I was taught by the good nuns at Our Lady of Perpetual Help School that God was all knowing and everywhere. We were encouraged to be Godlike.

As I grew older, it dawned on me that I couldn’t be everywhere, and much to my dismay, I couldn’t know everything.

Much later in life, I got the gift of awareness of how I could be more Godlike – Perspective.

It seems that if God is everywhere, he/she/it can see from all perspectives. To be Godlike, it helps to see things from a different angle.

Here’s an example I’ve used before to illustrate being Godlike: You are on the corner of a rooftop of a tall building looking down at the traffic at intersecting streets. You see two cars speeding towards the intersection. They don’t see each other because their view is blocked by the building. To make the example more interesting, let’s pretend that one car is in hot pursuit of a terrorist about to bomb the city and the other car is a husband rushing his pregnant wife to the hospital for delivery. You can see from this vantage point that these cars are on a collision course, no matter how noble their goals.

You have perspective.

Often, when we don’t have perspective, our current path is on a collision course with reality. That’s because we have tunnel vision. We don’t stop and take notice of our Godlike ability to engage perspective.

Imagine for a moment that all perspectives are represented by a circle marked with 360 degrees. Engaging perspective only takes shifting a few degrees either way on the circle.

Chances are, if you are not not getting the results that you want, you are stuck on one vantage point. Allow yourself the freedom to shift, ever so slightly, and view your situation from another angle.

From your new vantage point, you’ll be able to see a new perspective – one that’s not caught up in the devilish details of your current view. It’s from this perch that you’ll be able to see the Godlike thing to do.

All the best,

John

What level of relationship do you have with another? There are many levels to pick from, ranging from casual to canoodle and everything in between.

What differentiates the levels of relationship? I submit it’s a comfort level.

We aren’t as comfortable with the person labeled as casual as we are with the person we’re “serious” with.

There is no absence of the following happening when relationships are coming apart: Many people seek counseling.

Have you ever noticed that people will tell a counselor what they weren’t comfortable telling the person they’re in counseling with?

“He’s a selfish, cotton headed ninny muggin.” “She’s an anal descendant of Whigs.”

Many counselors provide a very valuable service but their services would be less necessary if you were comfortable enough to tell your partner the same exact thing directly.

The erosion of comfort comes in large part from withholding. When you hold back, you dam up the flow of the relationship until the dam bursts, often in the counselor’s office.

Are you comfortable enough to tell a total stranger what you’re withholding from your partner? Your relationship is in trouble.

I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard complaining, water cooler chatter that people would have with casual friends about the person they lived with. My sense was that the relationship was running out of comfort.

Ask yourself this: If you aren’t comfortable enough to tell the person closest to you what’s on your mind, how soon will it be that you’ll be estranged?

It seems counter-intuitive but the less withholding you do, the more comfortable the relationship becomes. It doesn’t mean that you won’t encounter impasses or problems, it just means that you’ll have a better chance of getting past them by not withholding.

Please don’t confuse not withholding with throwing up on the person you’re in a relationship with. That’s just leads to a stinky mess. Throwing up is coming out with a list of pent up complaints. It’s better to address what’s bothering you the first time it bothers you to the point of discomfort. This prevents a molehill from growing into Mt. McKinley.

Your level of comfort determines your level of relationship. How comfortable do you want to be? One answer is: “Don’t tell them, tell me.”

All the best,

John

Light sources come and go as do people in our lives. When their power source moves on, we can no longer depend on their light to show us their particular way. Their human light, as beautiful as it was, was temporarily housed.

The light that continues to shine is perpetual. It shines through every living thing and is still here after they’re gone. It was the light that powered them and it’s the light that powers us. This light doesn’t die; it just moves on.

We are not the housing; we are the light. I believe it’s the only mystery we have to solve.

On the surface, it seems like all we are is flesh and blood. That’s where the physical evidence points. No surgeon can cut us open and find our light, but they can, without hesitation, see it shine through us, and not see it when it leaves.

When we discover that we are actually the light with temporary housing, we shine a lot brighter. The people and living creatures we miss the most knew, at base level, that they were light. That’s what we liked most about them – their light.

We do so many things to occlude our light in this lifetime. Each one of these distracting things moves us away from solving the mystery and moves us further away from basking in our light. These distractions are unenlightening. They have us chase the horizon when all we have to do is stop and notice our light.

The light lives on; the only thing you have to figure out, while you’re here, is how to let it shine through the temporary housing known as you.

It’s a work in progress for me, but I’m seeing light at the end of the tunnel. Are you?

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper asked this yesterday: “Who are you without your story?“ It’s not the first time I’ve been asked that question but it’s worth my reflection again.

We all have a story – one we’ve told thousands of times. One purpose of the story, best as I can tell, is to not make us responsible for our current lot in life.

