I received this in my inbox the other day and thought you might get a kick out of it.
How Do You Make Twins?
For all you people who, like Jason, thought I was making an announcement…Sorry.
Archive - January, 2009
Speaking without Notes: Introduction to My Upcoming E-book
Have you got a speech or presentation coming up? Do you want to really connect with your audience? Do you want to WOW them and make a major impression? Do you want to get invited back?
One of the number one things you can do is cut the lifeline between you and the lectern. Learn to speak without notes. Maintain eye-contact 100% of the time. Talk with your audience, don’t read to them. My upcoming e-book is designed to provide you with the 10 1/2 steps I follow in every presentation to help me connect with my audience and nail my presentations. Check out the introduction and tell me what you think.
“The #1 Key to Speak Like a Pro in 10½ Steps: From the classroom to the boardroom, from tens to thousands, speak in public without notes and look like a pro, not an idiot.”
Introduction: What You’ll Get Out of This Book
Screaming, you wake with a cold sweat. The sheets are a tangled mess. You had that dream again. You were standing in front of a crowd of people—maybe it was your English class, your company’s budget committee, your boss and his minions or just a group of unknown people. You were supposed to make the presentation but nothing was going right. You looked down and weren’t wearing any pants. You turned on the projector and the picture your “friends” staged while you were asleep in college showed up. You touched the lectern and it fell over. But the absolute worst part…you couldn’t find your notes. Okay, maybe being pantsless was worse than that. But still, what on earth can you do if you don’t have your notes?
This is an insecurity dream. And it really is most people’s worst nightmare. More people are afraid of speaking in public than dying, which means, as Jerry Seinfeld pointed out, when you attend a funeral, more people would rather be in the casket than behind the lectern.
I’ve known high school and college students who have taken zeros on assignments rather than give a speech. I’ve heard of businessmen and women who would rather be passed over for promotion than speak to a group. Perhaps you understand their fear.
The psychologists can provide their reports on why people fear speaking in public. I’m sure there are all kinds of issues involved. However, in this booklet, I provide you with the number one key to facing that fear and conquering it.
Know your presentation cold.
Over the past 15 years, I have given more than 1000 presentations. They have ranged from 5 minutes to more than 1 hour. The single greatest decision to improve my presentations was the choice to never speak from notes again. This was a big decision for me because I don’t have the luxury of only a few speeches to present over and over and over. I’m a preacher and want to offer something new every week…and I never speak from notes. I have even had times when I had to give four presentations in one day without any time in between for further preparation and I did it without speaking from notes. People have repeatedly asked me how I do it. I’m finally sharing how because I believe you can learn to do it too.
Whether you are giving a high school research report or a business proposal… Whether you are speaking to a handful or a crowd… Whether you are speaking for your first time or your fiftieth… This booklet is for you.
Overcome your fear by knowing your presentation cold. Wow your audience by looking them in the eye the whole time. Stand out among your peers by going the extra mile.
I’ll show you how with 10½ steps.
Are you ready?
Help Your Kids Stay Off Drugs, Pt. 3–Teach Them to Talk About Things
The three rules of unhealthy families are
Rule #3: Don’t Talk
We’ve learned over the past two weeks that these rules are a sure fire way to lead our kids into addictions and failed relationships. I’ll repeat, there’s no fool proof way of having happy healthy kids. But we can certainly give our kids a leg up if we learn to break these rules.
Nobody thinks they live by the last rule. At least, I haven’t been with any families who declare they have taken a vow of silence. They talk. They talk about football, baseball and the Olympics. They discuss the weather. They share the latest office gossip. They talk about every one else’s problems. But when it comes to anything truly deep, meaningful and personal, they are silent as the grave. Instead of talking, they toss around jokes (all the while declaring the jokes demonstrate they are emotionally healthy), they rage, they minimize, they sidestep, they stonewall.
Few families actually allow talk about feelings, problems or embarrassing situations. There may be a huge pink elephant in the room. Most families will walk gingerly around it and never say anything, pretending it’s not in the way and doesn’t smell.
