Happiness and Contentment

Happiness and contentment is not the same thing.

To be content, for me, would mean that I do not want to change anything from the way it is now. So my perception of contentment, is that it is a response to external circumstances. Happiness, in contrast, is the way you feel, and one of the fundamental arts of living is to be happy regardless of your circumstances. This means that even when the circumstances are not the way you'd like them to be, you still have the ability to realize that your state of mind is not caused by your circumstances, but by your thoughts and your patterns of thought leading up to that point.

At first thought it would seem that we would be most happy when we are content, but strangely enough, contentment seems to very quickly bring with it a boredom, a frustration of “is this all there is?”

It has been my experience that I am most happy when discontent with the way things are, and working hard to change things, doing things that are aligned with who I am fundamentally am.

People that are happy because of their great external circumstances seem to offer little hope or comfort for most of us, unless they carved those circumstances through a path of hardship. It is the people that are happy despite the fact that they seem to have just as much trouble and difficulty as everyone else, that most inspire us. And at the very core of Christianity lies some of these principles. It seems God first draws us to Him, first teaches us to seek and find His Kingdom, which is righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit, not our circumstances, and then all things will be added unto us.

Rom 14:17 For God's kingdom does not consist of food and drink, but of righteousness, peace, and joy produced by the Holy Spirit.

Mat 6:33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

Interestingly enough, once we learn to be happy despite our circumstances, it becomes easier to change those circumstances, and much easier to enjoy the process of implementing that change.

Theory of Motivation

There is a theory of motivation that is quite widely accepted, which appeals to me. It is called “Expectancy Theory.” This theory says that we will be motivated if we believe that a particular level of effort, will be followed by a particular level of performance, and that a particular level of performance, will lead to a desired reward. These are also called “Expectancy, Instrumentality, and Valence.” Let me simplify it with an example.

First requirement for motivation: A Need

Motivation always has to start with a need, desire, or want. For the sake of the example, we will call anything that I want to achieve or obtain, whether it is really a need, or merely a whim, a “need.” Let’s say I had a need to listen to good quality music. In Order to fulfill this need, I would want to have a good Hi-Fi system, and this would cost me $ 1,000.

Valence

Valence is the ability of something to satisfy my need. I believe that the Hi Fi system would meet my need. If I had a Hi Fidelity sound system, this would provide me with the means to obtain the necessary satisfaction. This is called “Valence.” The ability of a reward to satisfy me, is its valence. An MP3 player would have a lower level of valence for me, than a good Hi-Fi system, because good quality music is important to me. If portability of my music were more important, the MP3 player would have a higher level of valence. Money would buy the Hi-Fi, and it is therefore easy for me to attach a high level of valence to $ 1,000.

Instrumentality

Instrumentality refers to the ability of a certain level of performance, to be directly linked to a certain reward. Let’s say that I’m working in a Restaurant, as a waiter, and earn $ 2 per hour basic pay, on top of which I earn gratuities. The gratuity is voluntary – so if I impress the customers, I tend to get more. I know that the more customers I can serve in a shift, the more gratuities I can get. So, I have reason to believe that serving more customers, getting larger tips and working more hours, will get me to my $ 1,000 goal faster. This is called “Instrumentality.” Instrumentality says that if I perform at a certain level, I will receive a certain reward. In this case, the higher my level of performance in these areas, the sooner I’d get to obtain the high-valence reward.

Expectancy

Expectancy is my level of belief that a certain effort will result in a certain level of performance. Suppose I believed that by smiling at all my customers, trying to anticipate their needs, and paying special attention to the children, I would get larger gratuities. I also believed that by getting the kitchen to produce food for my customers faster, I’d be able to turn over tables faster. By working more shifts, I could make more on my basic rate. So I would do all these things, because I believed that this effort, would result in a certain level of performance. So working from the beginning, I would be willing to put in a certain level of effort, if I believed that this would result in a certain level of performance (Expectancy), which, in turn, would give me a reward (Instrumentality), which would enable me to obtain something, that would satisfy my need (Valence).

Absence of one link destroys motivation

The moment any of these links are broken, my motivation fails. Now let us say that what I really crave, is not listening to good music, but more time with my friends. The first two parts of the link are still there. The same effort, will still provide the improved performance, which will give me more money, and the money could still buy a Hi-Fi – so expectancy and instrumentality are both there – but valence has disappeared. That money has no ability to buy me more time with my friends.

