The Best You

Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature. 1 Corinthians 14:20

How often are we guilty of trying a door knob and when it doesn't turn we break out the sledge hammer and go to work on it? Don't try to make it happen. If only we could get this door open we would finally have answers we have been looking for. If only we could use enough force, surely the opportunities hidden behind this door would be worth the effort and we would find ourselves in fields of clover. How often have we been guilty of thinking that if anything good happens it's because of our abilities and strengths? How many times do we over value our wit, skill, and acumen? When will we learn that when we finally get exactly what we schemed, charmed, and bullied our way into, too often there is nothing there but a steady diet of aggravation, disappointment, and heartburn? As we mature and begin to let locked doors be just that, locked doors, we will begin to find that our dreams don't die, they simply keep looking for open windows that will take our hearts into places of peace and prosperity.

We are born with incredible gifts. We are given a complicated schematic of unique traits and talents. Don't try and force yourself. The moment we try to re-wire who we are, we become someone we don't even recognize. There have been many who let circumstances, loved ones, and friends convince them that "if only" they would act like someone else, "if only" they would talk like someone else, "if only" they could do what someone else does, "if only" their dreams were someone else's dreams, they would finally find accomplishment and satisfaction. The problem is that when we put on someone else's clothes, our wiring gets crossed and we become the proverbial round peg in a square hole. When we stay true to ourselves and become comfortable in our own skin, it's amazing how much our stress takes flight on the wings of the morning and how much our joy grows in the garden of our own making. As we mature and begin to realize the value of living OUR dreams, talking with OUR words, working with OUR hands, loving with OUR hearts, and being happy with OUR life, we will find doors of opportunity will open and the on the other side will be contentment and satisfaction.

The most difficult activity we engage in is waiting. Don't be impatient; none of us like waiting rooms. None of us enjoy the long serpentine lines at the DMV, none of us like listening for the oven timer to go off. Patience is hard! Patience is work! Patience is learned. Being patient doesn't happen over night. There is, more often than not, a process that has to happen before we become someone who knows the peace of patience. We have to be disciplined. When anxiety begins to cause the water in our pot to boil, we have to be willing to take the pot off the fire. We have to refuse the temptation of putting our negative glasses on and seeing our circumstances with distorted vision. We have to look at the benefits of what is going to happen, rather than concentrating on what is not happening now. As we mature and begin accepting the role of patience, we will find rest that sleep cannot give, and peace that can never be understood.