lives and made necessary changes. If we’re whining through life it’s because we’ve chosen to victimize ourselves and to be the victim of the world. We’ve decided we don’t want to do the work that is necessary to change our thinking and behavior. And we’re still seeking someone else to fix our lives and make us happy. Well, I love Disney movies, but there’s no magic prince, princess or fairy godmother who’s going to rescue me or you. Nothing in this world changes or gets better until I decide to make the necessary changes within myself. I can do it. We all can do it. We have to pick ourselves up, work hard to be responsible for our lives and happiness, and rely on a Higher Power and trusted others to ASSIST us. No one else can do for us what we need...

If we truly want to be free of the negative thoughts that make us miserable, we have to stop giving our power away to them. The same is true about anything we choose to focus on, whether it be other people’s lives and problems, our own character defects, or all of the expectations that have dominated our brains, causing misery when they weren’t fulfilled. What we believe about ourselves, we become. And what we choose to focus on grows. When we focus on negative thoughts, past disappointments or unfulfilled expectations, they grow bigger and bigger. And it doesn’t take long for them to emotionally consume us into a swamp of negativity that is as dangerous as quicksand. If we don’t like the way someone else behaves, we can realize that we aren’t responsible for their lives, and we can choose to take our attention off of them and focus on the positives in our lives. Or, better yet, we can focus on the things we need to change about ourselves to make our own lives better, happier ...

Right on! There is nothing more troublesome than the thoughts that rumble around inside our heads; especially the negative, crtitical ones that we continually beat ourselves up with day after day. Most every addict I know lives in the wasteland of their negative thoughts. We allow our brains to trap us  inside a self-imposed prison. Well, it’s time to break free. I’ve realized that thoughts are JUST thoughts. They pop into my head and sometimes they exit as fast as they entered; other times, I grab hold of them and mentally abuse myself. But the truth is no one knows where our thoughts come from and no one knows where they go. They’re sort of like the ticker tape that runs at the bottom of your TV screen when you’re watching CNN, or some other news channel: Words magically appear on the left side of your TV screen and magically disappear on the right side. The words running across the TV screen have no more power than we choose to give them, and it’s the same way with ou...

As a child I was taught "magical thinking." In other words, I was led to believe that if I was a good boy only good things would happen to me; if I went to Church every Sunday only good things would happen to me; and if I  said all the right prayers,  I'd receive everything I ever prayed for to God. I carried this thinking with me into adulthood, but obviously, the older I got, the more aware I became that being the good boy/guy, going to weekly Church services and saying certain prayers were not a surefire guarantee that everything would always go my way. As a result, as a young adult, I was often bitter and angry with God. After all, I had followed all of the rules: I'd always been the good guy, I went to Church weekly, I said my prayers, so why were bad things happening to me? Well, because God is not a magician, or a genie. There's no magic lamp, and we aren't guaranteed three wishes-- or anything for that matter. The only thing that we are promi...