HAVE YOU EVER HEARD AN AMISH ADULT YELL?

An author for Reader's Digest writes how he studied the Amish people in preparation for an article on them.

In his observation at the school yard, he noted that the children never screamed or yelled. This amazed him.

He spoke to the schoolmaster. He remarked how he had not once heard an Amish child yell, and asked why the schoolmaster thought that was so. The schoolmaster replied, "Well, have you ever heard an Amish adult yell?"

The next time you loose your temper (I don’t see why they call it loose you temper…it’s your patience you’re losing)  think the word LOGIC.  Shout it to yourself.  Write it across the roof of your mind.  And then apply it. 

Because as long as it remains no more than apphilosophical eercise inside your head it will continue to be mostlyworthless...ful of sound and fury and signifying noithng.

Logic says...
 you don’t want people to dislike you and not want to have you around.  Logic says that the more you gain a reputation as an angry person the less gain you will have of friends. 

And yes...ask yourself whose fault it was the last time you had an all out blowout with someone or a full blown pout? 

I’ll bet it wasn’t all their fault. 

What do you think? 

We can be our own worst enemies can’t we.

Do you want to fill your days with weariness?  Anger does that.  It wears one out.  Think about that.

Memory.  I remember the people in my lives who have provided miserable examples of how to live.  Whose anger made them say and do things that filled my memory bank with such inopportune moments. 

 And I pray for forgiveness when I have been guilty of the same. 

So remember you are a Farmer Brown planting memories of how yu have acted and if there has been no self control ...and if it angry members inside the heads of family adn friends...yur harvest will be a crop no one will wamt to harvest.

Practice makes perfect.  Well, when it comes to patience…no one manages that.  But persistent consistent practice certainly helps…staying patient a minute longer and praying to get over any anger a minute sooner…

And oh yes back to that
Amish adult...are you even close...and how is the yelling factor in your family recently.

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FEAR AND LOVE DON’T MIX (or how to be more patient)

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"He that can have Patience, can have what he will” – Benjamin Franklin

The child is afraid to go home from school.  He does not like discipline.  No child does.  But the unreasonable anger that propels his parent(s) kills the effectiveness of what they are trying to teach and plants the seeds for future memory trees he will never want to sit beneath.

They loved each other but now they fear each other.  Fear the words that are so filled with hate.  And neither will say “I am sorry”  And oh how those words can heal a wound and open up the beginnings of love again.

Some control their anger easier than others.  It is a fact.  Anyone who says they have never let ill conceived thoughts come tumbling out with no restraint are hardly making a truth.

But when a parent or a child or a mate sees the other person constantly trying to improve and saying “I am sorry” a hundred times and maybe more…it does make it easier to live with.

The WORDS “I am sorry” have little replacement value as against action.  There is no doubt about that.  But one has to begin somewhere…and not accepting blame is no place to begin.

Go for counseling.  Read a self-help book. (DON’T STOP WITH ONLY ONE)  Read the best self-help book of them all; THE BIBLE.

 When someone is giving you a hard time.   Go for the big picture.  Look beyond the moment.  Try to imagine what it was that shaped this angry person in front of you.  Were they one of those children who was raised with fear?  Are they filled with insecurity?  As you walk away from them, for staying near someone who has a mouthful of invectitude isn’t very helpful.

Thank them (silently in your mind) for being such a great teacher.  Study them, study them well, study not to be like them.  It can be a great learning experience.

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FEAR AND LOVE DON’T MIX (or how to be more patient)

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He that can have Patience, can have what he will” – Benjamin Franklin

The child is afraid to go home from school. 

He does not like discipline.  No child does.  But the unreasonable anger that propels his parent(s) kills the effectiveness of what they are trying to teach and plants the seeds for future memory trees he will never want to sit beneath.

They loved each other but now they fear each other.  Fear the words that are so filled with hate. 

And neither will say “I am sorry”  And oh how those words can heal a wound and open up the beginnings of love again.

Some control their anger easier than others. 

