THERMO --- STAT OR METER? Which describes you?

“He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior.” - Confucius 

It is amazing for me to be sitting outside during the month of July in Tulsa, Oklahoma. It is 72 F. However, the average temperature for this time is about 95 degrees or 35 C. This isn’t about science and without getting into the semantics of science let’s set the stage of this blog. 

Let’s say the water begins to freeze at 32 F. The thermometer’s (an external device, which measures temperature) median is set at zero. It measures anything above zero as warm and hot and anything below zero is cold or freezing.  Okay, I am not a scientist, all I know is when my toe comes out from under the covers and it is cold, it is time to stay in bed. If I am outside and a bead of water forms on my head, then I know it is hot and time to go inside where it is cool.  A thermometer measures the reaction to what it is in. 

When I tend to focus on the temperature, especially when I look at the thermometer in the summer, the more hot I begin to feel. When I am indoors from the heat or cold, my thermostat can regulate a nice comfortable temperature year round. Then a thought occurred to me about how this can equate to our life. Therefore, are you a thermometer, by mirroring the environment, or are you a thermostat that can change it?  

As a veteran of the Army, I had to learn to adapt to dangerous situations by using the resources around me and planning strategies, which could neutralize the situation. I had to learn through many trials and hardships to change my outlook from being negative to positive situations. By learning different strategies, taught me that I can be a thermostat and regulate the environment around me by who I am and what I do. Yet, sometimes, I was a thermometer and was changed by certain personal events, poor choices and often good positive choices. 

Life can be a hot situation or it can be a cold situation. If it is warm, then for me I am just complacent and not growing and prefer to move the needle to learn and to grow as an individual. As an individual, I prefer growing in His grace and to be changed. I had to learn to grow from being externally compelled (thermometer) to being internally motivated (thermostat). 

How you look at life determines, whether you can change (thermostat) it or be changed by it (thermometer). In order for me to be more of a thermostat, I had to learn to captivate my thoughts and make them obedient (2 Cor 10:5). I change my thermostat by renewing my mind every day (Rom. 12:2). By regulating myself, it enabled me to be content in all circumstances (Phil. 4:11). 

When life becomes a storm, it is difficult sometimes not to be a thermometer and measure how big or small or how hot or cold it can become. My focus is then off of regulating my mind, but merely reacting and measuring the external trouble. It can be a challenge. The fishermen were experts at the seas, in the biblical times. Yet, I remember the story where Jesus was asleep in the boat and they came in fear and awakened him. They were the thermometer measuring the storm and Jesus was the thermostat that was able to regulate the environment. 

We have the same control over the storms in our life. It isn’t that was can get rid of the trouble, but it is how we regulate our thoughts to be able to survive it. Understand the difference between being a thermometer, which reacts to the storm, or being a thermostat where you can regulate your thoughts to weather the storm. During this time it takes practice to work on self-talk. Self-talk is the mercury within the thermostat that can get you below normal (depression) or above normal hot (furiously angry). 

Negativity mindset dilutes the human potential to find positivity. The power within you is to focus your mind by capturing the negative thoughts and make them obedient to the positive thoughts. This will enable you to no longer dwell on what went wrong, or who to blame. This could build roadblocks that greatly reduce your power to change. When you embrace the positive of I can, accept responsibility for what has occurred and realize it is the stepping stone into something better, it enables you to focus on succeeding. 

Finally, how do we regulate our environment like a thermostat? Regulating emotions and impulses means to purposely decrease or increase the intensity of an emotion by determining whether to act or not on impulse. First, use your thoughts to slow down by reacting suddenly to the situation. Think about using a coping skill, which can regulate your anger or anxiety. Choose how you think about the situation and how you plan on reacting. This will take time, but only when you are conscious to the situation you are in. These are some of the skills we can all learn, but the crucial key that opens the door is being able to step back and reflect on what you are thinking, feeling and wanting to do. Journaling your thoughts is a good idea. 

Draw out on a piece of paper columns. Label the columns like this:

What happened	My thought	My Feeling	What did I do?	What could I do better?
A person cut me off in traffic	JERK	Anger	Flipped him off	Slow down and let them pass

This will help you to reflect and observe your reactions and can help regulate the thoughts for future problems to help gain control over your behaviors, thoughts and feelings. By becoming a thermostat you learn to be emotional aware of the situation, especially when you feel confused and are set in old habits. If you are emotional aware, then you can regulate, instead reacting to what is happening and are able to make good choices. 

Fear defeats more people than any other one thing in the world.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Daniel Goleman in his book, Emotional Intelligence, describes self-regulation as a master aptitude and there are five core elements of self-regulation: 

1.  Self-control which regulates impulses and emotions. 
2. Trustworthiness that maintains principles of integrity. 
3. Conscientiousness by taking responsibility for your choices/actions. 
4. Adaptability to being open to change by being flexible to the situation. 
5. Innovation by looking at the situation by gaining new information and looking at it from a different perspective.

There are some who are “high” self-regulators (thermostats) who can keep cool under pressure and be able to redirect their emotions, which could cloud their thinking. There are some who are “low” self-regulators (thermometers), which find it problematic to manage impulses and have poor boundaries. This can also create an unstable environment by reacting before thinking. 

