I Regret Often That I Have Spoken; Never that I Have Been Silent

When Western Union asked Thomas Edison to "name his price" for the ticker he had invented, he asked for several days to think about it.  His wife suggested $20,000, but he thought it was too much.

At the appointed time he went to the meeting still unsure as to his sales price.  When the official asked, "How much?" he tried to say $20,000 but the words just wouldn't come out of his mouth.  The official finally broke the silence and asked, "Well, how about $100,000?"

Often silence allows others to say something better than we could have said ourselves!  By keeping quiet, others will have a greater interest in our thoughts; then when we have an interested audience, our words will have greater impact.

The Bible tells us that even a fool may be thought of as wise when his mouth is kept shut.  (Proverbs 17:28).  In that sense, silence can keep us from embarrassing ourselves.  People may think we are smarter than we really are.

When you feel moved to express an opinion, weigh the impact of your words and keep this thought in mind, "The less said, the best said."  We can't get in trouble for what we don't say.  Like Edison, we might even benefit from our silence.

In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin; but he that refraineth his lips is wise.

Proverbs 10:19

The Seven Powers for Self Control

Lesson 6:  The Power of Acceptance

Until you feel your feelings, you will not allow others to feel theirs.

"But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”

—1 Samuel 16:7

In Lesson 4 we learned that no one can make us mad or upset without our permission.  The only person that we can change is ourselves.  This does not mean that we are to beat ourselves up and give up on ourselves because we have not lived up to our own standards.  Lesson 5 taught us that we are to love ourselves first and foremost.  If we don’t love us, then who will?  I think the big lesson in both of these is that we are to understand that we are human, and are therefore bound to make mistakes, and probably the same mistakes over and over again.  That’s called being human.  It’s more about the lessons you are learning from your mistakes. 

Lesson 6 is about the Power of Acceptance.  Acceptance means favorable reception or approval.  There is nothing in that definition about other people.  It means everyone, including and especially, yourself.  Becky Bailey, in her book Conscious Discipline, says, “We must discipline ourselves first by changing our beliefs.  By changing our beliefs...we change our thoughts.  This changes our feelings, which changes our behaviors.”  If you change your beliefs to say that “I am a lovable and capable human being,” then you allow yourself the privilege of loving yourself just the way you are, warts and all.  You understand that you will do your best and that your best, on any given day, may look different … and that’s OK.

My student, in Lesson 5, had not learned the lesson of acceptance.  I had not walked in his shoes, I don’t know exactly why he was driven to perfection.  I can make assumptions, but that is all that they are and I am not here to make judgments against anyone.  Far from it!  I am here to assure you that when you seek, when you crave perfection, you are destined to a life of never being quite good enough.  You will always find fault in what you have, what you do, and who you are.  While I’ve never reached the level that this young man was at, I’ve struggled with the idea that to be loved, I must meet someone’s criteria.  I’ve looked for things to fill a void in me that couldn’t be filled, for when I got the “prize” there was always another just ahead. 

It wasn’t until I learned that to be loved, to feel loved, I had to love myself that I began to really understand.  Loving others, accepting others, isn’t really possible until we can and do love ourselves.  So what do I mean when I say love ourselves?

“But there isn't any second half of myself waiting to plug in and make me whole. It's there. I'm already whole.”

Sally Field

Here’s what I’m talking about:  Loving yourself means accepting ALL of the parts of you, the parts you like and especially the parts you don’t like.  We all have them, both of them.  Acceptance of the parts you like is pretty simple.  If you don’t have any of these or only a few of these, then we need to have another discussion.  I want to focus on the parts you don’t like for now.  These parts are here, within us, to teach us lessons.  Remember, we all have them.  I mean every one of us!  Instead of fighting them, instead of being angry with ourselves over them, we need to love them and when we learn to love them and accept them as lessons, then they will begin to dissipate.  Remember, what you focus on, you get more of.