We’ll start with the big pink elephant rearing its head in this blog post. Junior comes home from school and says, “Mom, what’s oral sex?” Mom gasps and drops her coffee cup on the floor. As she hurriedly runs to grab a towel she shouts, “Where did you hear about that?” “Tommy said his older brother’s girlfriend does it.” “What!? We don’t talk about that. I don’t want you talking to Tommy anymore.” Junior just learned, in his family, you’re not allowed to talk about sex. Where will Junior go one day when he’s experiencing sexual feelings and is really interested in finding out more about it? Not Mom and Dad, it’s against the rules to talk about sex in their family.
How about this scenario? Susie’s still dressed in her volleyball uniform when Dad gets home from work late. “Dad, you said you’d be at my game this time.” Dad, already frustrated from a tough day at the office harshly replies, “Look, I don’t want to talk about it. When you’re an adult you’ll understand.” What did Susie learn? Her family doesn’t talk about hurts and feelings. Where will she go one day when she’s really hurt by some young man? Not her parents. We don’t talk about hurts here.
Or yet another. Pre-teen Johnny asks his Mom, “Why does our church do such and such? Jimmy’s church doesn’t do that.” Mom, likely not very sure herself responds, “Because that’s what God said and I won’t let you go around questioning what God said. Do you understand me, young man?” What did Johnny learn? In our family we aren’t allowed to talk about spiritual questions and especially disagreements. Where will Johnny go one day when he’s really having a crisis of faith? Not his parents. They don’t talk about spiritual matters in their family.
I hate to bring up this one because this is one where I follow the rules too often. Dad rebukes Mary for something. Mary, having been unjustly accused and misunderstood, “But, Dad…” “No ‘buts,’ young lady. You will listen to me and you won’t give me any lip. Do you understand?” What did Mary learn? I’m not allowed to talk about injustice when I’ve been wronged or speak up in my own defense. Where will Mary go when someone touches her inappropriately and made her feel uncomfortable and dirty? Not to Mom and Dad. She’s knows what the person did was wrong but knows just as firmly her parents will blame her and she’s not allowed to speak up in her own defense.
Things we’re definitely not allowed to talk about. Dad’s alcoholism, Mom’s raging fits. The black sheep older brother who’s taking drugs and got a girl pregnant. The teenager next door who has spiked green hair and a chain running from his pierced nose to his pierced ear. We don’t talk about sex. We don’t talk about death and dying. We don’t talk about our hurts. We don’t talk about our feelings. We’re not allowed to say we’re sad. We’re definitely not allowed to say we’re mad. If we ever say we’re anything but happy, someone might even bring God into the picture, saying, “God doesn’t like it when you’re sad. You better cheer up now or I’ll give you something to cry about.” We learn that we’re not good Christians if we ever say we’re anything but, “I’m blessed.”
There’s a great little scene in the 1995 Emma Thompson version of Sense and Sensibility. Following a very trying lunch and afternoon with Mrs. Jennings, who was trying to figure out if the Dashwood girls had any suitors, Marianne rebuked Margaret for parading ignorant assumptions about a Mr. F being engaged to their sister Elinor. Marianne speaks ill of Mrs. Jennings and Margaret pipes up in her defense and Mrs. Dashwood, the girls’ mother, cuts the conversation short.
Margaret: I like her, she talks about things. We never talk about things.
Mrs. Dashwood: Hush, please. That is enough Margaret. If you cannot think of anything appropriate to say you will please restrict your remarks to the weather.
And thus we learn we are not allowed to talk about “things.” No, we haven’t taken a vow of silence, but since we’re not allowed to feel and we don’t trust anyone with our feelings anyway, we don’t talk about “things.” Sadly, in this scenario we know many things about the people with whom we live, but we don’t actually know them. And we certainly don’t want them to know us. After all, we haven’t talked about it because we don’t trust them.
Certainly, we need structure in our homes. Children should speak with respect. Children do need to learn some conversations are not appropriate in certain settings. However, we do need to let our children know it is good to talk about things. We need to learn to talk about things. Let us not restrict our remarks to the weather.
The Entire Serenity Prayer
I’ve seen what is called the “Serenity Prayer” for years. Most commonly it is attributed to Reinhold Niebuhr, written during the early 1930s. It became famous in modified form by 12 step programs. I’ve seen it cross-stitched on walls. I’ve seen it printed on posters. I’ve even seen it written on bathroom stalls.
