Reality Reflection: I Need, You Need, We All Need

This month we’ve been talking about relationships and something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately is the topic of needs. We all have needs, some of us meet them pretty well while others aren’t as good at realizing, communicating, or acting on those needs. My partner recently said that he wished he could do more to meet my needs and I said that he does meet my needs, I just may not need him in the same way he’s been needed in past relationships. It’s an important fact to remember because while we all have the same basic needs (food, shelter, love), how we meet those needs and the levels of those needs are different for all of us, not to mention the other needs (and passions and interests) we have individually.

But going back to the topic of relationships, when you choose to enter a relationship you go in with the intention of bringing something to that relationship and hoping to get something out as well. So while the word “need” doesn’t have to be the one that’s applied here, because you may already have food, shelter and love, there’s still something missing in your life that you think you can gain by entering into that relationship.

I don’t think ‘needs’ is a dirty word, unless you’re content to have serious needs and not do something about them (dumping them on someone else isn’t “doing something about them”).  It’s perfectly normal to have them, and also perfectly normal to ask for help with them. I’m not a believer in knowing and being everything to everyone. I don’t have to be able to fix a pipe or rewire a house or fix a broken bone, there are other people who are very good at those things and actually enjoy them.

I think it’s time we stop seeing our needs as an embarrassment or something we should hide. I think it’s time we step up and ask for the help we need, ask for the direction we need and ask for the support we need, and above all do something about the needs we have. Yes, sometimes you’ll have others turn you down, but I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised how many people are willing to step up for you, especially if they know you’ll step up for them in their time of need.

The Disservice of Rushing

Lately I’ve been thinking (again) about the rush that most of us live our lives being and doing. We’re so busy, trying to pack something into every second it seems. And in some ways I can understand because there’s a lot of life to be lived and lots of things to do and we’ll never be able to complete them all in our (short) life time. But I think that pressure and decision to say yes to so many things has had a negative impact on our relationships. I don’t think that we take the time often enough to really think about what we say or how we talk to people. Sometimes we’re so focused on being right or doing something our way that we’re not able to see the value in doing it another way, and we’re certainly not willing to admit that we don’t know everything.

I believe we can all learn something from everyone on the planet. Maybe it’s just one or two things, but those things can have great value. But when we go into a conversation or relationship with our minds already made up in how a conversation will go or how smart we are (and they’re not) or making a decision without really listening or getting all the facts, it’s not only hurtful to them, but can have a negative impact on us as well.

Just because someone is younger than you, is older than you, is from another country, went through a divorce, went through bankruptcy, doesn’t like pets, or likes your favorite sports team’s biggest rivals doesn’t mean that they can’t have good ideas, can’t teach you something and aren’t worth a few minutes of your time really listening to what they have to say. The same is true for advice, just because it’s free doesn’t mean it’s bad or because it costs a lot it’s good.

I don’t think it’s (just) about trying to pack every minute of every day full, it’s about making sure to use your time wisely and make the most of your life. Some of the best moments of your life will be with other people. Some of those great moments will only happen if you slow down and take the time to meet someone new, take the time to build up existing relationships or make amends in one that you’ve damaged. I encourage you to take time to slow down this weekend and really watch where you’re going, listen to the full explanation or conversation before making decisions, and suspend judgment a bit longer than you do normally. What will you experience with an open mind this weekend?

A Summer of Growth

Summer is one of my favorite seasons. It’s a season so full of life and living that it just makes me happy. As I was thinking about the summer growing season of fresh fruits and vegetables as well as Father’s Day this past Sunday in the USA, it got me thinking about how things grow. The term growth in and of itself implies that you start with something smaller than you end up with. If we’re talking about change it could be a transformation because of going from one thing to another, but that doesn’t mean that the size of something has to change. But with growth it is about size and starting with something smaller than you’re going to end up with.