It is a fact.

  Anyone who says they have never let ill conceived thoughts come tumbling out with no restraint are hardly making a truth.

But when a parent or a child or a mate sees the other person constantly trying to improve and saying “I am sorry” a hundred times and maybe more…it does make it easier to live with.

The WORDS “I am sorry” have little replacement value as against action.  There is no doubt about that.  But one has to begin somewhere…and not accepting blame is no place to begin.

Go for counseling.  Read a self-help book. (DON’T STOP WITH ONLY ONE)  Read the best self-help book of them all; THE BIBLE.

 When someone is giving you a hard time.   Go for the big picture.  Look beyond the moment.  Try to imagine what it was that shaped this angry person in front of you.  Were they one of those children who was raised with fear?  Are they filled with insecurity?  As you walk away from them, for staying near someone who has a mouthful of invectitude isn’t very helpful.

Thank them (silently in your mind) for being such a great teacher.  Study them, study them well, study not to be like them.  It can be a great learning experience.

The next time you loose your temper (I don’t see why they call it loose you temper…it’s your patience you’re losing) think the word LOGIC.  Shout it to yourself.  Write it across the roof of your mind.  And then apply it. 

Logic says you don’t want people to dislike you and not want to have you around.  Logic says that the more you gain a reputation as an angry person the less gain you will have of friends. 

Ask yourself whose fault it was the last time you had all out blowout with someone or a full blown pout?  Whose fault was it?  I’ll bet it wasn’t all their fault.  What do you think?  We can be our own worst enemies can’t we.

Do you want to fill your days with weariness?  Anger does that.  It wears one out.  Think about that.

Memory.  I remember the people in my lives who provided miserable examples of how to live.  Whose anger made them say and do things that filled my memory bank with such inopportune moments.  And I pray for forgiveness when I have been guilty of the same.  So farmer Brown (for that is what we will momentarily call both of us) watch what you are planting…you are planting memories that will grow into ugly trees of selfish misuse of time.

Practice makes perfect.  Well, when it comes to patience…no one manages that.  But it practice certainly helps…staying patient a minute longer and praying to get over it a minute sooner…

And oh…yes…we all have to begin somewhere.

An author for Reader's Digest writes how he studied the Amish people in preparation for an article on them.
In his observation at the school yard, he noted that the children never screamed or yelled. This amazed him.
He spoke to the schoolmaster.

He remarked how he had not once heard an Amish child yell, and asked why the schoolmaster thought that was so.

The schoolmaster replied, "Well, have you ever heard an Amish adult yell?"
Doctors from Coral Gables, Fla., compared the efficiency of the heart's pumping action in 18 men with coronary artery disease to nine healthy controls.

Each of the study participants underwent one physical stress test (riding an exercise bicycle) and three mental stress tests (doing math problems in their heads, recalling a recent incident that had made them very angry, and giving a short speech to defend themselves against a hypothetical charge of shoplifting). Using sophisticated X-ray techniques, the doctors took pictures of the subjects' hearts in action during these tests.

For all the subjects, anger reduced the amount of blood that the heart pumped to body tissues more than the other tests, but this was especially true for those who had heart disease.

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WHAT WERE YOU LISTENING TO WHEN YOU WOKE UP THIS MORNING

What were the first thoughts you had when you woke up this morning?

At the moment when the sculpture of your mind is beginning to shape your attitude for the rest of the day.

Like a rabid dog negative thoughts will be yapping at your heels with negative consitency right up until the last shout you will hear from yourself before you drop off to sleep.

If you awoke with anger toward another human being for what they did or did not do you will have set yourself up for ongoing anger and it will spill over to other areas too.

Messy mental pictures will distort everything you see.

So have the Bible or another book of positive sayings or both...by your bed and force yourself to read them if you must but read them.

Give them the strength of prayerful persistent effort...otherwise you will be a slave to what is behind the rising curtain of each day. 

And yes...it is impossible to do this and not feel better about yourself and everyone else around you.