Until recently, I thought it only contained three lines:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.
That little bit of the prayer has actually helped me in numerous situations. It has kept me from blowing up at people I cannot change. It has kept me from falling prey to temptations I cannot change. It has kept me from sinking in the mire of past actions I cannot change.
However, I have learned that the original prayer/poem was a bit longer and I want to share it with you.
- God grant me the serenity
- To accept the things I cannot change;
- Courage to change the things I can;
- And wisdom to know the difference.
- Living one day at a time;
- Enjoying one moment at a time;
- Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
- Taking, as He did, this sinful world
- As it is, not as I would have it;
- Trusting that He will make all things right
- If I surrender to His Will;
- So that I may be reasonably happy in this life
- And supremely happy with Him
- Forever and ever in the next.
I know this prayer is not inspired scripture. But it certainly was inspired by scripture. I want to remember this prayer. I want to remember that there are numerous things I cannot change and I need to quit wasting my time and energy trying to change those. There is something I can change, by the grace of God. That is me. May I always have the wisdom to remember that.
I want to live one day at a time (cf. Matthew 6:34) and quit trashing today by worrying about tomorrow. I want to trust that God will make all things right in His time. I want to surrender myself to His will and simply do the next right thing. Through that, I can have happiness, not through pursuing my own ideas. My best thinking messed me up. God’s thinking is what will save me and make tomorrow better.
Just thought I’d share.
How to Keep a Smile on Your Face and Improve Workplace Morale
Thanks to my friend James Wood for passing this great advice for improving company morale and helping everyone keep a smile on their faces.
NOTICE TO ALL EMPLOYEES
All personnel will now be required to look happy while working. Company-approved supplies will be provided to each employee at little or no cost.
Workloads getting to you?
Feeling stressed?
Too many priorities and assignments?
Here is the new low-cost, company-approved solution to cope with multiple priorities and assignments!
Each employee will be supplied 2 paper clips and rubber bands. (See Fig 1.)
Figure 1
Assemble items as shown in Fig 2.
Figure 2
Apply as shown in Fig 3.
Figure 3
Enjoy your day. This new office equipment will help you to reach the end of a productive work day with a smile on your face!
The Management
Get the Most from Your Team, Validate
Thanks to Bill Seaver for putting me on to this.
The video is rather lengthy, but I think you’ll like it and it teaches a great lesson.
***Warning:There are a couple of mild expletives.
Here’s the link for those who are getting this via e-mail: Validate.
Clay’s comment made me want to come back to this post and add some validation. I’ve met some people who have really done this in my life and I don’t want to take them for granted. There are three guys in general who I think have a true gift for validating and affirming others. I have lots of great friends with lots of great abilities. However, I definitely don’t want to take for granted the ones who seem to go out of their way to lift me up.
Phillip Shumake (his website is coming soon so no link yet)
You guys are great. You’re amazing. You’re awesome. You give. I’m glad you’re my friends.
Help Your Kids Stay Off Drugs Pt 2–Teach Them to Trust
We continue our series on the three unhealthy family rules, by which too many families live.
Rule #2: Don’t Trust
Last week, we pointed out living by these rules are some of the biggest causes of addictions as we grow up. These are the reasons that some people can go through detox, endure the withdrawal period, seem to be clean, come home and go right back to their addiction. It’s more than physical. Because they learned they weren’t supposed to feel, learned not to trust and learned not to talk, they have nowhere to turn to deal with the feelings coming up, so they medicate them.
We learned about how we can teach our children not to feel in part 1. In just the same way, we must teach our children to trust. Relationships are built on trust. Without trust, you can’t have vulnerability. Without vulnerability, you can’t have emotional, mental or spiritual intimacy. Without emotional, mental or spiritual intimacy you can’t have a good relationship.
Of course, some are saying, “You have to be careful teaching your kids to trust people. They can really get hurt.” See, you learned this lesson while growing up too.
“Oh no, I’ve never taught my children not to trust me or not to trust anyone.” Good, I hope that’s the case. I know for me, I’ve violated this rule too many times and I’ve seen it violated.
Let me share 8 ways we teach our children not to trust.
