Remember Paul, the apostle. We reap what we sow. He went on to warn Christians in the Roman Empire to avoid the worst form of deception, which is self-deception, to think you can reap results different from the seeds you have sown or are sowing.
There are two common types of self-delusion that can be avoided by playing back the past.
1. Blaming circumstances for your present position
When we blame other entities, parents, society, race, what have you, for our current circumstances, we blind our selves to the fact that, ultimately, we are responsible for our own position in life. Remember the great Law of this Universe as it applies to human behaviour, and take responsibility for your life. Play back your past with an objective mind, and you will be able to identify behavioural patterns, attitudes, lifestyles, and habits that have led you to where you now are.
2. Assuming that tomorrow will be better without making changes.
To convince yourself that tomorrow will be better if you just wait out today, “Ah everything will be fine, whatever will be, will be.” Is to breed disappointment, or worse failure. Tomorrow will be a repeat of today if you do not change your present behaviour.
Newton, in his first law, also stated the following;
“An object continues in its state of rest or in uniform motion in a straight line until a force is applied to it.”
The threefold implication of the law:
- If an object is motionless, it will remain in that state until acted upon by an external force.
- If an object is moving at a constant speed, it will continue to do so until acted upon by an external force
- If an object is moving, it will continue to move in a straight line until acted upon at an anle by an external force.
As applied to human behaviour:
- If you are struck, motionless in life, you will remain so..
- If you are moving along a certain path, you will continue to….
….until acted upon by an external force.
That is, life will continue to produce exactly the same results you see today until a change is made or until you make a change. And the first critical step to position yourself for a better tomorrow is to play back the past.
Consider the following article I stumbled across…
“An Elderly, carpenter was ready to retire. He told his employer-contractor of his plan to leave the house building business and live a more leisurely life with his wife enjoying his extended family. He would miss the pay check, but he needed to retire. They could get by.
The contractor was sorry to see his good worker go and asked if he could build just one house as a personal favour. The carpenter said yes, but in time it was easy to see that his heart was not his work. He resorted to shoddy workmanship and used inferior materials. It was an unfortunate way to end his career.
When the carpenter finished his work and the builder came to inspect the house, the contractor handed the front door-key to the carpenter. “This is your house,” he said, “my gift to you.”
What a shock! What a shame! If he had only known he was building his own house, he would have done it all so differently. Now he had to live in the home he had built none too well.
So it is with us. We build our lives in a distracted way, reacting rather than acting, willing to put up less than the best. At important points we do give the job our best effort. Then with a shock at the situation we have created and find that we are now living in the house we have built. If we had realized, we would have done it differently.”
We are responsible for our present states. When you sit down to play back the past, you will make these three major discoveries about your life:
- Your present position: Where you are (the results your life is currently producing).
- Your problems: Why you are where you are (the actions responsible for the results).
- Your promise: How to get to where you want to be in life (the corrective measures needed to change the course of your life).
QUOTE FOR TODAY
“The world has the habit of making room for the man whose actions shows that he knows where he is going.” – Napoleon Hill
No comments:
Post a Comment