my thoughts

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Maybe I Didn’t Think I Had Enough Stress

Could I have added more stress to my life? I don’t know what I was thinking; I’m just glad I got through it. Stress is something we all live with, but there are times when stress is higher than at other times.

I’ve even heard that a little stress is good for you. Stress keeps you alert, motivated; it keeps the blood pumping.

Without a little stress we would probably all be sloths, sitting – rather, lying – around with no cares, no urgency, no get up and go.

When I was a teen I had no stress in the summers. I would sleep until 11 a.m. and then stay up late at night.

My dad used to call that “living the life of Riley”, and though I never met Riley, and didn’t have any idea what he did, it sure sounded like he had a pretty good life.

At the time, it sounded like my dad wished he had a little of that life.

Now I always have a little stress in my life. I always have something to do, and if I don’t, I put a little stress on myself to find something that I need to be doing.

But this past Saturday I put too much stress on my life.  

It was game 5 in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. My team, the Toronto Maple Leafs, were down 3 games to 1 in the series. 

They were facing elimination and playing in Boston, which has so far in this series proved to be a near impossible place in which to win.

To be honest, I didn’t have much hope for my Leafers going into the game. 

But just the same, I was a little stressed that they would leave the playoffs so quickly after having such a great year. 

I was also preaching the next morning. I’m very used to that so no bad stress there – just a little good stress having my sermon in the back of my mind.

That should have been enough stress for one night. I should have been happy that I was showing no signs of slothfulness on a Saturday night.

But for some crazy reason I decided to add more stress to the evening … I decided to start doing my income tax.

I’m not sure why but maybe I thought that it would provide a distraction from the stress that was being generated in me by the game.

Everyone has to do taxes but you don’t have to do them when you’re stressed out to begin with. But that’s exactly what I did.

It was a rollercoaster of a night. Tension was high because the Leafs weren’t making it easy, especially with all the penalties they took in the second period. 

All the while I was gathering my information, making calculations and demanding that Lily find me certain documents and receipts. 

It was a brutal night, but the Leafs won which reduced my stress level significantly. And though I didn’t finish my taxes, I got to a winning stage with them as well.

Now I need a day of being a sloth so I can recuperate.

Here’s the thing: We put even more stress on ourselves whenever we don’t seek God in times of stress. Even if it’s a little, if we will take it to Him rather than go it alone, God can ease our burden, leaving us with just the right amount of stress to keep us moving forward.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How do you deal with stress in your life? Leave your comments below.

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My New Technology Doesn’t Work With The Old

Trying to use new technology with old technology doesn’t always work very well. Sometimes the two are incompatible.

I found that out recently when I got myself involved in a project just to be nice. By the time I had finished, however, I didn’t feel all that nice! 

I was asked to lend my video camera to someone for a project they wanted to film. Someone else was also asked the same thing.  

When it came time to film, the person doing the project chose to use the other camera. That was fine with me. 

But a few days later, that camera owner informed me that her camera would no longer hook up to her computer and that the person who had done the filming had assumed she would edit the film for him.

I agreed to help and to get the files off the camera and to edit the video for her. 

Bad call on my part! The camera wouldn’t hook up to her computer because the video files were recorded in an old format.

… I remember many years ago wanting to add front shocks to my mountain bike, thinking they would be a great feature to add.

When I went to the bike shop to ask how much the transformation would cost, I was informed that my bike was too old. The old front end construction didn’t allow for the addition of a new fork with shocks.

I ended up purchasing a new bike with front shocks. It cost a lot more money than my original plan, but the old bike construction was just too restrictive to keep using it.

I was facing the same problem with the camera, except for one difference: I thought that somehow there would be a way to get those video files into a useable format.

I worked on it, searched the internet and found some solutions … or what at first looked like solutions but weren’t.

I did discover that I could buy an application that would do the work for me, but it would cost $50 … not worth it for a six minute movie, especially since I would have no use for the program once this project was finished.

I spent over five hours working on this project that I was only asked to lend my camera to! 