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         “In this country we have the freedom of conscience and the freedom not to practice it.”  (thought off of a thought by Mark Twain)

 

In Paul’s letter to the Galatians he spells it out “…serve one another in love.”  He certainly does not advise us to serve each other with selfishness.

           

     Selfishness shows up at heaven’s gate with a written request, “I read where Jesus said, ‘…in my Father’s house are many mansions…’ and I just want to be sure I get the biggest and the best.” 

           

     Almost twenty years ago, 1988 to be exact, there were two kinds of video recording systems fighting for the market. 

      One was a Beta system which Sony invented, and kept only to itself. 

     The other was the VHS system that everyone today uses. 

The difference was that JVC, the Japanese company that invented the VHS format shared its plans with a raft of other firms. 

As a result, the market was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of the VHS recording machines being produced.  Sony didn't share and the first year, Sony lost 40% of the market and ten years later it had lost 90% of the market.  Selfishness, even in the guise of good business sense, does sometimes get its just rewards.

What Sonydid first was good business sense...but then the human psyche is quite something else

I used this recently and I use it again. "We have seen the enemy and it is us"  Look at all the messes in your life and ask yourself how many of them may have been caused by selifshness and how much of that selfishness was your own.

     

            I had my first vegetable garden during World War II, well, actually mother and daddy did.   

I was in charge of weed control.  

At any rate, if I didn’t keep the weeds at bay we wouldn’t have had much of a garden.  Selfishness is a weed, and that is as kindly a definition as it is going to get.  And if you allow it to take over your garden of life you will have a mess. 

            Selfishness can be an open hand that is seldom ready to give, but always ready to take.  Or it is a fist, a weapon of deceit, an obscenity that blots out beauty at every opportunity.  Selfishness takes relationships and squeezes life’s blood out of them.  It is an emotional death sentence ready to kill off any remorse, any attempt at reconciliation or regeneration of spirit. 

            There was a blacksmith who one day was commanded by his king to make a chain, and he did as he was commanded.  Then he was told to double its strength and its length.  He did so, and was then commanded to do the same thing a third time.  When finally he was finished, the King ordered him to wear these chains for the rest of his life.

We make chains - chains of selfishness, not at the order of our heavenly King but because He gave us the freedom to do so if we so choose. 

 But just because we know how to, does not mean we should not also be aware that eventually we are making them for ourselves.

            The worst kind of selfishness can be called sanctified narcissism because it wraps its ideas in piety and turns the Golden Rule into dross.  It is the worst kind of legalism that turns the Mount Everest of ethics into a thousand little mole hills of complaints. 

             “Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.  Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. (Luke 6:27-31) 

 

The selfish individual says, “Can’t do all that, just can’t. I find it works better, at least for me, if I continue to do unto myself as I would have me do unto myself. And do unto them what makes me happy.

Once upon a time, there was a farmer who heard of a highly recommended new seed corn. He bought some and produced a crop that was beyond his wildest dreams.

When his farmer neighbors found out about it, and since he had bought more than he really needed, they asked if they could buy some from him. He not only would not sell it to them, he would not tell them where he had purchased the seed.

The next year he planted his crop and, with his obvious advantage, waited for it to bring him bigger profits again. Except, this year it didn’t work that way.

The second year his crop was not as good. By the third year the yield was even worse.

It then dawned on him what was happening. His prize corn was being cross pollinated with the inferior grade of corn in his neighbors’ fields.

Yes, selfishness does have its own rewards. (rewritten, Wellsprings of Wisdom, by C.R. Gibson)

In 1982, on the ABC Evening News program there was reported a very unusual piece of modern art.

It was a chair to which was attached a shotgun. The viewer was required to sit in the chair while looking directly into the gun barrel.

The gun was fully loaded and a timer was set so that it would go off sometime between the setting up of the exhibit and one year in the future.

No one who sat there could be sure it would not go off at the very minute they took their seat.

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THE SCARS OF SELFISHNESS

Philippians 2:3-4

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit,

but in humility consider others better than yourselves.