Or, let’s say I want the Hi-Fi, but the Hi-Fi I want, has been declared illegal in my country. It doesn’t matter how much money I earn, that Hi-Fi is simply not available. Valence is there – the Hi-Fi would have met my need – but instrumentality is now absent – the money cannot buy me the Hi-Fi, no matter how much of it I earn. My performance cannot influence the receipt of my reward.

Or I want the Hi-Fi, it is for sale, but I work in an area where it is not the culture to give gratuities to waiters. Apart from that, it’s a tourist lunch stop-over, so I can’t even try to impress some regular customers, to try and get them back more often, or to try and get them to sit at my tables. There’s a legal limit to the amount of shifts I can work – so I can’t work any more than what I’m already doing. And on top of that, I’m convinced that nothing I could do could ever convince the kitchen staff to work any faster. So no matter what I do, I cannot impact my performance. I still have valence and instrumentality. If I had the Hi-Fi, I could listen to my music, If I could earn gratuities, if I could turn over tables faster and if I could work more shifts, I would get more money, but my effort has no effect on this performance. Nothing I do, can influence these factors in any way. So I will not be motivated to put in the effort. Expectancy is missing.

So you see that in order to motivate yourself, you need to first understand your true needs and desires, and then you need to build back from there the reward you would need to fulfill that need, the performance that is likely to earn that reward, and the effort that is likely to get you to that level of performance

Determination and Faith in the path to success

Success requires determination, determination requires faith, and faith requires support.

Success Requires Determination

In order to succeed in anything, we need determination. Stories abound of people that have overcome obstacle after obstacle to finally reach success, but I cannot think of even one, telling of a simple smooth road to unbounded success. Without determination, we tend to stop at the first obstacle. And obstacles there will be.

Determination Requires Faith

In order to be determined, we need to believe that somewhere beyond the obstacles lies success, and that we can -- and want to -- have that success.

Faith Requires Support

Believing something is not an independent, loosely floating concept. Faith in something can be compared to a platform. The supporting pillars are things you believe, which support the platform of your faith.

When you want to strengthen your faith in something, you need to look for supporting evidence that will add pillars under your platform. The more of these you have, the stronger and more stable your faith becomes.

Let's say I want to believe that I will become a successful writer. To strengthen that belief, I would look for supporting pillars.

One pillar might be the belief that good quality writing would improve my chances of success. In order for that belief to be of value to me, I have to believe that I can actually produce good quality writing. By subscribing to forums where I can get feedback on my writing, I might get more evidence to support my faith. Or I could get loads of negative feedback and eventually just give up, because the negative evidence will erode this pillar, until my faith in my ability to succeed at writing, has lost its support.

Another pillar might be that I believe that by being determined and focused on writing, I will get better and better at it. I believe that practice improves skill. This belief, in turn, might rest on some evidence from research that has been done, or maybe on the evidence of having practised, and seen an improvement in my own writing.

To strengthen your faith, find positive evidence and think about it

The process of strengthening a single pillar to support what I want to believe, is not necessarily a hundred percent rational. Our minds form neural pathways, and the size or strength of such a pathway, impacts on the strength of a specific belief. The size and strength of a neural pathway, however, is not related to its truth or rationality, but rather to its use. The more I use a pathway, the stronger it becomes.

So let's say that I believe that practice improves skill, and I have two pieces of evidence, of exact equal weight. One piece of evidence shows a research subject who had improved a certain skill with practice, and another, in identical circumstances, had not improved in skill at all.

The piece of evidence that I choose to think about the most, will cause a strengthening of that specific element of faith, through strengthening that neural pathway. If I continually dwell on the evidence of no improvement, I will find myself holding a stronger and stronger belief that practice does not improve skill.

A Negative focus will erase your ability to believe

Choosing to allow my thoughts to dwell on the negative evidence will systematically erode my confidence in my own ability to improve my skill through practice. I will consequently have lost one pillar of my belief that I will ultimately succeed as an author. I will also lose my motivation to practice, because I have removed the valence of this activity.

By not practicing, my skill will not only stop improving. It will actually deteriorate. Ultimately, I will almost have guaranteed my failure as an author.

A Positive focus will strengthen your belief

If I choose to think more on the evidence that showed practice improving skill, I will strengthen the neural pathway that holds that belief. The stronger it becomes, the stronger will be my expectation that practice will improve my skill. This will cause me to look for more and more opportunities to practice, which is likely to increase my chances of coming across exercises that have the potential to improve my skill.