I’m not sure you sense my frustration here, but if steam could come out of my ears … well, you’d maybe have a picture of my frustration.

In the end, I used a free program that read the files and converted them to a useable format … except it didn’t save the sound. I had to use that program to interpret the files, then replay the files while recording the sound from my computer screen. 

It was not perfect, but it worked. … I will definitely tell the owner of that camera to throw it out and not use it again.

Here’s the thing: The problem with technology is that it is continuously changing. If something is over five years old, you might find it no longer works or you can not get replacement parts for it.

God never changes. You can always connect with Him and relate to Him using the same means we have used for centuries: continue to pray, worship and serve Him. We may keep adding new formats, but the means remain the same. God longs to connect with us, and we never have to look for a new way. 

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What have you had to replace because the original was outdated? Leave your comments below.

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I’m A Budding Political Activist

I think I’m becoming a political activist and I don’t really know how it all happened.

There have been a couple of issues that have created a sore spot in me that I can’t seem to ignore. … It’s like a blister that develops on your foot; you can only ignore it so long.

Well, there are a couple of things that are associated with the government that are rubbing me the wrong way.

I received an email from people at Sauble Beach where our cottage is located. They were asking me to write the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry for preventing the town from cleaning up the beach of debris from the winter.

The ministry is trying to protect a handful of birds that want to nest on 12 kilometres of beach. … My house is only 1200 square feet and I am able to live in it just fine. Twelve kilometres for a few birds seems a little excessive to me!

So I wrote an email, politely asking the ministry to consider letting the town clean up their beach – after all, it’s the only reason most people go to Sauble Beach.

I received back a long email outlining the course of action that needs to be taken to ensure that these endangered birds are able to nest and breed at Sauble. The email never really acknowledged that they would even take my request under advisement, or thanked me for my opinion.

All I got was a defence for their actions.

So I decided I would push back a little. I send another email.

I pointed out that my wife, while on a vacation in Florida, saw thousands of these birds on the beach in Daytona. I also pointed out that maybe these birds have found a better habitat to survive in. Really, if you only had feathers to keep you warm, wouldn’t you choose Florida over north central Ontario?

There was another thought I had which had to do with survival. The ministry is concerned about the survival of a few birds. But what about the survival of a town and its people?

The reason Sauble Beach is a blip on the map is because it has one of the best beaches in Ontario.

Take the beach away and the local economy would crash, businesses would fail, people would move away. Home owners and cottage owners would have to give up their residences.

So who should have first right of survival? – a few birds or a few thousand people whose livelihood is based on taking care of one natural resource: the beach.

Well if the ministry has its way, they would choose the birds. The birds would run the beach; debris and grass would begin to take over.

People would stay away … and then there wouldn’t be a reason to pay someone in Natural Resources to stick their nose into an area that has had a long history of creating vacation fun for thousands of people.

Well, maybe the seven Piping Plovers of Sauble Beach would band together and chip in financially to float the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry payroll.

Here’s the thing: There are times we will only believe what we have been told or learned or were brought up on. Scripture has a way of challenging our thinking. Don’t be so set in your ways or responses that you fail to understand the message a particular passage of scripture has for you.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What is something you have a hard time seeing the other side of? Leave your comments below.

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There Is A Difference One Day To The Next

Things can be different one day to the next, even when the conditions are the same.

Have you ever noticed that you can have a great day and, with no rhyme or reason, the next day is crummy?

I find that young adults can be like this. My wife, Lily, and I regularly talk to our kids on the phone. One day they can be sailing and the next they are in the pits.

Maybe there is some latent hormonal chemical reaction that strikes from time to time (they’re both in their late 20’s), but I am always dumb-founded to know what changed from the day before.

Often nothing changes, but we look for something to blame. It somehow feels better when we can find a reason for the turn of events.

… Like when the weather fails to turn out the way we had hoped it would, we blame the weatherman, as if he had something to do with changing the weather. As if he or she had some control over how the weather was going to turn out!

It doesn’t matter that meteorologists only predict the weather, we like to stick it to them and focus our frustration on their seeming incompetence.

