A WOMAN'S VIEW ~ Lenore Buth

Discover your pluses

"What's your greatest strength? Your greatest weakness?"

That question stumps many of us, at least for awhile.

Professional counselors tell us that most personality traits have two sides, just as coins do.  

But there's more to this truth:

Neither our strengths nor our weaknesses are all good or all bad.

I learned this first-hand when a good friend and I agreed to co-chair a women's event. 

Everyone admired "Sue" for her faith, her cheerful attitude and her efficiency. (Okay, the truth is we envied her these strengths.) To the rest of us, this lovely woman "had it all together" in every area of her life.  

Working with a saint

Sue and I were friends and I liked her a lot, but I secretly felt a bit intimidated and uncomfortable around her. She came as close as anyone I could think of to being a Proverbs 31 woman. 

In short, Sue was everything I was not. Everything I wanted to be and kept resolving to be, but never quite achieved.  

No wonder I so often viewed her as "right" and myself as "wrong." 

Now we two Christian women were to work as a pair. Well, why not? We were adults and we might even be a perfect match, right?

Wrong. We drove each other slightly nuts

Sue wanted to nail down all details four months ahead of time. I considered that way too early and typically responded, “Don’t worry. It will all come together.”

I enjoy last-minute inspirations and the surprises that come when something “works out.”

Master planner Sue found that a foreign concept. She couldn't rest until her multiple lists had every single box checked. Only then could she feel confident the event would go without a hiccup. 

After awhile I gave up trying to put her off and adapted to her style of planning. Before long we had planned every detail and lined up people for every task, with months to spare. 

Sue's frown lines eased and so did mine. It felt good to have every minute of the event planned, so good I vowed--again--to mend my evil ways. 

The great day arrives

We arrived early, both of us certain everything about the big day would go smoothly.

Enter Reality, a.k.a., the usual glitches that accompany any big event.

People who agreed to bring this or that arrived empty-handed. Others who were scheduled to handle various tasks never showed--and they hadn't called with an excuse.  

To my great surprise, Sue could not adjust. She froze, except when she sputtered. It was as if she couldn't think how to function and deal with the moment. 

I, the last-minute type, quickly came up with a Plan B and found substitutes for people who didn't show. I sent others to quickly purchase what was missing.

That day I simply did what needed to be done, as always, and no big deal. No one seemed to notice anything missing.

Breakthrough!

It sounds strange but that day became a gift to me. For as long as I could remember I had prayed to "be more organized," but never managed it for more than a week or two. 

I previously viewed Sue as a sort of poster child for being in control and I admired her.

Now I saw the downside of her more orderly personality. She had to plan and had to stay on schedule or be flummoxed.  

I'm the opposite, always ready to interrupt what I'm doing to listen and I'm quick to adapt. That's good, but being easily distracted gets in the way of finishing what I start.

Could my natural approach to life--which I labeled "disorganized" and saw as a weakness--be in its own way a strength? 

Every personality type has both strengths and weaknesses

This truth pours balm on marriage and family relationships and can help defuse tensions on the job.

First we pray to see other people and ourselves as we are. That may take awhile, because growing always does.

Eventually we realize that it's okay for them and for us to be who we are.   

Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.  --Romans 15:7  NIV

Consider it one small step for peace with others--and with ourselves. 

God makes us one-of-a-kind, remember?

As usual, the Apostle Paul gives us wise counsel.  

In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. ... Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. ... And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. --Romans 12:6 LNT; Colossians 3:12-14  NIV 

Let's not settle for "live and let live." That's too shallow and we miss too much.

May we learn to appreciate the people in our lives and their individual strengths--and extend the same courtesy to ourselves.  

Most of all let's rejoice that God made each of us. As we are. For a purpose. 

Still learning,  

Lenore      

 

Right Thinking Sets Us Free

Here's a handy acronym to remember: W.I.A.T.                

It stands for Wrong Ideas Appearing True.        

Every one of us carries around at least a few of them in our subconscious.
They lodge  down deep, below the level of our awareness. We may have acquired them long ago, which explains why we have a hard time recognizing mistaken thinking.

Yet these WIATs probably influence us more than we realize. 

• They color our thinking and our mood
  
• They influence our behavior
• They govern the way we look at events and individuals

Some WIATs are silly and we know it

Yet even rational, intelligent people still may accept them as truth. Most of us know at least one person who believes something like this:

• Always leave a building through the same door you entered or it will bring bad luck
• Never say something is going well or you'll jinx it
• If you say you're happy it guarantees you soon will be unhappy

WIATs can be contagious

We spread them to our family and friends as easily as the flu virus.