I will write more, increasing the volume of publishable material I have available, and increasing the chances that someone will notice my writing.

Ultimately, I might not have guaranteed success through this one avenue, but I have at the least shut down one possible path to failure, and I have strengthened one of the pillars that will support my faith.

My strengthened faith will enable to be more determined, and as explained in the beginning, determination is a key ingredient of success.

One swallow doesn't make a summer, but one polar bear can make a winter

I have noticed that there are almost no guarantees of success in this world. We can do all the right things, and each of them can enhance our likelihood of success. But there is not a proven, failure free recipe.

On the other hand, it is often possible to guarantee failure through one mistake. In “Determination and Faith in the path to success,” I show an example of how one negative belief can guarantee failure, whilst replacing that exact same belief with a positive one, will merely form one brick in the wall of success. Without many other strong bricks, completing that wall will not be possible.

Circular vs. Purpose driven thinking

I have found in my life that when I dwell on negative thinking, my mind tends to go in circles. I find after a little bit of thinking time, that I am back on a familiar path. That same negative thought that presented itself a few minutes ago, is suddenly here again. As soon as I follow it, I find myself continuing down an ever increasingly familiar path of worry, despair, hatred, anger or whatever other negative emotions I am attaching to these thoughts.

Every time I walk this thought-path, I am strengthening those neural pathways, making it easier and easier for me to believe the negative only, and more and more difficult to believe or even perceive the positive. Ultimately, if I spend enough time in these thought patterns, I will begin to build a set of thought-filters that will not allow any positive experience to enter my thoughts, without first being tainted by these negative filters.

This is a counterproductive use of thinking time.

When I create a positive image of an environment I want, and begin to spend time building that environment, devising plans, steps and tasks to develop that image into reality, things get better. Although there is also a certain amount of returning to familiar thoughts, I find that there are always new thoughts. I see new benefits in the environment I am creating, which I had not noticed before. I find new and innovative ideas on how to create that environment. Instead of filters that taint the positive, my mind begins to build sensitive receptors, looking for every opportunity, however small, and searching through every event for the positive material in that event, that can be gleaned and used to build the new environment.

Aligning your energy

Moreover, his energies were never exhausted, not only because he was physically strong but because he followed the mainstream in himself. In this way he was unlike so many of the men and women of our time who live on the capital of their energies because they find themselves embattled against their natural selves. They do not earn new allowances of energy for themselves but merely exhaust the supply which nature had originally bestowed on them. Jung, on the contrary, seemed to generate more mental and spiritual energy for himself living, as it were, on interest and never touching the original investment of his nature. In this way both volume and value grew rapidly in an age of increasing inflation of mind and being until one almost wondered at times whether energy had not accomplished the impossible of spontaneous generation in him.

I dug this from an old journal. I think it was said about Jung, by an author surnamed van der Post.

The Four Beacons

Below is an email that I sent, regarding the concept of figuring out what to do with your life.

Although I wrote it to a young lady, trying to find her way after school, it is the same principle that I applied at the age of 37 to make a major career change in my own life. The best thing I’d ever done!

From: ARROWSMITH [mailto:arrows@saol.com]

Sent: 07 October 2008 14:45

To: Ashton Fourie

Subject: Direction

We are praying for direction for our youngest daughter Savannah as to what she must do next year after matric. She is so unsure what she wants to do next year. We are praying for direction for her. Any scriptures come to mind?

Lots of Love,

Deborah , John, Skye and Savannah.

From: Ashton Fourie [ashton@ashtonfourie.com]

Sent: 20 October 2008 10:15

To: 'ARROWSMITH'

Subject: Direction

Hi Deborah, John, Skye and Savannah.

Life direction is one of my favourite topics. Here are a few of my thoughts. I hope they can help.

In my life, I have made many mistakes, and have struggled for a long time to find out what it is that I should be doing.

One of the good things about this, is that I seem to have discovered some stuff which might be useful for others, in trying to decide where to take their lives, especially when youngsters are making decisions after school.

Have you ever watched a ship come into a harbour? You might have noticed three beacons. If I remember right, there would be one green, and two red beacons. These three beacons are normally very bright, and are exactly in line with the mouth of the harbour. If you were to stand exactly in the centre of the mouth of the harbour, you would see only one beacon - the green one - and the other two would be hidden behind it. Move to the right or the left, and you would see the red beacons coming into your line of sight.