The other day I played hockey with a group of guys and everything clicked – passing, shooting, skating. I scored one goal that I’m still playing over in my mind … it was a beauty!

I’m sure the guys on the other team weren’t saying the same thing. They seemed frustrated; not much was going right for them. I almost felt a little sorry for them.

But hold on to that thought …

Today came around and this time, playing with another group of guys, nothing was working.

Passes never seemed to get to me, and my passes sometimes got intercepted by my own teammates. Shooting, well, I hit three goal posts … that’s enough said there.

I felt as good today as I did the other day when I played. All the conditions were the same.

I was playing with a different group of guys, so I could say that it was the players that made the difference. I could blame them to make me feel a little better about myself.

The problem with that is I was playing with better hockey players today than I was the other day when everything went right!

There just doesn’t seem to be any explanation for the change, or any way to hang some blame on anyone.

One day everything went right and the next day nothing seemed to go right.

When someone is in a grumpy mood, we tell them that they woke up on the wrong side of the bed, or that they didn’t get enough sleep. We can blame their mood on something they did or didn’t do because those are conditions we can measure.

When there is nothing to measure, we are left with a mystery that will never be solved; it just must be accepted.

Here’s the thing: We often blame God when, out of the blue, things go wrong. We blame Him for allowing the bad to come into our lives. We want to blame someone or something and we feel God is as good a person to blame as any. However, before you turn your ire on God for something He may or may not have been at the centre of, why not accept it and keep moving forward? If you don’t, you will just spin your wheels, fixated on blaming.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: Who or what have you been tempted to place blame on lately? Leave your comments below.

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I Wish I Could Expand Time

Time never expands but the things we do often expand to take up more time than we think.

We can’t add to time, but we can plan less so that we end up with time to spare.

But really, who does that? Not many people. Most people run late because they try to do more than they can get done in the time given them.

We think we can do things in “X” amount of time but most often we miscalculate, or something interrupts to eat away at the time we have.

It’s sort of like cracks on the road. Water gets in them and then freezes. The frozen water expands, overfills the crack and eventually breaks up the pavement, creating potholes.

That’s what happens to our time. It’s like a crack that gets filled up but then whatever fills it expands past the time we have.

The other day I was working on a project that I gave the whole day to. I finished the main part of the project well under the time I had allotted.

But after the main part was finished, there were other parts of the project that also needed to be done, like PowerPoint presentations, online notes, and presentation notes.

I had a lot of time to get them done by the end of the day though. So I was feeling pretty good about myself. I felt like the pressure was off and I might even surprise my wife, Lily, by getting home early.

But later in the afternoon things started to expand. I also didn’t account for my drop in energy so I wasn’t accomplishing tasks at the same rate I had been in the morning.

But worse than that, one task expanded to fill up the time I had left. I never saw it coming. I never accounted for it.

I was in the the last stages of my afternoon. I don’t usually listen to music while I work because it’s a distraction to me; I think better when it’s quiet.

But the work I was doing didn’t require much thinking, mostly performing rote tasks that I have been doing each week for years.

So I turned some music on. Sure it would slow me down, but I still had lots of time, more time than I needed … until I couldn’t find a picture I wanted for my presentation.

I looked and looked and it literally took a half hour to find the picture I needed. And then I only found it by fluke in my email trash bin.

That one little thing had expanded past my allotted time. When I left for home, I still had one task undone; I hadn’t even started it.

Time doesn’t change, and though we plan and organize our day to live within the confines of the time we have, things seem to expand to the point that they overwhelm our time.

Here’s the thing: What I have also found true is that when you take time to worship God, your worship expands to overfill the time you set aside for it. This happens because you are relating and dialoging with the Lord, and good relationships take time – often more than we realize. So whatever time you set aside for God, know that if you are truly developing your relationship, you will eventually have to increase the time you allot for God.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What expands to fill up your time more than anything else? Leave your comments below.