Therefore, ask yourself are you a thermostat (regulating yourself and the environment by the way you think) or are you more of a thermometer (measuring and reacting to the situation by shutting down (cold) or blowing up (anger))? 

We have to put ourselves on the anvil and Forge Attitudes In Trusting Him (f.a.i.t.h).

By Faith, 

What Are You Responsbile For .....?

“In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.” ~Eleanor Roosevelt

Responsibility is not a superpower to vanish the wrong or a way to elevate oneself above how they feel about themselves. Responsibility according to Webster means: “Something that you should do because it is morally right or legally required.” I don’t want to go into semantics of the word responsibility. An analogy of a police officer that has a responsibility has to legally uphold the law and capture those who have broken it. Take the word responsibility and break the word into two words. Response and ability, then it will provide a new meaning and understanding. There is an ability in how we respond to others, which enables us to be responsible in regards to self-regulation.

There is some reading this blog entry and may be already concocting thoughts that I am wrong without fully reading what I am writing. Please, stop and process and really give this some thought.   There is some laziness, which has permeated throughout Christianity by believing in what men have written or have preached from their “sermon on the hill”, without processing (reading for oneself) it to the written Truth (the bible).  Yes, we all see and read and in act upon it the way we view it, but debating isn’t the way to do it and that will be reserved for future debate and do not want to distract from the true meaning of this article.

Sometimes, I am frustrated with those who express they are Christians. It is as if they take responsibility as a crown to judge or point out the injustices or idiosyncrasy in others and often to make themselves look better than where they really are. The bible isn’t to be a smoking gun, where you bang out scriptures to nail people as a crucified savior. When I confront some of them, they express, “I am only human and I make mistakes.” Some express, “read the bible it gives me the right to point out your living wrong and I am to confront you.” The flip side of the coin, because it is often out of retaliation or reaction of hurt, some express, “Christians are hypocrites and why should I become one?”

The responsibility is not pointing out the wrong in others, or to judge them by the way they are or are not living. It isn’t to compare others to ourselves or ourselves to others based upon the outward appearance, material wealth, or popularity. The responsibility is not in making things right. The responsibility is not in the apology, when things are wrong. The responsibility lies deep within the heart to nourish others, accept them for who they are and where they are at the moment in life. When responsibility is taken away, then it becomes inward of self-regulation.

If we can take a moment and sift out the way we were raised, taught, things we have read, our experiences, what do we have left to make an informed decision? It appears everything influences everything. It is like a drop of water from a faucet and then placing it into the ocean. It can be overwhelming to try to separate the drop from the ocean. Yet, somehow the drop seems to manage its way back to the faucet and the cycle repeats itself.

Very deep thinking has to take place to captivate those thoughts and make them obedient to Christ (2 Cor 10:5). What then is our ability to respond that is the responsibility to others? We are the drop from the faucet being placed into an ocean of people. It is realizing we are no different than others. What makes us different is what we allow to make us different. Water into Ice, Water into steam, salt water to drinking water or water pressurized to cut diamonds. People can become harden like ice that they are felt used. People can become angry like steam and burn those who come around. There are some willing to change to serve others like salt water made into drinking water.

What then is a human’s responsibility to others, regardless if one is or isn’t a Christian? It isn’t to point out the flaws in others. We all have a past. Reading a pathological therapist report can skew how I view that individual in how I treat them. To help an individual would evaluate first by getting to know the individual and processing their behaviors, choices and actions. Then, process how that individual is or isn’t being influenced by the environment and social realms. The ability to reason provides a response, in which then becomes my responsibility to help the individual without telling them they are wrong. Loving the individual and assisting them by walking them through a journey provides a nurturing environment to choose if they want to continue to be ice and steam or become something productive to nourishing others around them.  

When I read daily in His word, I do not see a Savior in the bible that points out sinner’s faults, but instead sees them as human beings that need to feel accepted, loved and cherished. The approach He uses is taking the eyes off themselves by His kind words and actions, and then redirects their eyes on Him. In this approach people are healed. It relinquishes the urge to feel it is my responsibility to be quick judge or to point out faults in others. Instead, I am called to evaluate myself to His actions and then to encourage and uplift others.

This is not a cookie cutter approach. It takes prayer and understanding to become responsible in the journey of your own life, as well as how you influence others around you.  I read in the bible of a woman that was caught in adultery. I read of a Savior, who bent to her eye level, wrote in the sand, and then stood up to face the accusers. Her accusers (who felt they were responsible to quickly judge and blame) left one by one, until no one was left standing.  I see a Savior that took a loving approach to help heal an individual lost in herself and made her whole again, without casting a stone of judgment (even when by law He was too).

One can be like the accusers and feel responsible to constantly throw stones or one can have an ability to respond like the Savior. It is easy to become part of a lynch mob, absorb biases of others gossips about someone else and quickly point out the faults in others. It is a lot more work to investigate the situation and form our own conclusion about the situation. True, some say we can never be like the Savior that judges hearts, but we can be the Savior that uplifts the spirits from their hurt. What will be your responsibility to mankind: A stone thrower or a bridge builder of stones to restoring bridges to healthy living?

Whether you prevail or fail, endure or die, depends more on what you do to yourself than on what the world does to you.” (Jim Collins)

By Faith (Forging Attitude in Trusting Him)