People grow, plants grow, and animals grow, and the one thing that we all have in common is that we start small. No matter how big the tree gets, how big the dog is, or how tall the human is, each one of them started as a very small seed. If you think about companies like Amazon, Walmart and Verizon, they didn’t start as the giants they are, they started as little ideas with a person or group of people. Buildings don’t appear fully built, they start as boards, beams and pieces.

God doesn’t expect you and I to be the person we’re meant to be instantly, He knows there is a growing process we go through in our lives. The thing about growth is that even if it’s going very slowly it continues. Sometimes pruning is necessary to ensure that growth continues, but either you’re growing or you’re dying. I don’t know about you but I’m not ready to die yet.

But the reminder here today is that everyone starts somewhere. The smartest people in the world didn’t start off that way, they started off just like you and I. The people who become presidents and cure sicknesses started off just like you and I. You don’t have to be anyone but who you are at this moment. The important question is what you’re going to do with your next few moments and where you’re growing and going from here.  How will you grow this summer?

Reality Reflections: Think Before You Speak

One of the things I’m always talking with my clients about is the importance of checking how you say things.  If I walked up to you in the middle of the sidewalk and said “do you like Italian food?” you would think I’m crazy or at the very least weird. I don’t know you, we don’t live near each other, we haven’t talked online, we’re not social media connections, we don’t work together: there’s no relationship that could be conceived of between us. If however I said “Hi, I’ve got a coupon for a free dinner for a couple at this excellent Italian restaurant down the road, no strings attached, would you like it?” That would make a big difference and you would think I’m being generous and not rude or weird (which would be my goal). The way you phrase things can make a big difference.

A more typical example would be someone saying “What are you doing here?” at the local bar to you. It’s not quite rude, but it’s not exactly friendly. A better way to say it would be “Hey! It’s good to see you! How have you been? I didn’t know you liked this bar! Are you here with or meeting anyone or would you like to come hang out with my friends and I?” (with appropriate breaks for responses of course).  Another common example would be “Why didn’t you take the garbage out?” when you could say “Could you please take out the garbage tonight.”

When you start these conversations as I have proposed initially you’re basically asking for a fight, for someone to be offended or for lots of misconceptions and misunderstandings to take place. Yes, I know that sometimes the words that fly out of our mouth happen because we’re surprised by something or we’re tired or we’re just not thinking. But if we all took 5 seconds to think about our words before they flew out of our mouths and used our ears more proactively, we would be in a lot better shape personally and with our relationships.

If you take a moment and remember that last time that your words offended someone even if you didn’t mean for it to happen, and the guilty and horrible feeling that (should have) followed, I think you’ll find sufficient motivation for taking those few extra seconds to think about your words before you have to apologize for hurting someone.

New Relationships

This month one of the topics we’re talking about is relationships. I’m a big dog lover and follow several service dog organizations. One of those organizations just had a new litter of puppies, and as I was checking the little ones and their proud mama out, it got me thinking about relationships. So today I thought we’d talk about the joy of new life, new relationships, and new opportunities.

We’ve talked about the fact that relationships end, there are many reasons that we choose to end our relationships, and often they’re good reasons. Sometimes there is fault, failures and mistakes involved, and sometimes the end could have been avoided. But sometimes relationships are meant to be for a period of time and then we’re supposed to move on. The unfortunate thing is that some of us sit and stew or feel sorry for ourselves or sulk for entirely too long after that break up. That instead of living life, moving on and starting fresh, we’re stuck in the past. Yes, you should mourn your relationship and take time to consider what went wrong (and make changes if appropriate) but that shouldn’t take too long, certainly not years in the large majority of cases.

Instead we should be looking ahead. Every day someone dies and someone is born. We can focus on the person we’ve lost or the person we’ve gained. While we never truly let go of the person we’ve lost, they should not remain our primary focus, we should be focused on the next generation. The person who has passed on will in all likelihood have very little impact on the world now, the person who has the greatest chance to impact the world is the one who was just born.