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I Wish My E-Wallet Was Growing Faster

My e-wallet is starting to get a little thicker, and I’m not concerned about it one bit. In fact, I wish my e-wallet was expanding at a faster pace than it is.

I wouldn’t be able to say the same thing about my physical wallet – that’s a completely different matter.

My physical wallet is at its max; I can’t put anything more in it. I use a hard case for my credit and information cards and it can only hold so much before they are so jammed together that you can’t get any of them out.

Since the time I started carrying a wallet I have tried to keep it as thin as possible. But the older you get, the more cards you have to carry with you.

I remember a time when I carried a billfold with six slots for cards in it. It was pretty thin, but before long I needed to double up the cards, with more than one per slot.

I started feeling my wallet when I sat down. I kind of had to move to sit on one cheek more than the other.

I’ve seen people with wallets that are two or three inches thick, and I wonder how they are able to sit down at all.

In fact, many people pull their wallets out of their pockets when they sit down.

That is not something I would ever do. I would constantly lose my wallet and be replacing it and all the cards inside it on a monthly basis.

For me a wallet has to be thin and be able to stay in my pocket. And that’s what I like about my e-wallet.

I can add cards to it and it never gets any thicker. I just added a card to it the other day.  And when I use it I won’t even have to pull my wallet out of my pocket. I just use my phone or my watch.

E-wallets are the way to go. We should be able to put our health care card and drivers’ license in our e-wallets as well.

I would like it if all I needed to carry with me was a billfold. And even there, I’m using cash a lot less.

There are some stubborn institutions though. I have two credit cards by the same company, from different banks. One bank gives me the e-wallet option while the other one doesn’t.

I’m not sure what their reasoning is other than they don’t want to make life too easy for me. I guess we will always have those who are not going to go with the trend until the trend is a well-worn path used by almost everyone.

All I know is the quicker the wallet in my back pocket shrinks, the more comfortable I’ll be sitting down.

Here’s the thing: Often I will find myself communicating with God in the same familiar ways, praying the same types of prayers, asking for the same types of things. My ways are very accustomed to me. But seeking new ways to speak with God, and to listen to Him communicate back, opens up whole new avenues of relating to God. Always be growing in how you interact with God and you will find God to be more refreshing and easy to access.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What new ways of doing old things do you need to look into? Leave your comments below.

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Not Sure I Can Live Through These Deadlines

Deadlines are part of my world, but there are some deadlines that suck the life out of me more than others.

Most weeks of the year I live with at least one deadline: I have a sermon to prepare for Sunday and it doesn’t matter what has happened during the week, that deadline has to be met.

I might be sick that week, have meetings I’ve been called away to, or have had to conduct a funeral, wedding, etc. No matter what, that deadline of being ready to get into the pulpit on Sunday remains.

I know that deadline, have become accustomed to living with it, and can successfully navigate through my week to deliver on time.

But there are other deadlines that I don’t deal with regularly and they take a heavier toll on my state of mind.

When you compound a deadline with one or two other deadlines, all due around the same time … well, that’s how I’m feeling right now.

Right now the pressure is on. I have only a few days to go before these deadlines stop me in my tracks.

It’s like those auto commercials where they test how a car does in a crash. They stick a crash test dummy in the vehicle and then they remotely drive the car into a wall or a cement barrier of some kind.

It’s fascinating to see what happens when the vehicle stops on impact. The front of the car coils up like an accordion and then the car bounces back a little.

The car is a right-off, but what the company really wants to know is how the dummy will fair inside the automobile when it reaches the deadline.

Based on the dummy’s reactions they can tell how safe they have made the car. But no matter what kind of safety measures they have built into the vehicle, there are two things that happen to the dummy.

First, when the car hits the deadline, the dummy moves forward; the inertia is uncontrollable and the dummy’s body has to move in a forward direction.

But then at the pinnacle of the impact there is a force placed on the dummy that is every bit as uncontrollable, forcing its body to snap back in the opposite direction.

This action causes a whiplash affect on the dummy.

I am that dummy right now, right at the stage of whiplash with these multiple deadlines looming over me.