“I’m the daughter of left-handed, abusive clowns” you may say. That’s to absolve you of any responsibility for where you are. Your story may also be used to justify a counter-productive behavior. “If you had the kind of day I had, you would be drowning your sorrows too.”

Those are some of the reasons we keep telling our story but the question remains: “Who are we without our story?”

A story has a beginning, a middle and an end – just like our human existence. Who you are without your story is the animating force of creation that has no beginning, no middle or no end. The animating force keeps on ticking long after we and our story have been forgotten.

You, without your story, are the infuser, not the infused. Your story imposes limits; without it, you know no boundaries.

Freeing yourself from your story is the freedom we all seek. When we realize this freedom, we are not corralled by our circumstances, just creatively responsive to them.

Continuing to tell our story imposes the limits we seek to escape. The road to freedom begins with retiring our story and all the labels we’ve affixed to ourselves. Labels are mini-stories that keep us stuck.

You, without your story, are the creative force that animates everything. It’s a discovery we all desire to make but most of us are unwilling to pay the price. The price for this priceless gift is to leave our story behind.

“Who are you without your story?” Finding out is one less story away.

All the best,

John

Most of us believe in the old axiom: “You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression,” so we rarely have a plan in place if we do get a second chance.

Sometimes second chances do come along but we approach them from the wrong angle and go about making the old axiom a self fulfilling prophesy.

The angle we approach from is the “Don’t” angle. We list all the things we don’t want to do with this second chance. These would be all the things we messed up the first time around. This puts the focus on “Don’t” which is a backwards strategy.

The “Do” angle has a much better chance of making your second chance more impressionable.

The question you want to ask is: “What DO I want to do with this second chance?”

“Do” is a move forward strategy. It focuses you on what you do want to do. “Don’t” drags you backwards and has you think twice about every action you take – what not to do and what to do. It’s a cumbersome strategy that scatters focus and waters down results. Reminds me of a common occurrence on the golf course . . .

Even if you don’t play golf, you’ll be able to appreciate this scenario. The last time the golfer played this particular hole he/she put the ball in the water. They now have a second chance to play this hole. Imagine what it would be like if your entire focus was on what you didn’t want to do again. Ask any golfer with that mindset where the second ball went. The one word answer is “Splash.”

Just do this exercise in your mind right now: Think of something you don’t want to do and notice the feelings it generates in your body. I get a sluggish feeling when I imagine “Don’t.” Now think of something you “Do” want to do. What feelings are attached to that? For me, I feel an energy that makes me want to act.

“Do” and “Don’t” may seem like semantics to you until you put them into action. When you do that, you’ll personally experience the feelings that go along with each approach.

When you focus on what you do want, your second impression is so strong that it makes your first one come in second.

All the best,

John

Here’s a question to ponder: What do you do when you find out what you believe isn’t true?

If you’re like most of us, you deny the evidence and keep on espousing that belief.

Let’s face it, there’s not a lot of evidence for most beliefs, but that fact doesn’t keep us from believing in them. We believe most things without evidence.

The hard question is the one asked at the outset: What do I do when I find out what I believe isn’t true? I submit that we initially get angry and defensive and those two behaviors will stay with us until we find another way to respond to the question.

There is no right answer, only ones that move you forward or keep you stuck. Reminds me of a story . . .

When I was in radio as a program director and consultant, part of my job was critiquing on-air personalities. From time to time I would encounter someone who believed they were God’s gift to radio who truly had no gifts. Coaching them up was always management’s first choice rather than firing them, so the process began. Ask any coach in any profession if they can coach someone who doesn’t think they need coaching. They will tell you hair curling stories about people who were filled with anger and defensiveness.

What facts are you not facing? Denying that they are there will keep your belief in place and your feet stuck to the floor.

Anger and defensiveness may be your initial reactions but are not productive responses to hang on to when you make a discovery of fact. Sometimes facts hurt and that can make us angry. The mistake we make is directing that anger outward at the messenger and not reflecting on the message.

Are you fighting with the evidence? That always results in a knockout. The trick is to get out of the ring when you come to your senses and find out what you can do when you find out what you believed isn’t true.

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper delivered his version of fire and brimstone the other day when he pronounced this from his pulpit: “Hell is in your head.”

I don’t think he was referring to the concept of hell being in your mind; it felt more real than that.

My best guess is he meant you are actually in hell when you are caught up in your thoughts.

We create a living hell every time we get ensnared in a fiery debate inside our head. If Hell is constant friction and gnashing of teeth, I can think of nothing that resembles that more than the flames we fan inside our mind.

What we fail to notice is that none of that blitzkrieg of banter has ever produced a productive result. It only puts more fuel on the fire. That’s hell.

To escape the fires of hell, it helps to notice that you’re in there. Once you notice that you are creating and fueling the agony, you can choose to grab a nearby seat (perhaps in Limbo) and just observe the raging fire of vitriolic rhetoric. It’s actually quite entertaining when you watch and don’t participate.

