Category Archives: christianity

How to Stop Blaming Others…

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Years ago, there was a commercial for some laundry detergent that had a woman trying to get rid of the ring around the collar of her husband’s shirt. You saw the wife holding the shirt in her hand and hearing the voice chanting, Ring around the collar!

The narrator pointed out a distressed wife trying and trying to get the stains out as he says: You’ve tried scrubbing them out and soaking them out and you still get RING AROUND THE COLLAR! In the commercial, the ring around the collar was seen as telltale evidence of her failure.

What the ad never addressed was the obvious question: “Why didn’t that guy wash his neck?”

All of us have a tendency to fall into the pitfall of blaming others. Not blame for ring around the collar. But blame concerning the mistakes you commit in your life.

So let’s just clear the air. For many of the troubles you face in life, there’s no one to blame but yourself. Now that’s not true for everything. But for many things that is the case.

This podcast  addresses the tendency we all have to play the blame game as we struggle with The Pitfall of Blaming.

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PITFALL: Living Emotionally Driven Lives

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I miss Mr. Spock. Not Dr. Spock — the baby-book guy. I miss the pointy-eared Star Trek Mr. Spock from the planet Vulcan. I miss him because he was great illustration material.

Spock was from a society that, while it had emotion, chose to place that emotion inside the chains of rational thought. A constant tension in the Star Trek series was between Spock, who denied his emotional nature, and the humans, who often lived by emotions. Naturally, the humans always came out on top because the scripts were written by humans — not by Vulcans.

I miss Spock, because in many respects, he was right. Not that we should have no emotions. Emotions are part of the nature of God, printed on our being. So I am not saying emotions are bad. But it is essential that we humans do not allow our passions, our lusts, our selfishness, and our feelings to dominate our decision-making processes. When we do that, we fall into the pitfall addressed in this podcast.

The pitfall of emotional helplessness.

 

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Escaping the Trap of Pessimistic Fatalism

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I love the undo feature on computers.

If I accidently delete an important paragraph from a sermon, I can undo it. If I accidently delete a file I need, I can go to the recycle bin and restore it.

Google even allows me to un-send a message I have emailed within a few seconds of sending it.

It’s amazing how often I use that feature.

  • I say something I shouldn’t have said. Undo.
  • I forget to add a recipient. Undo.
  • Whoops — forgot the attachment. Undo.

Don’t you wish there was an undo button in life? There isn’t. So often you’re left with unrelenting guilt for things you cannot undo. If you don’t deal with that guilt, you will find yourself in this pitfall of pessimistic fatalism.

This podcast addresses the pitfall and gives counsel on how to avoid it, or, if you’re in it, how to escape it.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download