In a few days it’ll all be over; time will have run out on me. I will be a wreck, emotionally and mentally drained.

So in the short time I have, what do I do? I ask myself the question, “Do I work at one deadline until it is finished and then tackle the next one, or do I begin each one and gradually work towards completely them all at the same time?”

This is where I differ from a crash test dummy. It is just along for the ride, no thought, no input. Me, I have to think through the questions and decide a course of action.

Here’s the thing: We are all coming to a deadline. The problem with our deadline is that most of us don’t know when it will be. But when the deadline hits, that will be the end; we will be stopped in our tracks. To be ready for that deadline, be sure you have become friends with God, through faith in Jesus Christ. There is no better way to prepare for that deadline than to live now by faith in Christ so that you’re ready for that deadline of death.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: How do you handle deadlines: well in advance or right down to the last minute? Leave your comments below.

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I’m Finding I’m Having A Challenge With Change

I will be doing something this week I don’t like to do: change.

There are some things I like to change, and others I have no problem changing, but there are some things I will avoid changing at all costs.

Change is a curious thing. I have an Apple Watch with several very different bands. I like that; I like to be able to change my watch strap.

In fact, before I got my Apple Watch, I had a collection of watches in all shapes and sizes because I like to change them up.

I’m not sure I would have been all that excited about moving to a new watch if I couldn’t do something to change the look at least a little bit.

But when it comes to other things, like changing my email address, well, that’s a whole other matter.

I’ve had the same email address for 22 years, and been with the same internet company all that time.

But things are going to change here this week. We got a new internet service and TV package.

I really struggled to make the change because I didn’t want the hassle of informing everyone that they have to stop using my old email address and change to a new one.

The crazy thing is I don’t mind doing it for other people. I get those email messages that inform me that so-and-so’s email has now changed so please update my contact list.

I do it; I don’t have a problem with it, and it works fine.

But just thinking about changing mine, well, it creates a stress that is not rational but real.

It doesn’t make any sense, but I really don’t like the thought of changing it. I’m sure no one will be devastated that they can’t contact me if they forget to make the change in their address book … and possibly I could lose some contacts that are more like spam anyway.

That wouldn’t be so bad.

I just don’t like the thought of all that I have to do to make this change … even though I actually don’t have to do all that much.

But the thought of doing it seems a bit too much. It’s disruptive; it’s changing something that has been the same for a very long time.

It’s like changing out old hockey equipment. I hang on to the same equipment until I am forced to make the change.

Years ago I had a pair of long johns I would wear under my equipment. I had the same pair for so long that they had holes all over them.

I actually sewed them together, so that I could keep wearing them – that’s how crazy my aversion to change is!

With my email address change, the price tag was what eventually forced my hand.

We could save close to $50 per month by making this bundle change.

I just couldn’t justify my old email address being worth that much money.

And you know, just talking this all out right now has made the change seem a little more doable.

Here’s the thing: Sometimes we can get stuck in a sin because we have a hard time with change. Sometimes we have a hard time moving forward in our relationship with God because it will mean change. Be careful that an irrational aversion to change doesn’t keep you from dealing with sin and moving closer to God.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What is something that God might be asking you to change? Leave your comments below.

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How to Win An Argument With Yourself

If you’ve ever tried to win an argument, you know how hard it is to change your mind.

In my last post (read here) I wrote how real change only comes when you change your mind, and not when you just do something different.

Doing something different can bring temporary change, but not long-lasting change. For the long haul you need to change your mind.

I remember I once changed a teacher’s mind. In my high school geography class we were studying Israel and who had a right to the land – the Jews or the Arabs. It was a hot issue because, at the time, it looked like Egypt and Israel would go to war.

Our teacher set up a debate for our class to decide who had the rights to the land, with one side defending the Jews and the other the Arabs.

I got thrown on Israel’s side and, since I was probably the only kid who went to church, I had some background to Jewish history.

By the end, my side had won and my teacher was really impressed that we had changed her mind with our arguments.

Changing your mind takes work; it doesn’t come easy.