The ships use these three beacons to ensure that their course is true, straight into the harbour - so they don't maybe accidentally hit some shallow ground to the side of the mouth of the harbour. As long as they see only green, everything is fine. As soon as they see red, they know that they have to adjust course.

In our own lives, there are also a few of these beacons, and the sooner you can learn to know these beacons, the easier it will become for you to learn to direct your life in the way that you should go. I've also learnt that these need to be aligned, for your life to "work." Focusing on one only, just doesn't seem to quite work.

Beacon Number One: God’s Calling

The first beacon is the most important: It is God's will for your life -- His calling for you.

Some people believe that only certain people are called, and the rest of us should just make a "normal" living. However, I believe that each of us have been put here with a specific purpose, a specific plan. God made you the way you are, because He wants you to be doing something for him, in this time.

2Pe 1:10 So then, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election certain, for if you keep on doing this you will never fail. (ISV)

So how do you know what God's calling for your life is?

The first way, is to pray and ask God to reveal it to you.

Jas 1:5 Now if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives to everyone generously without a rebuke, and it will be given to him.

The second way to know, is to record words spoken over you by prophets. Write them down, and review them regularly, because they contain some keys to what God wants to do in and through you.

1Ti 1:18 Timothy, my child, I entrust to you this command, which is in accordance with the words of prophecy spoken in the past about you. Use those words as weapons in order to fight well,

Your calling is also built into the way you have been created - more about this in the third beacon, which is your design. Let’s first look at the second beacon, so that we keep the order of priority right, here.

Beacon Number Two: Principles of God’s Word

The second beacon, are the principles of God's Word.

If anything that you are planning to do, starts moving outside of the principles of the Bible, then you should know that you are moving outside of God's will for your life - and moving into a dangerous place.

There is only one way to safeguard yourself here, and that is to study God's word regularly, continually and systematically. You should always be busy reading through the Bible from cover to cover, apart from any Bible studies you are doing, to make sure that you are continually reminding yourself of all the principles in God's Word.

Psa 119:15 I study your instructions; I examine your teachings.

Psa 119:16 I take pleasure in your laws; your commands I will not forget.

Beacon Number Three: Your Design

The third beacon, is your design. God made each of us different, and He made us the way we are, for a reason. I believe that our design and our calling are very closely linked. Take a look at the Parable of the Tractor and the Ferrari.

With your design, I refer to the things you are good at and the things you enjoy. You could also call it your talents. If you try and do things you are not really good at, you will find it very frustrating.

So how do you know what your design is? Over time, you learn to know and recognize what you are good at, as opposed to those things at which you suck. At school, you will probably have found that you find some subjects easier than others. That's a good start. You could also have found that maybe you'd been doing some extra-mural activities - and that you might have been better at some of them, than at others.

Design has another part to it though, and that is enjoyment. It is true that we often enjoy the things that we are good at, but sometimes there are things that we can be good at, but we don't enjoy doing them. Especially if you are talented in various areas of life, you might find that you seem to be good at certain things, but when you do them, you are not really happy.

The best way to figure this out, is to look at your life and take note of the times when you are happy. Take a few minutes every day thinking about the day, thinking of the times you were happy; write down what you were doing, and why it made you happy. Also take note of whether you felt that you were good at what you were doing.

I cannot think of a single scripture that supports this principle, but there are multiple scriptures where we see God implementing this principle by referring to the fact that the people called to do a certain

task, were both skilful, and moved in their heart to do it.

Exo 31:2 "I have chosen Bezalel, the son of Uri and grandson of Hur, from the tribe of Judah,

Exo 31:3 and I have filled him with my power. I have given him understanding, skill, and ability for every kind of artistic work---

Exo 31:4 for planning skillful designs and working them in gold, silver, and bronze;

Exo 31:5 for cutting jewels to be set; for carving wood; and for every other kind of artistic work.

1Ch 27:32 Jonathan, King David's uncle, was a skillful adviser and a scholar. He and Jehiel son of Hachmoni were in charge of the education of the king's sons.

2Ch 34:12 The men who did the work were thoroughly honest. They were supervised by four Levites: Jahath and Obadiah of the clan of Merari, and Zechariah and Meshullam of the clan of Kohath. (The Levites were all skillful musicians.)

Son 3:8 All of them are skillful with the sword; they are battle-hardened veterans. Each of them is armed with a sword, on guard against a night attack.