1. Gossip
Not gossiping about our kids. Gossiping about other people in front of our kids. Kids aren’t stupid. They can see when we treat others well to their faces and then talk about all their flaws, faults and problems behind their backs. What do we think they learn from that? They can only surmise we do the same to them. All those nice things we say to their faces won’t mean squat because they’re sure we must be talking badly about them behind their backs.
Additionally, since most of their relationships are going to be fundamentally based on what they learn from us, they’ll think everyone must do that. Everyone must gossip. Everyone must say nice things to their faces but bad things behind their backs. It will be hard for anyone to break through that wall and gain their trust.
We must watch what we say to and about others. Our kids are learning to trust or not.
2. Belittling
This ties in with the Don’t Feel rule. Have you ever laughed at your child when they shared that something hurt them or bothered them? That is so easy to do. Their problems are so small. To us they seem insignificant and humorous. In the big scheme of things they may not matter that much. But they matter that much to them. If we belittle them by laughing at them when they open up to share their feelings, they learn not to trust us with their feelings.
Or what about this practical example. One of our children confides in us that she kind of likes a certain boy. Then every time we see that boy we needle the child. “Oh look, there’s so and so.” Or even worse, “Hey so and so, look who’s here.” What have we told our daughter? “I can’t be trusted with your feelings about boys. Don’t share anything with me, I’ll only hurt or embarrass you with it.”
3. Mocking
When emotions come out, they can be…well…emotional. In our culture, truly expressing emotions is not the norm (which will lead us directly into the Don’t Talk rule that will come next week), therefore when they come out we might mock them.
“Big boys don’t cry.” “Quit being such a sensitive girl.” Or worse, we might even mock their crying and then laugh at them. With little children their attempts to express their anger can easily come off seeming a little silly. The last thing we want to do is make fun of their expressions of anger. To add insult to injury, how often do we store up the story of our child’s emotions to share with our spouses when they get home. We tell the story and share a good laugh at the child’s expense.
All our kids learn from this is we can’t be trusted with their feelings.
4. Betraying confidences
Sometimes we can feel our kids’ secrets are not nearly as important as ours. Who really cares if we tell our friends about our son’s girl troubles or about our daughter’s fears when she had her first menstrual cycle? It’s not like these are issues of national security. We know no one will look down on them. Those really aren’t big deals.
Once again, it is to our kids. We need to remember how we felt when we were kids. Sharing these kinds of secrets was big stuff. We were laying our heart on the line. We were making ourselves extremely vulnerable. I know that as we got older and started dealing with bigger things we came to believe those issues weren’t so big. But back then they were huge. Even though one day our kids will also come to realize those things were not that big, the feeling of betrayal will linger even when they can’t remember why. They’ll learn not to trust others.
5. Broken promises
How do we feel when someone tells us they will do something and then they don’t? For our kids it is ten times worse when their own parent makes a promise and then breaks it. Our children don’t have the mental capacity or experience to understand about our work and other responsibilities. They just know we promised and we didn’t follow through.
The first thing this means is we need to be careful what we promise and commit to. If we’re loose with making promises and commitments we can’t keep, our kids will lose trust. Keep in mind, you don’t have to say, “I promise” for a child to think we’ve promised. If we say we’re going to do something, we had better do it. Otherwise, our kids learn people can’t be trusted to do what they say.
Certainly, there are times when promises get broken and we couldn’t help it. In these cases, we must validate and affirm our child’s feelings of sadness, anger, betrayal. Don’t berate them for their feelings. Remember how you feel when someone brakes a promise to you. Then apologize and make an amends. Don’t offer excuses and justifications. Make amends and ask for forgiveness. But don’t let this become a habit. I believe our children are resilient. But I also believe they are smart. They can see when you just have a habit of lying but then trying to make nice to get out of it.
6. Overreaction to mistakes
I am certainly a believer in corporal punishment. I believe there is a time to use the rod of discipline. However, if we hold our kids to adult standards and then overreact with discipline because they acted like kids, they’ll learn to fear, not trust us. I believe our children have a sense of justice. They can learn early on that misbehavior warrants appropriate discipline. My wife and I have had great conversations with our kids in which we agreed together about disciplinary measures for certain issues of disobedience and rebellion.
