The perfect lady

When people ask me to be myself, I wonder if they really know who I am and what I am capable of.  I am manipulative, selfish and would generally not help anyone if unsure they would be of any use to me. Impatience defines me, and really I have no qualms detaching myself from people when I find them irrelevant to me.

So imagine how grateful I am that the Holy Spirit resides in me and helps me be more like Christ. Seriously. I really can’t be Christ-like without Him. The first thing was to take a self-assessment (which obviously I did and that’s how I know to tell you all of the above).

Secondly, I have determined that if I really want to be Christ-like, I need to understand what that even means. It isn’t being a pushover on whom people would spit and I would say thank you.  I find that it is having the confident knowledge that God lives in me and still put on the nature of a servant to serve others (not to my advantage, but that they may profit).

Philippians 2: 5-8 aptly describes Christ-likeness “Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what…” (MSG).

Thirdly, it is a conscious effort. I don’t just talk about being Christ-like. I think about it. I study it. I live it with His help. I fall, dust myself up and tell myself “He has to shine through me.”.

I am not going to speak ‘Christianese’ and say, “ I am not perfect, I make mistakes”. I am perfect, and not by your standards but by His. I make mistakes but I am perfect because He said so. When I accepted Him, He made me perfect and told me in Matthew 5:48 to be perfect like my Father. And we all know that whatever He speaks comes to life.

The point is this: You cannot be like Him without Him and He won’t force you to. He is the perfect gentleman and would only work on transforming you if you totally let go of you and let Him take over.

Book Review- Nearing Home: Life, Faith, and Finishing Well

Billy Graham is a world renowned Preacher/Teacher/Evangelist and receiving this book was cherry on the cake.

It is a book about how to live life in one's old age...but really, we all need to learn how to enjoy our lives as it is, how to make improvements and how things should be put in the right perspective.

He shares the difficulties he has encountered in his old age, especially after losing his wife. He states the importance of having a proper relationship with God and relying on Him completely while wisely planning early for your retirement.

My review on "Where has Oprah taken us?"

When I got this book, I tried not to make an assumption about its content...I'll let you be the judge of how well I did. 

The author, Stephen Mansfield, delves into the history of Oprah's lowly beginnings to her rise over the years as a person of influence both in the media and otherwise. He points out that she seems to be a person of faith but what she professes exactly is a mystery...almost. 

The author concludes by saying "what she believes is illogical, inconsistent, arrogant, destructive and amazingly naive." 

I would not go as far as saying that because this is a

perception of what she believes, however it is true that one 

can only criticise what one sees.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com <http://BookSneeze®.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 

Never ending wheel of complaint

It is easy to take things for granted. When you step back, you would almost be appalled at how we complain endlessly about seemingly unnecessary things. I would use this lovely weather as an example. Twitter updates from a particular set of tweeps were anticipating summer for months. They complained about how cold it was, how lazy the weather made them feel etc. Now its summer, 23 degrees and all. The same set are complaining about the sun, how hot it is, how sweaty they are all the time. 

It struck me: we can go through life complaining about anything and miss the beautiful moments we experience. If it is cold, layer up and enjoy the fact that you are not sweaty or whatever. If it is hot, see it as  an opportunity to wear clothes you ordinarily would not. It is so easy to get trapped in the vicious cycle of complaint and wake up wondering why we are never happy.

Our thoughts determine our actions to a great extent. If you make up your mind to be happy come what may, chances are that you would see an opportunity in the most dire circumstances. Stones exists and whether you turn them into stumbling blocks or stepping stones is all up to you.

"Every person takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world." Arthur Schopenhauer.

I am not the centre of the universe.

"She is one, she is many". This describes the colour sisterhood perfectly. It is a constant reminder that the world does not revolve around me. There are people to cater to and I need to equip myself fully to meet the needs around me just as God meets my needs. It took me a while to fully understand this concept. I erroneously thought that only God could comfort people in trouble. How that worked, I never found out but I strongly believed that no human being should assume they can comfort anyone.