The minute you feel compelled to counter a point offered by “the other side,” you have bitten the tempting apple and reenter the fray. The result is that your peace of mind is taken away.

Observing your mind at work is a one-way ticket out of hell. Once you remove yourself from the fight, you are no longer interested in being right – only being at peace.

As an example of this phenomenon, you can enter a political debate any time you choose. Just call a local talk show and express an opinion or go to a local bar and do the same. Before too long you’ll be embroiled in a debate that has no end. That’s exactly what you do when you saddle up to the barstool in your mind.

Like anything else, the devil is in the details. Once you get caught up in the details, you lose sight of the bigger picture – that you have the ability, through observation, to leave this pit behind. This allows you to rise up to the level of peace, and that’s heavenly.

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper must love taking walks because he delivered this gem the other day during one: “When seeking help, bring your needs, not your neediness.”

What you need and what you are needy about travel on different paths. One goes towards the light of help and the other goes nowhere.

Neediness, pure and simple, is the lack of resourcefulness. A person who genuinely needs something lets what’s on the periphery go out of focus and zeros in on that specific need. Resources now have a direction to flow. The needy person is like a novice photographer at a wedding who takes thousands of pictures in rapid fire succession hoping to get some that look good. That’s called “Spray and Pray.”

Neediness contains a deep sense of lack – a lack of resources.

Neediness is a perception that doesn’t look in the direction of resources; it only focuses on lack. Looking into an empty pit is not going to fill up the hole. Looking for resources is your best option.

The needy person doesn’t think much of themselves because they are blind to their internal resources. They don’t think there’s enough of whatever it is they need. People needy about money don’t think there’s enough money to go around when, in fact, there’s more than enough. It’s what the parable of the loaves and fishes addresses.

A needy person is looking for someone else to provide for their needs when they are the own best provider. Dr. Dave Dobson made the bold claim that we are our own best therapist. He wasn’t suggesting that people not seek help; he was suggesting that they check in before they assume that what they need is out there somewhere.

You are resourceful; you just have to get focused on that part of you rather than staying glued to being needy.

Neediness is a repellent. No one wants to help a needy person because they know it’s a bottomless pit and a forever commitment – Translation: A drain.

If you are always looking for a helping hand, you’ll never handle your difficulties. That’s called not growing up. Growing up is recognizing your own resources and fashioning solutions.

When you become resourceful, that’s when you’ll discover willing people willing to lend a hand. I guess this whole post could be written more succinctly by quoting an ancient proverb: “God helps those who help themselves.”

All the best,

John

The Grasshopper offered this observation the other day: “You’re not responsible for your thoughts and feelings; you are responsible for your actions.”

How often have you beaten yourself up for your thoughts or feelings? Did that ever get you a win?

Thoughts produce feelings and feelings produce thoughts, but unless they lead to action, condemning yourself for them is an exercise in self abasement.

You can have “awful” thoughts or feelings about something or someone but unless they lead to an awful action, they’re not illegal, or condemnable for that matter.

If you are denouncing yourself for your thoughts and feelings, you’ve had sufficient training in guilt being cathartic. It isn’t.

If you want to judge yourself for something, judge yourself for your actions. They are the only things you are responsible for.

Thoughts and sensations just pop into your mind and body unannounced; you have a clutch to keep them from developing into actions.

Thoughts and sensations are not preventable; actions are.

Jimmy Carter’s admission that he looked on many women with lust and committed adultery in his heart just underscores my point. To flog yourself for biology and chemistry at work is to deny science. To take action on those thoughts and feelings may lead to impeachment.

Taking responsibility for your actions takes action. Taking responsibility for thoughts and feelings just popping up is just an idle thought.

All the best,

John

In the spirit of full disclosure, I’m not very practiced in reaching out. I’m more than willing if something is right in front of me and am usually at the head of the line when someone asks for assistance. But I’m not a self starter when it comes to finding out if you need a shoulder to dampen or your hand held.

My pattern has been to guard my privacy with a vengeance and, in the past, wrongly assumed that everyone else guarded theirs too. This kept me in the “mind my own business” department. The hard lesson I learned from having this pattern is that you can’t get help when you give the impression that you don’t need help.

Everything is not always AOK but many of us pretend that it is that way. It’s just another way to keep people away from our private sanctuary of suffering.

We have to reach out before someone can reach in and that takes a lot of bravery.

It takes an admission that you are vulnerable – a fate worse than death for people who pad themselves with privacy.

Vulnerability reveals a crack in our armor – a small entry way for others to reach in.

It’s been said that we come into this world alone and we go out on our own but I’ve discovered, in the space between, we’re not meant to walk alone.

Let folks know you have an underbelly. It’s a “reach out” revelation that will cause others to reach in.

All the best,

John