Dan 5:12 He has unusual ability and is wise and skillful in interpreting dreams, solving riddles, and explaining mysteries; so send for this man Daniel, whom the king named Belteshazzar, and he will tell you what all this means."

Beacon Number 4: What do you WANT to do?

The last beacon, is what you really WANT to do. It should be a combination of all the above, as well as just being aware of what kind of future makes you happy when you think about it. The thing that you should simply ask yourself, is "What do I WANT to do." This is a difficult question to answer, and it must be, most importantly, submitted also to the first one - which was your calling - what God wants you to do.

There are times in our lives when we have to do things we don't want to do, but generally, it has been my experience that God wants us to do the things we enjoy, that make us happy, and that give us a sense of achievement and fulfilment.

Psa 37:4 Seek your happiness in the LORD, and he will give you your heart's desire.

Psa 37:5 Give yourself to the LORD; trust in him, and he will help you;

This scripture can be interpreted in two ways - and according to a friend of mine who used to lecture at Bible College, both interpretations are correct:

The first and most common interpretation, says that when you desire something, God will grant it to you - provided obviously that you meet the condition before that - which is to delight yourself in Him.

However, the second interpretation, which is less often made clear, is the fact that the desire itself, comes from God. He places the desire itself in your heart.

Think and pray about all these things, and find your descriptions of each of these Beacons. Write them down, and then see in which direction they point. If you go in that direction, chances are that you will be spot on,

walking where you should be, and find a life of happiness fulfilment and purpose.

Love

Ashton

Productivity

Productivity starts not with your careful planning, but with your mindset
and your level of motivation. Motivation is not, as many of us
sub-consciously and erroneously believe, a general state of mind, such as
being happy or sad, depressed or elated. No, it is a very specific state of
mind which relates to a specific activity. You are always motivated, except
when you are depressed. The challenge is to find what you are motivated to
do. The activity that links to your current motivation, is the activity
that you will be able to perform, at that moment, with the greatest
enthusiasm, and most probably with the greatest level of efficiency and
effectiveness - thus it will be at your highest potential level of
productivity.

Depression is that unexplainable state where you feel unable to motivate
yourself to do anything. Where there is not a single activity that you can
think of, which you have any motivation, whatsoever, to do. However, we
often mistake a lack of being able to think of something that we would like
to do, or even a lack of opportunity to do what we would like to do, for
depression. This might lead to depression, but it is not yet, depression.

Hard Work and Blessing

Proverbs 10:22 The blessing of the Lord gives wealth: hard work makes it no greater.

This is a strange verse.

It seems to be in contrast with verses regarding diligence and slothfulness.

Maybe this refers more to workaholism, or maybe the author was just trying to balance personal effort with God’s blessing

Most of the other translations seem to translate hard work, with sorrow.

This is what the Strongs has to say regarding the hard work or sorrow:

… usually (painful) toil; also a pang (whether of body or mind): - grievous, idol, labor, sorrow.

So this speaks not of reasonable hard work, but of the hard work that causes pain – slogging through the night, or dragging yourself from day to day doing what you hate. So this does not relate to diligence and honest labour and all those things. This relates to the kind of work that wears you out.

When you are having to work like that, to survive, you can know that you are not operating in the blessing of God, and then some major adjustments in your life are called for.

Eat and Drink and Enjoy what you have worked for

Ecc 3:13 All of us should eat and drink and enjoy what we have worked for. It is God's gift

Enjoy that which you have earned. Herein lies a good habit which will go a long way to helping you maintain motivation. Motivation has to do with expectation. When we expect a desired result, chances are that we will be more motivated to do something. If we never gain any pleasure from our work, then the desirability of the result of our work becomes less and less – until it fades and we are merely driven from day to day, by whatever drives us – mostly fear, stress, worry, anxiety, and similarly destructive emotions.

If we regularly take a bit of time to enjoy what we have worked for, then there is a continuous resetting of the balance. We regularly step away from the things that drive us, enjoying the things that give us pleasure and enjoyment.

The subtle warning: Don’t enjoy what you have not worked for

There is also a subtle warning here, and that is in the “what we have worked for.” It is a subtle way of saying: “Don’t make debt, don’t do that impulsive buying.” You see, the moment you make debt to buy something you want, you are giving yourself the enjoyment of something for which you have not worked. You pull the gratification closer, and so you de-link the gratification from the effort of working for it.