Each of you should look not only to your own interests,

but also to the interests of others.

     Selfishness is not on the list of the Seven Deadly Sins, but I certainly believe that if the list were expanded to ten it would easily make it. For selfishness is mental, emotional and spiritual suicide. It builds a castle, and then places itself on the throne instead of God. Selfishness is a jackass who wants his or her own private stable from which to issue decrees. It is like a caterpillar who sells its privilege of becoming a butterfly for an extra mouthful of leaves. And selfishness is truly the doorkeeper to the gates of hell.

     Remember the words in the hymn Amazing Grace… “I once was lost but now I’m found, was blind but now I see…” Well, no the selfish man or woman, if they are honest with themselves, could say that. Not even if they squinted would they be able to see because they have missed the Lord’s message and their myopic view of life has thoroughly done them in.

     At the opposite end of human behavior is a lady whose story I’m pleased to tell. It is a tale of those who attend the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg because of the generosity of this woman who is still simply referred to as Miss Ola. This loving, unselfish African-American took in laundry for 75 years. She never had a golden parachute to ease her financial journey through life. She never made an income anywhere near five figures. For a great deal of her life, an income of four figures was well beyond her reach. But Miss Ola daily read her tattered Bible held together with scotch tape so that her favorite chapter, the 13th chapter of First Corinthians, wouldn’t come falling out. She read it and she believed it and she practiced it - this message of love from the Apostle Paul.

     And oh, how this unselfish woman loved; not in a philosophical way, sit on the front porch talk about it way, but in a down-to-earth give-it-life kind of way. And so it was that in 1995, she was able to express her love for her fellow human beings in an unbelievable expression of concern. She gave $150,000 to the University of Southern Mississippi, an historical black college.

     When asked how she could save so much when she had earned so little, her answer was simple and to the point, “It wasn’t hard. I just didn’t buy things I didn’t need. And I did it so others could gain the education I never had the chance to get.” One year and a half later after giving this unselfish gift, she died at the age of 91.

 

“Do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interest of others.” (Philippians 2:4) Just a reminder of how the morning’s scripture read.

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THE POWER OF NEGATIVE THINKING

     The Power of Negative Thinking does come easily. To see if you still have the stuff it is made of, tomorrow morning, when you wake up, walk outside and stamp a flower. Scream at a sparrow. Kick a tree. On your way to work, triple your honking power. Honk when there really is no reason and make it long and loud. Short of having a wreck, work toward winning Road Hog of the Year Award. It may come easily but that does not mean positive influences might not inflict great harm. And always remember, YOU ARE WRITING A HISTORY BOOK CALLED YOU.

     Don’t stop with anything less than maximum output. At work or at home, if you are asked to do something extra, pout if you are a woman or mutter if you are a man. If someone says, "Thank you," give him or her a blank stare. If you feel a smile coming on resurrect some real or imagined hurt. If an associate or a mate shares with you a good idea, grunt. If it is an exceptional idea, feel threatened. If he or she still won’t go away, kill their enthusiasm by saying, "It won’t work." Above all else avoid any social issues that might cause you to take a stand.

     When lunchtime rolls around be sure and have a meal that heightens your cholesterol and enthuses your ulcer. Have your fourth or fifth cup of coffee for the day and in the middle of the afternoon your third or fourth candy bar so you blood sugar can continue to ride a roller coaster. Start on your third pack of cigarettes, preferably near a non-smoker.

     If it has been a workday, at its close shove toward the elevator and race toward the parking lot. Remember that you will have been on emotional overload since early morn and you don’t want to lose your edge. Everyone wants to get out of the parking lot first. Don’t let them. Drive like you are in a demotion derby. Nudge but don’t dent until you have made several other drivers as miserable as you are. You may even want to write down license numbers as trophies.

     When you come back through your front door, kick the dog, yell at the children if they happen to be around, complain about congress, cuss about gas prices and gulp down your dinner. If you have to go out for the evening lament you never have time for yourself. If you don’t have to go out; turn on TV, switch from station to station, finally fall asleep, snore and prepare to do battle all over again.