Then I read 2nd Corinthians 1:3-7. I read it repeatedly and in various translations because I really couldn't believe what I was reading. The particular phrase that struck me was "...God of all comfort who comforts us in our tribulations, that we may be able to comfort those who are in any trouble, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God." (NKJV)

Basically, God does not comfort me so that I could keep it all to myself and pay no attention to those who need comforting. I am His vessel and when He comforts me during my hard times and brings along another person who is going through hard (or harder) times so that I am there for the person just as He was there for me. That's huge. We cannot give what we do not have and that is exactly why He gives us peace and comfort so we can share with others.

It really has changed the way I conduct myself. I literally walk into a place and mentally calculate how to contribute to making the place run more efficiently or smoothly. I constantly have to depend on God to sort out my issues and I am overwhelmed and honoured when He shows me how I can contribute to alleviating someone else's pain. Taking the focus off me and on other people is really challenging and I constantly ask God to equip me with the meekness of heart to remind myself daily that really, its not all about me.

The cycle

It is easy to get carried away with life and how difficult it can be. I would be the first to agree with you, life can be tough. One thing I have learned over the years is the fact that I have to constantly stay motivated, immerse myself in the Word of God and read books or listen to podcasts that uplift my spirit. Seriously, life is to short for me to only listen to the negatives.

I remember John Maxwell making reference to the fact that clean people do not take a shower once a year, they bathe daily. Same thing goes for energetic and positive people. They do not moan all day, they constantly renew themselves with positivity and stay away from constant negativity. 

There is this very interesting TED talk I listen to daily, Yes, daily. It puts things in perspective for me. It is called "The happiness advantage" by Shawn Achor. The first time I listened to it, I smiled a lot. Not only because he has a great sense of humour, but also because he made me understand that old Yiddish expression that says "to a fly in horseradish the whole world is horse radish."

The world is as beautiful as you allow yourself to believe it is. Yes, ugly things do happen but if you dwell on the ugliness for far too long, you would never ever see the beauty even when it is staring you in the face.

Have a great day.

Book Review: DOING VIRTUOUS BUSINESS

DOING VIRTUOUS BUSINESS

THE REMARKABLE SUCCESS OF SPIRITUAL ENTERPRISE

BY:

THEODORE ROOSEVELT MALLOCH

The 167 paged book with a foreword written by Michael Novak is divided into seven captivating chapters and two other sub-chapters:

1·         Spiritual Enterprising

2.    Spiritual Capital

3.    Virtue

4.    Faith, Hope and Charity

5.    Hard virtue: Leadership, Courage, Patience, Perseverance, Discipline

6.    Soft Virtue: Justice, Forgiveness, Compassion, Humility, Gratitude

7.    Spiritual Capital in a sceptical Age

Conclusion: Spiritual Enterprise in the Global Economy

Appendix 1: A Gallery of Virtuous Companies

Appendix 2: The Numbers

Notes

Index

About the Author

The author, who himself benefitted from having been reared in an observant home and raised in the cradle of faith used his experience to craft beautifully how one can operate a business empire in a total spiritual realm. His intellectual pedigree, interdisciplinary training and a life of real-world work was a great advantage to having a broad over-view that helped in a perfect delivery of the book.

His meeting with the world’s greatest investor of the time, Sir John Templeton, set the tone for the book. Being one who looks at life from all ramifications, the meeting afforded more opportunities than just to gain some useful perspective on the market or to discover which company to invest in, it was a meeting that charted a full course of how enterprises and the entrepreneurs who started them are guided by a spiritual force rooted in faith. He used the encounter, the challenges it offered, generous support from Templeton and his own endowment to found the Spiritual Enterprise Institute which is now a multidisciplinary business academic center dedicated to exploring and analyzing the modern phenomenon of spiritual entrepreneurship and spiritual capital in the context of globalization. The framework of the Institute is premised on the fact that virtues, while explicitly held and applied are defined broadly so as to accommodate the perspectives of all faith traditions. It encourages integrating the spiritual principles and practices of virtue and faith into the mission, values, planning and operations of business and institutions.

The whole emphasise of the book is to present an overview of the ability of people with religious faith and spiritual commitment to make great success of their business. It explained that success comes because faith changes business for the better, and it presented a good blend of spirituality, enterprise and virtuous living.

The book which is a glossary of spiritual business enterprise is a must read for every Christian entrepreneur. 

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze®.com <http://BookSneeze®.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255