Now you have debt, and you know the debt has to be paid. So, you are driven by fear, and you work because you MUST make the money to pay the debt. Your efforts are now linked to debt – a negative element in your life. Instead of having created a pattern of motivation because of the reward that lies at the end of the effort, you have created a pattern of motivation because of the fear of what would lie at the end of not making the effort. The gratification has already been received and consumed.

A Pattern of Destruction

When this becomes a pattern, it becomes incredibly destructive. Now you know you have debt, so you work as hard as you can to meet your required payment. For a few months you succeed in keeping this up, filling your life with self-discipline and ambition, driving yourself from day to day, with the only gratification that remains, the sense of knowing that eventually that debt will be settled. But then, one day, all the media and advertising gets to you again, you realize that you have now settled half the debt, and the bank has just invited you to increase that credit limit again. And you so desperately need that holiday, that one dinner out, that new holiday home, or that new shirt. Whether it’s a million dollar, or a hundred dollar temptation, makes no difference to the pattern. The pattern is that eventually you succumb, you take the gratification again – because after all, you’ve been working so hard! And now you have more debt, and you work hard again. But once again, the work comes after the gratification. The positive motivator has been had; it is no longer a motivator. What remains is just the fear of what will happen if you don’t pay back that debt. You have debt again, even more this time, you’re going to have to work even harder. You’ve just been had again! You’ve been set up for the next fall.

Pleasure is stolen from your work

Sub-consciously, you are now linking work with debt and fear. Over time, this association will become stronger and stronger. You will enjoy your work less and less, and eventually begin to hate it as much as you hate the emotions that are driving you to keep working. You have become a slave of the bank, a slave of your employer, a slave of society.

I don’t think many of us realize just how much of the joy of life has been stolen from us, through easy credit. There are few things as enjoyable as having worked for something, saved hard for it, finally getting it and then being totally free to enjoy it, without the burden of debt to weigh you down.

How do you get out of this cycle?

Breaking the Cycle

There are volumes written on this topic, so to try and offer a solution in one article, seems impossible. But one principle seems to have worked well for me:

With immediate effect, separate your debt from your other finances and make it inaccessible. If you have an overdraft, a credit card or a revolving credit plan, or a bond that you can access as soon as there are excess funds – freeze those. Give the access to someone else if you must. Figure out how much of that you can pay off – realistically – every month – and do that. Pay it, and forget about it. Don’t watch it, don’t set all sorts of “get out of debt” goals – because if you always think about your debt, you will just keep feeding debt.

Now you open a savings account, and you begin to save for whatever you want. Start with something small. Save for three months, and then reward yourself with that something small. Experience that gratification. Now you have broken the circle. Now you are ready to learn to live in a new lifestyle.

Be happy and do your best

Ecc 3:12  So I realized that all we can do is be happy and do the best we can while we are still alive.

What a sobering thought.  I have often discovered that there is a sense of fulfilment in doing things well, and a sense of frustration in doing things badly.  So whatever you do, do your best, and be happy.  Don’t worry about what you aren’t able to do.  Don’t stress about all the things you cannot do.  That which you do, do it to the best of your abilities.  More than that, you can’t do.  Settle for that.

 

Can we change things that are not within our control?

Despair. This is one of the most common responses to situations that cause unhappiness in our lives. The reason we despair, is because we believe that we cannot change things. We believe that the reason things are the way they are, is because of some external factors that are outside of our control.

We are more in control than what we often think

The reality is that our environment is very often not really shaped by forces outside of our control, but actually by forces that are just outside of our current skill of control. There are indeed certain things that are outside of our control, such as the weather, meteoric activity, earthquakes, and certain health conditions. If you are perplexed about conditions such as these, this article is probably not for you. You should rather read an article about how to cope with things, by adjusting your attitude towards them.

However, before you simply dismiss your situation as being in the above category, why not take the time to really think about it. The reason why many people believe that they cannot change a certain set of circumstances, is because of a lack of insight into indirect cause and effect linkages in our society. Most of our circumstances are caused by society, and most of our personal circumstances are caused by our interaction with society.

Bi-Directional Interaction with Society often shapes my circumstances

Interaction implies bi-directional action. I do things that impact my society, and my society does things that impact me. This seems obvious to most of us, because we are aware of our direct interaction and the results. For instance, I can tell someone that works for me, to move a desk, and they will do that. I had a direct influence on that person, and that person influenced the environment directly. The desk was moved. It’s still easy for me to see how I impacted the environment. The desk is now in a different location, pretty much because of my having given an instruction.