I think of the young woman friend who always removed every Kleenex pack, umbrella, etc., from her car before she'd leave it for maintenance. When I asked why, she answered, "Well, you know how mechanics are. They'll steal you blind every time."

When did she get that idea? Here's her answer: "Oh, everybody knows it's true. It happens all the time."

"Not to me," I said. "I've never had a problem, neither has anyone in our family."

That stopped her for a moment and then she said, "Well, it happened to my dad. After that he never left his car or truck at a garage or loaned it out without first emptying it out. He warned me to be careful and so I am."

Most of us can't identify the origins of our WIATs so easily.

Be on the alert for notions that don't stand up to logic

We do it all the time. Haven't you ever said something and then asked yourself, Now where did that come from?

Think how often we say something like this:

• I can't wear that color.
• I could never do that. I don't have the brain/talent/strength for such things.
• She would never want to be friends with me. 
  

Sometimes we can trace our bogus thinking back to one of our parents and their thoughtless remarks.

That's not surprising, because children usually accept without question whatever our moms or dads say. Those words, true or false, can dog us for life.

Starting over

Now's the time to clear out old wrong messages and replace them with truth. After all, aren't we wiser now?

Here's a place to start:  

1. Next time you put yourself down, stop and say out loud--or think--"That's not true!"
2. Replace the faulty thinking. State what is true, based on what you know today and your own logic
3. Repeat as often as needed

Yes, I know it sounds too simple, but it works. Just stick with it until you've banished old thinking that's wrong.

(It's true. I've lived these strategies long enough to see many of my WIATs fade away.)

Revamping our wrong notions, once and for all

If we realize we're stuck in old thinking that hurts us more than helps us, it's time to leave it behind. 

Jesus came to set us free, but sometimes even Christians forget that whatever weighed us down in the past need burden us no more: 

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. --Psalm 46:1 (ESV)

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he [or she] is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!                      --2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)

In Christ, WIATs lose their power over us. (That doesn't mean we'll never let wrong thinking take hold again.)

From now on let's hold all our ideas up to the light of faith and right thinking and what makes sense now. Let's be free of old thinking!

Learning along with you,

Lenore

 

Encouragement for our down times

Every news broadcast reminds us that just breathing could be dangerous. 

Covid-19 is everywhere and it feels as if everything changed overnight.

We are smack up against the truth that life is hard and beyond our control.  

It's astonishingly easy to be a sponge and absorb the constant stream of bad news and scary warnings on all sides.

Then we fall into the trap of expecting the worst, justifying it by explaining we just want to be ready for what comes.  

Who wants to live that way?  

Re-think your thinking

You and I cannot change the world or what's happening, but we can change where we fasten our thoughts.

Whatever our personal situation may be, here's what we know for rock-bottom sure:

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.  --Hebrews 13:8

Does that make us immune to hurting when someone we love becomes ill or dies? Do we laugh at job loss? Do we feel nothing when crises wipe out retirement savings? 

Of course not. The difference is we don't give in and park our minds in Pity Land.

If anyone knew about suffering, it was the Apostle Paul. Try reading his words aloud and listen with your heart.

For God, who said, "Let light shine out of darkness," made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this is all-surpassing power is from God and not from us.

We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed ... Therefore, we do not lose heart.    --2 Corinthians 4:6-9, 16a

I believe every word of these passages, yet I confess, this "jar of clay" sometimes gets discouraged, too

That's why I love this phrase from Psalm 103:14:

. . . for he remembers that we are dust.

Whenever I start beating up on myself for not being the shining strong example of faith I want to be, I think of these wonderful words and remind myself I am only dust.

Imperfect. 

Human.

But loved by God, who knows my weaknesses and loves me simply because I love Jesus. That means I can forgive myself and move on.

So can you.

We see what we look for

Once the question of who we are in Christ is settled in our minds we look at life from a different perspective.

We let go of the "victim mindset" and accept that life can be hard but like Paul, we may be down but we are are not destroyed. 

Here's what God said to His people through Moses--and to you and me.

I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life . . .     --Deuteronomy 30:19-20

That means every morning--every moment, really--we decide: Will I choose life?

Because that makes all the difference. 

Still learning, too, 

Lenore