     It does require consistent effort to be a card carrying Negative Thinker. Keeping alive the best of one’s worst is never easy. Because, yes, there are Biblical guidelines and spiritual nudges that might get in the way if we give them half a chance. Therefore, a word to who ever will listen, "Control yourself because if you don’t you might actually become a person you enjoy keeping company with."

(THREE RECENT THOUGHT PIECES ON WYRICK’S WRITING’S “Wisdom is”  “Who Wins if You Do Nothing but Battle Life?”  “A Journey Through Grief”

 

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THE LAW OF GRAVITY HAS NOT BEEN REPEALED

      When I was six years old and visiting my grand mother in southwestern Virginia I learned a very valuable lesson.  The law of gravity had not been repealed.

     I was a flat-lands boy from the coastal region of Norfolk, Virginia. Dig down six feet and you hit water.  Now I stood at the top of a hill that begged not to be ignored.  Within seconds, with more exuberance than wisdom, I was speeding faster and faster over God’s green earth. I had never run with such little effort.  I had wings on my heels.  I was superman and I had not even had Krypton for breakfast.

     What joy!  What exhilaration!  What freedom!  What a problem!

     By the time it was too late to change my mind I was speeding past huge boulders and missing them by inches.  I leapt over smaller ones.  Fortunately, when my out of control journey ended I found myself soaking wet in a creek that lay at the bottom of the hill.  Had I veered a little to my left the consequences would have been far more severe.  There the ground dropped off and created a veritable cliff.

     Now many years later I reflect that life is like that.  There are choices that get us into trouble and out of trouble.  Once we have started down wrong roads it is often hard to put on the brakes.  1 Cor. 10:23 put it well, “Everything is permissible - but NOT everything is beneficial…(and) not everything is constructive.”

     Daniel Boone used to say, “I never got lost but I was once powerfully confused for three whole days.”

     When I returned to Miami not that long ago, I had driven over 1000 miles and flown over 4000 but I was never lost and I was never confused.  The reason is quite simple.  I had maps and I used them.  The pilots had electronic maps and they did the same.  As I drove had I ad-libbed my way through my journey I might have ended up in Memphis, TN instead of Raleigh, NC.  Since the pilots were flying planes infinitely faster than my car any errors they might have latched on to would have created even greater disaster.

     “Life is hell,” said the man who sat beside me on the plane.  Then he told me about his life’s travels.  As he shared so many wrong choices I thought to myself.  For you, how could it be otherwise?  If, in our lives we travel the wrong highways, make too many wrong turns and take no directions from a Savior who says, “Follow Me,” then life can be hell and getting lost can be very easy.

     Many years ago while traveling in Maine, my wife and I made the wrong decision by interpreting a line on the map as being what it was never intended to be.  Since we had never gone that way before, it looked like an interesting road to travel.  We thought our decision a good one.  It wasn’t.  As the miles unwound, the road grew worse and worse. The ruts deeper and some places, where snow had recently melted began to look impassable. Several times I accelerated and skidded across sections I would never have negotiated at a moderate speed.  It went from scary to can we ever get where we’re going from where we are?

     Life’s like that.  We’ve all made bad decisions, and if we’ve been lucky, we’ve escaped more scared than scarred.  It is why, of course, every time we say, Yes, we had better look very hard at what we’re saying Yes to.

(THREE RECENT THOUGHT PIECES ON WYRICK’S WRITING’S “Wisdom is”  “Who Wins if You Do Nothing but Battle Life?”  “A Journey Through Grief”

 

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THE HIGH ROAD TO BETTER BEING

            

     A number of years ago a young boy was found in the jungle.  He had lived with animals.  He had not been taught how to act in the presence of human beings.  So, undisciplined and untaught he continued to live as he had always lived.  Take a tiny baby and as that baby grows teach it no discipline.  Teach it no manners.  Teach it no morals.  Let the little darling do as he or she pleases and that little darling will not grow up to be a little darling.  The Book of Proverbs puts it well, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.”      