If changing our minds was easy, we wouldn’t do the same things over and over again, expecting a different result.

Changing your mind is like a skill, and to develop any skill you need to work at it; you need to practice.

Years ago I learned the skill of playing the guitar. The only problem was I didn’t practice it enough. Though I play the guitar, I don’t play it very well – that would require me to practice way more than I do and, over the years, I’ve proved that I don’t have the desire to practice enough to become good at it.

Changing your mind requires that you put new or different information in your head, and then use it or practice it over and over.

It’s similar to having a favourite picture frame filled with an ugly picture. You won’t be happy with the frame until you change the picture in it.

In my office I have a picture I had taken of me with a famous hockey player. I also got his autograph to “Pastor Paul” on a separate card.

They sat on my desk for a while before I did anything with them. They were of no benefit to me until I got a nice picture frame, removed the sample picture that came with it, and replaced it with the picture of Darrell Sittler and his autograph.

It looked great; it was just what I wanted. But it took another week until Lily found the right place to hang it on my office wall so I could enjoy it.

To change your mind, you have to want to change, and then you need to put new information in your mind and use it.

Here’s the thing: If you are struggling with a sin, a habit, or a character issue and you want to overcome it, change it. Then find a verse that speaks to that issue and memorize it. Work that verse into your mind by saying it every day, and every time you fail at the change you want to make. Over time you will change your mind with that verse. It will help you to change your character so that you will not be plagued by that sin, habit or issue any more.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: When you think of something you would like changed, what verse comes to mind?  Leave your comments below.

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I Never Wanted To Change My Mind

I always thought that changing your mind was a flaky thing to do, that someone who changes his or her mind can’t really be counted on.

But I’ve changed my mind on that one. … Please don’t consider me flaky now; let me explain.

The Bible tells us that God never changes. He is the same yesterday, today and forever; He’s not going to change His mind. He is all-knowing and all-powerful so He can remain unchanged.

For the rest of us, we have to change our minds. If we don’t, we never will progress; we will never get out of our ruts. We will never make any breakthroughs.

In order for you to do something different, it will mean you have to change your mind.

We can try to change things by focusing on developing new skills or processes. We can try to make ourselves follow a certain set of rules or regiments.

But unless we change our minds, we will not be successful in the long run.

People go on diets or they hit the gym, bound and determined that they will lose weight or get into shape by doing certain things and eating certain things (or not eating certain things).

But most of those people, who start out with these great intentions, go back to their old ways of eating and their old ways of living on their couches.

The reason? – they never changed their minds.

They changed their habits for a while, or their activities or their intake for a time. But only a change of mind will activate their actions into something that will stick with them for the long haul.

Everything starts in the mind, not with your actions. When you change your mind, you can then change your actions.

Forget the diet until you change your mind about how healthy you want to be and feel.

Don’t go to the gym until you change your mind about being fit.

And by the way, changing your mind is not that easy.

It’s not just a matter of telling yourself something new. You have to believe that the change of mind is a worthy change, that it is a wanted change, that you are fully convinced that you have to make this change.

Often a change of mind comes when you reach the point when you are so unsatisfied that you have to do something.

It’s that Popeye principle. You know, when Popeye would be beaten to a pulp by Brutus, when he had no hope, no escape and no strength.

Just before he popped a can of spinach out of his shirt pocket and squeezed it into his mouth (where he got the strength to do that is another story), Popeye would say, “I can’t stands it; I can’t stands it no more!”

That’s it, right there – that’s when we get to the place where we are ready to change our minds.

Before that point, we probably will just be trying a new activity, fad or process.

… to be continued.

Here’s the thing: We like our minds just the way they are. Only when we are not satisfied, not wanting the same, are we ready to change our minds. That’s why, when it comes to our faith, there is usually something making us uncomfortable. Don’t ignore it until it goes away; grapple with it, wrestle with it. It may be God trying to get you to change your mind.

That’s Life!

Paul

Question: What has got you unsettled, unsatisfied that you may be inclined to change your mind? Leave your comments below.