Now let’s “move the camera.” It’s two months after I had the desk moved. John is a cleaner that works for a company cleaning our offices. John lost his job two weeks ago. The reason he lost his job, is because I became aware of the fact that the specific area where I work, was no longer kept as clean as it used to. The area is supposed to get cleaned at night, but I’d started noticing that sometimes in the morning, the carpet had clearly not been vacuumed. I complained to the cleaning company, they apparently issued John a warning, but things didn’t improve, and finally John was dismissed.

Let’s now go and follow John around from the day I had the desk moved.

What happened to John?

It’s 18:00 the evening and everyone has gone home. John has just arrived. He’s one of a team of six people that clean this building. His job is to vacuum. Being the person who has to vacuum, he is intensely aware of the shortage of available plug points in this building. He’s heard so many stories of cleaners causing system crashes and all sorts of chaos due to un-plugging critical equipment after hours, that he’s very careful not to unplug anything.

As John gets to a certain department, he notices with a sigh that a desk has been moved – right in front of the only available plug point in that department. The desk is blocking the plug, and on top of the desk are three large network printers – making it far too heavy for him to move by himself.

From now on, every night is a hunt for an open plug point. Sometimes he finds one, sometimes he doesn’t.

A few weeks later he gets called in by his supervisor, Jack. Jack is a formidable man, who doesn’t listen to excuses – or reason for that matter. He gives John a good talking to, and without giving John much chance to say anything, warns him that he’s got one more chance. John tries harder, now even brings a broom and tries to sweep the area, but the broom goes too slowly, and he finds that other areas start getting neglected.

In the meanwhile, I complained again, and John was dismissed.

Was this within John’s control?

Now you might say that John had a range of solutions that were obviously available to him. He could possibly complain to a higher level than his boss, he could go to the labour court (if he’s in a country that has a legal system protecting him,) he could have come and asked me to please arrange for an extra plug point – or something!

Well, the point is that I was unaware of the negative indirect effect that I was having on John, and in the process, on myself. It did not occur to me that I was the cause of my office carpet not getting vacuumed. John did not have the skill or the presence of mind to think through his whole environment and find a way to influence his society in the way that he needed, to keep his job. For John, this was not that obvious. He had a supervisor whom he felt he could not influence at all. He did not know who had decided to move the desk. On top of that he had never even been in my organisation during the day – he knew no-one there. He had no authority and no influence in my organisation. Or did he?

John was unable to see across the borders of his life

John was unable to see across the borders of his life. This is the same problem that many people face every day. They experience the problem in their environment, but they are unable to see what they are able to do, in order to change the environment.

What needs to change? Who can change it?

One of the ways in which to address this is to ask the question: “What needs to change and who can change it?” and then to start tracking who could possibly influence the person that can change something.

So to play another routine through the above example:

John could have faced his problem that first night, and asked himself what needed to change. He would have identified maybe three options:

• · He needed a longer power extension cable, or
• · the desk needed to be moved again, or
• · he needed someone to leave him an open plug point in that vicinity

He could then have started identifying the people that could change these things:

• · His supervisor could approve a longer extension cable for him.
• · Someone in the building with some authority should authorise to move the desk.
• · Someone in the area of the desk should agree to leave open a plug point for him.

The first option would directly solve his problem. If he could speak to his supervisor and the cable was approved, he might be able to solve his problem immediately. But let’s say he tried his supervisor, who refused because there is a safety limit to the length of extension cables, or just because he’s obtuse by nature.

How can I influence those that can change things I need changed?

He now has two options left, and now he starts asking himself: “Who can influence the people that work in that area?” Arguably, any person within an organisation has a better chance to influence someone in that organisation, that someone without – so he might look for the entrance point to the organisation – the receptionist downstairs.

Now to make it more complex, let’s say that the receptionist is a snob and she happens to know John, and that he’s a cleaner – which is below her self-appointed status. When John tries to approach her, she tells him that he is not supposed to be in the building during office hours – and refuses to listen to his story.

So John has to keep up the questions:

· “Who could possibly influence the receptionist?” or

· “Who else could influence the people in that department?” or maybe:

· “How can I directly get into contact with one of the people in that department?”