    

     Teach the habit of affection by demonstrating it.  A quick hug.  A note on a pillow that reads, “Thanks for being our son.  Thanks for being our daughter.  A spoken word, “I was so proud of you…I’m proud of the fine young man (or lady)  you’re becoming…I’m proud of you for many reasons and I just had to tell you.”  Little verbal prods for excellence embedded in words of praise. 

     Nor does it hurt to spread the art of admitting mistakes.  “I was wrong.”  Can you say it?  If not, your child probably can’t either.  And a household filled with people who must always be right is a hearthstone filled with chaos. 

           

     Have you taught your child the sweet scent of otherness?  How inclined is the average child to give rather than take?  To share a toy?  Watch another television program to make someone else happy?  Give up something to make another playmate glad?  I still remember one woman who had come to me for counseling.  Forty years later she still remembered being berated by her mother for sharing some cookies with a playmate.  “I made those cookies for you and don’t you forget it!” her mother had screamed.  And she didn’t forget it.  And she grew up to be a very selfish, self-centered me first human being.

           

     The height of arrogance is the lowliness of prejudice.  Even if you are stuck with prejudices because they have been with you too long, don’t use your child as a conduit to a new generation.  If only adults could shut up about their prejudices for a generation maybe prejudices could die. 

           

     Don’t believe your child will automatically be a compassionate and considerate person. Teach them the great shame in being crude and rude. Listen to any group of children playing and eventually one or more will show they’re past masters in the art of insult.  Don’t let your children fall into the trap.  Teach them that if they can’t say something nice to say nothing at all.  Tell them that as Christian’s they are held to a higher level of behavior.  George Washington Carver said it, “How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and the strong because someday you will have been all of these.” 

           

     Some families can’t sit down to a meal without a blessing.  Others can’t do the same without an argument.  It is a great opportunity for family enjoyment and thereby family improvement. There do need to be ground rules such as; no television, the discussing of only pleasant things that have happened during the day and no fried neighbors or business acquaintances.

           

     I remember years ago when one of my girls was into Capezzio shoes. Only Capezzios. For a man not much interested in clothes, I just couldn’t and still can’t, relate. Well, designed items are still in.  Bigger and better and more costly.  Even boys are into this now with Air Jordans, Niki’s, etc.  Therefore, how do I feel about parents subsidizing such snobbery?  I’m agin it!  Tell your children you’ll spring for the price of regular shoes, jeans, etc. and if they want the high priced must-have-it items, they’ll have to make up the difference themselves.  If they want to mow some lawns, give up other things their allowance is buying, be creative or entrepreneurial, fine.  Just let them put their money where their mouth is, or feet, or body.

           

     What all of this is about is not letting your child grow up painting his or her life’s picture with a brush dipped in tattletale gray.  To have them follow the old admonition of Ben Franklin “Would you live with ease?  Then do what you ought, and not what you please.”

(THREE RECENT THOUGHT PIECES ON WYRICK’S WRITING’S “Wisdom is”  “Who Wins if You Do Nothing but Battle Life?”  “A Journey Through Grief”

 

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Quotes from tomorrow’s One A Day blog entitled HOPE

Hope has been called foolish, Pollyanna, unrealistic by some. Actually, it is getting on with life rather than choosing paralysis. It is believing in better tomorrows rather than imagining a terrorist hiding around every corner. It's getting back on planes, and eating out in restaurants instead of supping on paranoia. It is you and I looking for a place to let the best in us come alive.

This story appeared in the Dec. 8, 2001 edition of The Miami Herald. An 11-year old boy was told five months before that he had two to five days to live. His skin was ghostly white. Tubes were everywhere - his body, skin and bone.

He suffered from a rare form of muscular dystrophy. He was asked "Would you like a new toy? A favorite food?" "No," he replied, "but I would like for someone to publish my poems so others can find in them the strength and resolve I've found."

Fast forward to many days beyond