So before you feel frustrated or scared about having to start a new relationship, I encourage you to think about the possibilities that new relationship holds. Maybe this person will be the one that fits you most compatibly, maybe this will be the one who will challenge you to reach for your dreams, maybe this will be the one who shows you a side of yourself you never knew existed but will really benefit from, and maybe this person is just meant to bring you a little love and light. Will you choose to be open to the possibilities of a new relationship this week?

Anointed By God

If you’ve read through the Bible or attended church after the celebration of Easter, you’ve probably heard about the event called Pentecost. It’s written about in the book of Acts in the New Testament (along with a bunch of other really culture-shifting events). During Pentecost “all the believers were meeting together in one place. Suddenly, there was a sound from heaven like the roaring of a mighty windstorm, and it filled the house where they were sitting. Then, what looked like flames or tongues of fire appeared and settled on each of them. And everyone present was filled with the Holy Spirit…” (Acts 2:1b-4a). The whole event was pretty fantastic and hard to believe by those who didn’t witness it, except those who were anointed by the Holy Spirit on Pentecost were, in this specific situation, able to speak in different languages, languages they didn’t previously speak, as evidence of the anointing.

As I mentioned the Book of Acts is filled with stories like this one. From real life interactions with Jesus after He ascended to being brought back to life to shipwrecks and snake bites the book of Acts has lots of crazy stories that line up very well with seeing tongues of fire land on people’s heads. But it’s also got some great insight into what the early church was all about: faith, community, and sharing the Good News. The good news is that there are many churches alive and well today who have taken on those core aspects and continued them today.

Pentecost was an important and amazing event, but what about the rest of us? We aren’t exactly anticipating a Pentecost in 2017, and I haven’t heard of anyone experiencing exactly what the Early Church did back on that first Pentecost since then. First, it’s not necessarily something we should be looking to have happen. Second, as important as the first Pentecost was, there rest of Acts 2 tells us that they (the Early Church) added to their numbers daily. Those people weren’t experiencing tongues of fire, they were just interacting with people who believed in community and the Good News. We don’t need tongues of fire to make us believers or give us any special abilities. The only thing we need is belief in Jesus and the willingness to do His work on Earth and share about Him with others (using words when necessary). You don’t need tongues of fire to know that God has a plan for your life, or to have a calling and mission for Him.  So as you finish up this week I encourage you to look for ways that God is showing up in your life (they may be seemingly ordinary), how He may be leading you to build community and who in your life needs to hear about Him. What will God show you?

Reality Reflection: Everything to Everyone

I’m a fan of saying no to people, you know why? Because you don’t have to be everything to everyone. Not only is is about being honest to who you are and not putting yourself in positions that you’re completely unqualified for or incapable of doing, but because every time you take on something that you’re only slightly capable of (or not at all), you take away an opportunity from someone else who is qualified. If we really want this world to be all it can be, I think we have to be willing to share a little of the control with others, have to be willing to let them do their thing, and not get in the way when they take charge.

Yes, there are time when you’ll go a little outside your preferred box to help a friend or to try something new, and that’s a good thing. We should be trying new things to keep our minds engaged and learning. But we have our safe zones for a reason. The good news is that my safe zone isn’t the same zone as yours. You’ve got talents I don’t have and don’t have any inclination for developing. I believe there are plenty of opportunities for us within the things that interest and drive us that we should never have to take work, resources or life away from someone else.

But that does mean that we all have to step up in that which we are gifted in, and a whole lot less slacking, hiding or letting someone else’s sub-par job suffice. You need to take responsibility for what you can do in this world with your unique talents. Be proud of who you are and what you can do. That doesn’t mean you have to start a business or blog, it may just mean finding a company to work with and bring your unique talents to (one that fits better than your current one), or donating your time on weekends or vacations.

This week I encourage you to give others the chance to do what they do best, and choose to do what you do best. Who knows, you may not cure cancer today, but you certainly may bring a smile to someone’s face or relief to their life in some other way.