In answer to these questions, John might decide to write a note addressed “To Whom It May Concern,” and leave it on the desk in question. Or he might look around in the department that evening, and notice an office that seems to be more luxurious than the others – indicating that it possibly belongs to a person in authority. He could take a business card from that office and call the next day, to explain his predicament.

Maybe he would think of someone who knows someone who knows someone else who knows the receptionist.

Find the bridges across the borders in your life

The point is that by continually asking these questions, he would have been able to find the solution. He would have been able to find the bridges across the borders of his own life, into the lives of those who were influencing his life, so that he could influence their lives, in order to rectify the negative influence they were having on him.

The principle doesn’t vary, just the complexity

The variance from John’s life to yours is not whether or not this principle is applicable, but merely the complexity of it.

So next time you are facing some problem in your life, don’t immediately just point to whoever caused it and resign yourself to the fact that you cannot change it. Think about what you want to change, who can change it, and then start building the bridges from that person backwards until you can see a bridge to yourself. Then start building the skill you need to cross those bridges, and soon you will discover a power within yourself which you had never known existed.

There is always another possible solution you haven’t thought of yet

There is one more thing. In the above example, with some thought, John might have been able to come up with more options and more people, in every instance. The same is true in your life. When, at first, you come up against bridges that seem impossible to cross, take the time to think again. You might just find that there are a few other routes you haven’t thought of, accessible by bridges that are more within your skill set to cross.

The more you do this, the more you will find yourself able to look at your environment positively, believing that you can make a difference. You can make your own world and the world of those around you, a better place!

Don't think about the problems - think about what you want

You will see that this is an exactly opposite course from the one which we would naturally be inclined to adopt.

It will therefore have an exactly opposite effect to the one usually secured. Most persons concentrate intently upon unsatisfactory conditions, thereby giving the condition that measure of energy and vitality which is necessary in order to supply a vigorous growth.

- Extract from The Master Key System

This is an interesting concept. I would normally sit and plan how I am going to overcome a specific problem, but his philosophy has a different approach. It says: “Ignore the problem. By ignoring it, you are cutting off from it its lifeblood – which are your thoughts. Over time, the problem will die and fade.”

And look at this:

Proverbs 10:24 The fear of the wicked, it shall come upon him; And the desire of the righteous shall be granted.

So do I just ignore the problem?

Does this mean I totally ignore the problem? Am I being an ostrich, sticking my head in the sand?

I think what it is really about, is the focus of our thoughts. When we have a problem, our natural instinct is to start looking at ways to solve the problem. We focus on the problem and try to figure out how to get rid of it.

Two Ways to deal with a problem

A problem represents a specific set of circumstances in a specific area of my life. When trying to overcome this problem, I have at least two ways in which to try and do this:

• Number 1:
• Focus on the problem and think about it until I find a solution
• Start implementing that solution
• Number 2
• Create a vivid mental picture of an alternative set of circumstances that I would rather have in my life, than the current circumstances representing the problem
• Begin to identify what is lacking my life at the moment to make those circumstances real
• Create an action plan that will begin to bring into my life those things that I have identified
• Think of this new set of circumstances every day, and do something every day to work on some part of that action plan that will bring into my life the things that are lacking, to create the desired circumstances.

Is this really so different?

In the first option, you are most probably driven by emotions such as fear, worry, stress, anxiety, anger, hatred, disappointment, and who knows what else. These emotions, when allowed to live within you for long enough, will produce depression. Depression removes all motivation. Ultimately, the problem has a much better chance of surviving, or even if you solve that one, being replaced by other problems. It’s a dark life.

In the second option, you are driven by emotions such as hope, faith, excitement, desire and other similarly positive emotions. You have a vision that you are working towards. Your focus is on positive things. Your focus every day is on progress towards something good, rather than progress away from something bad.

A God-Given Desire to Know

Ecc 3:11 He has set the right time for everything. He has given us a desire to know the future, but never gives us the satisfaction of fully understanding what he does.

My desire to know what will happen, my desire to understand things in order to explain and forecast – this is from God.

However, a fulfilled desire doesn’t motivate – and so God never gives us the satisfaction of fully understanding – so that we will remain motivated to keep searching. In this search, in this partial understanding, we find a continuous drive – a continuous source of pleasure. There are few things in life as motivating as the sense of being on the brink of a new discovery, and few things as satisfying as the sense of growth that we experience when we appropriate new knowledge, a new understanding, and an improvement of character.