If you beat yourself up for your mistakes, then you are focusing on the bad behavior and you will get more bad behavior.  If you change your belief to say to yourself, “Well, there you are again ___________(whatever your mistake or issue).  What lesson are you trying to teach me today?” then you are not fighting any longer with yourself.  You are accepting yourself and when you accept yourself, you change your beliefs.  Change your beliefs…change your thoughts… change your feelings…change your behaviors.  This is the key to making those changes that will last a lifetime, those changes that we so want to make in ourselves.

When we love and accept ourselves, all the parts and pieces of ourselves, we are better able to love and accept others just as they are.  We understand that life is a journey and we each have our own lessons to learn on this journey.  We demonstrate to those around us that we are able to care and love, because we first love and accept ourselves.

 “When you find peace within yourself, you become the kind of person who can live at peace with others.”

Peace Pilgrim

A Penny for Your Thoughts

In one of my previous lives, I served as the director of a family resource center.  At one point, with lots of changes taking place, I noticed that the staff were all becoming 'down in the mouth.'  Moral was pretty low and we needed to make a change, so in an effort to reverse the thinking taking place I reached to my bookshelves and came across a book by Richard Carlson, Ph.D. called, Easier Than You Think.  I had bought this book several years before at a conference in Louisville, Kentucky.  The book had been sitting on my shelf alongside another of his books, Don't Sweat the Small Stuff.  As I picked up the book and began to read it, I decided this was the perfect little book to use at our staff development meetings.  The chapters were very short but packed full of quality life lessons, and I'm all about life lessons.

A friend and I were talking about this book just last night and the value of its simple message:  life really is easier than you think.  It's what we do with our lives (or don't do with them) that makes them so complicated and difficult.  Dr. Carlson shows us in a few pages easy ways to make small changes that will have a big impact on the quality of your life.

The first lesson is one that I have taught a lot over the course of my years.  He calls it 'A Penny for Your Thoughts.'  It became a key phrase for those of us at the center.  When one of us heard another thinking and saying negative things, we would simply say, "A penny for your thoughts."  This was just a little reminder that we have a choice of how we look at things. 

Our thoughts are the most powerful tools we have been given in this lifetime.  We can use them ... to create joy, anticipation, excitement, fun, happiness, and peace.

Of course, we can just as easily allow our thoughts to be self-destructive weapons.  We can wake up in the morning with a list of complaints as long as the front page of the newspaper.  And whichever road we take--positive or negative--our choice is likely to have little if anything to do with how "good" our life really is on the "outside."

If you can keep in mind the reality that you control your own thoughts and nothing else, you will be in pretty good shape.  Whenever negativity creeps into your mind (which it will do on a regular basis), remember two things:  You are the one who is creating the negativity with your own thinking.  But more important, you have the power to stop it.

After all, everything that happens in your life is processed in your head.  Your brain, your thoughts, tell you how to feel about it.  It really is a choice.  We all have over 60,000 thoughts each day, most of them the very same thoughts we had yesterday.  We can choose to "switch the channel" and not listen to the negative ones as they come up.  Take a little time today to stop and notice what you're thinking.  Is it helpful to you in any way?  Or does it just beat you up and leave you feeling bad?  Change that channel!  You don't have to listen to it.

Certainly there are times when we need to run a diagnostic evaluation of ourselves.  Are we on target for our goals?  Are we living the life we want to live?  But when the evaluation becomes an opportunity for us to  bloody our own lip and leave us feeling badly about ourselves, then we need to notice the negative self-talk and turn it off.  A simple statement to yourself such as, "I appreciate that these thoughts may have served some purpose for me in the past, but they just don't work for me anymore.  I choose to see this in a different light," flips the switch.  After you've flipped that switch several times, you can simply think or say, "No thanks!" and move on.  

Life is just too short to live it in a world of negativity.  We all  face trials but if we can find some good in each day, in each lesson, then our days will be filled with gladness and thanksgiving rather than despair and grief.  So, today I ask you...A Penny for Your Thoughts?