Peace in Relationships

We’re getting ready to head into what will probably be another busy week. It seems like even when we have the best intentions of slowing down that we don’t make it happen like we should. This month we’ll be talking about relationships. Yes, we do talk about relationships all year long and it’s a very broad topic, including family, partners/significant other, friends, coworkers and neighbors. But this month we’ll be focusing in on making the most of the relationships we have, learning how to be a supportive partner and navigating the complexities that we each bring to a relationship.

Whether we’re talking about family, partners/significant other, friends, coworkers or neighbors, in order for it to fall into the relationship category you have to interact with them. For estranged family members or neighbors you don’t even know by name, it’s not really a relationship, and we won’t be focusing on it much, other than in a conversation about starting or fixing relationships. Today though I want to focus on the one thing that frustrates, challenges and hurts us when it comes to relationships: fighting and disagreements.

Any time there’s a relationship there’s always more than one person involved. And with each and every one of us comes opinions, likes and dislikes, fears, and different ways of seeing things, which means that it’s very likely there will be at least one fight or heated disagreement between you during the course of your relationship (even if it’s over something like a misheard comment or lack of context). So if you want the best relationship possible there’s one thing to keep in mind: peace starts with you. Don’t expect or require them to always be the peacemaker or hope that you’ll never be lacking peace, choose to bring peace to your relationships and work on learning how to work things out in a more peaceful manner. Is peace something you need to work on this week?

“First, keep the peace within yourself. Then you can bring peace to others.” Thomas a Kempis

Where Do We Start?

I’m not the type of person to really watch or listen to the news but I do check in and skim headlines each day so I’m at least somewhat aware of what goes on in the world. There’s been a lot of hate in the news of late, and to an extent you can understand some of it: there are people around the world who suffer greatly and as a result of their suffering they believe that the only way to deal with it is to obliterate anyone in their path to showing the world who they are and making a statement about how hurt they are, even if they won’t admit it that that’s why they’re doing it. Too many people hide their pain behind bitterness, nastiness, brutality, humor and sarcasm, or just plain hide.

I can’t imagine how God felt after the Garden of Eden incident when He knew that there would be so much pain and suffering in the world; knowing that we would suffer so much as a result. The worst part was probably knowing that most of our suffering and pain to the degree that we experience it is because we’re too stubborn to get help, to be vulnerable and admit that we’re not perfect, that we have our failures and weaknesses, and because we can’t accept that it’s OK to fail or be imperfect.

In some ways it’s totally understandable that we don’t want to admit our vulnerabilities to others, that we don’t want to be honest about how we feel deep inside because we’ve been hurt or seen others experience the wrath, laughter, criticism and hate for not measuring up to other people’s expectations, unrealistic or not. It makes us question our relationships, question people’s motives, curb or go overboard in our thoughts, actions and reactions, and not choose to fulfill our potential.

There are lots of reasons to doubt and question other people, and we think that we’ve got some good reasons to question God as well. We think that because God hasn’t responded to our call immediately that He’s busy or doesn’t care, and when it’s been long enough we think that He’s forgotten about us or what we shared with Him about or that He doesn’t want us to have good things in our lives. But I think we’ve forgotten who God is.

Ecclesiastes 11:4 says “But there are some things that you cannot be sure of. You must take a chance. If you wait for perfect weather, you will never plant your seeds. If you are afraid that every cloud will bring rain, you will never harvest your crops.”

The thing about people and God and our lives after Eden is that we have to be willing to take chances if we really want to live. We have to take a chance in trusting God and opening up to other people and asking for help, not just complaining. We have to believe, and even more than that know, that God cares for us and that not only is God interested and cares about us, but He cares about other people too, and He wants us to as well. We need to take the chance that God really does have a plan for our lives and to be open to God’s creative purposes and plans for us, and not box ourselves up before we have a chance to explore the potential He placed inside of us. We need to accept God and the person He has created us to be, and the people He has created and placed around us. We need to be honest with God and with ourselves and with each other. And we need to make sure that we honor each other with the respect and knowledge that God created each of us so each of us deserves to be treated as such.