Sadly, some of us don’t react with appropriate discipline. We overreact because we’re angry, inconvenienced, frustrated, embarrassed. In these cases, our children learn we can’t be trusted with their mistakes. If we yell, scream and belittle because our child accidentally spilled his milk, telling him accidents wouldn’t happen if he just paid more attention, we shouldn’t be surprised when our child doesn’t want to come talk to us when he’s older and has made some really big mistakes. How many prodigals don’t make the trip home because they learned early on they couldn’t trust their parents with their mistakes.
7. Don’t believe them
I know this is tough. Our kids don’t have a highly developed sense of morality. They haven’t figured out the morality of telling truth and lies. So sometimes they will lie out of self-preservation. They’re not actively choosing to be immoral, they’re just kids. That being the case, we sometimes run on the default belief that our kids aren’t telling the truth. Perhaps we are afraid that others will think we’re being soft with our kids.
I recall one time when an adult called to tell me about how my daughter was picking on her grandson. The truth of the matter was the boys had been picking on the girls first and the girls were just retaliating out of a sense of self-defense. What would have happened if I had ignored my daughter’s explanation and assumed she was lying? I would have taught her that I don’t trust her. I would haver taught her that I don’t trust people. If I don’t trust people, why should she?
8. Don’t trust them
Too many parents codependently follow their kids around checking up on them to make sure they did what they said, did it the right way, did it the parents’ way. They don’t trust their kids to do what’s right and it is betrayed in the way they deal with them. Every conversation is a cross-examination about whereabouts, who are you withs and what are you doings.
Look, I know it’s tough. We are concerned for our kids. However, what we need to work on is modeling right behavior, teaching right behavior, preparing them to face temptations and then trusting them to do the right thing. This is increasingly true the older our children get and should be a way of life for us once they are grown and out of our house.
Here’s the key, if we’ve let them learn it is okay to feel and then to trust, when they make mistakes, they’ll know. They’ll feel guilty and they’ll talk to us about it. Then we have opportunity to let them learn positively from their mistakes. Taking the other approach is a vicious cycle. When we show our children we don’t trust, they won’t trust us. They’ll do wrong things but be afraid to talk to us about it. Then they’ll just sit in their shame and guilt. Having no healthy release for these feelings, they’ll look to medicate them by pursuing those same mistakes that got them here in the first place. The less we trust them, the less they trust us, the more mistakes they make, the more they look rebellious, the less we trust them…
Yes, it is true. Sooner or later, when we teach our children to trust, they’ll get burned by someone. However, if we’ve lived in such a way that they can trust us, they’ll talk to us about it and we can help them through it in a healthy way.
If you really want to keep your kids away from addictions, let them feel and be trustable. As I said last week, there is no fool proof formula. However, when you follow this, you’ll give your kids a leg up against addiction. Additionally, you’ll give them a leg up for serenity and peace in their marriage, relationships and life.
The Psalms Teach Us to be Honest with Ourselves and with God
I’ve been studying the Psalms a great deal lately. I came across this great statement from Walter Brueggemann’s Praying the Psalms. Instead of me commenting, tell me what you think about it.
“Note that the Psalms thus propose to speak about human experience in an honest, freeing way. this in contrast to much human speech and conduct which is in fact a cover-up. In most arenas where people live, we are expected and required to speak the language of safe orientation and equilibrium, either to find it so or to pretend we find it so. For the normal, conventional functioning of public life, the raw edges of disorientation and reorientation must be denied or suppressed for purposes of public equilibrium. As a result, our speech is dulled and mundane. Our passion has been stilled and is without imagination. And mostly the Holy One is not addressed, not because we dare not, but because God is far away and hardly seems important. This means that the agenda and intention of the Psalms is considerably at odds with the normal speech of most people, the normal speech of a stabled, functioning, self-deceptive culture in which everything must be kept running young and smooth.
“Against that, the speech of the Psalms is abrasive, revolutionary, and dangerous. It announces that life is not like that, that our common experience is not one of well-being and equilibrium, but a churning, disruptive experience of dislocation and relocation. Perhaps in our conventional, routinized prayer life (e.g., the daily practice of the office) that is one of the reasons the Psalter does not yield its power–because out of habit or fatigue or numbness, we try to use the Psalms in our equilibrium. And when we do that we miss the point of the Psalms. Moreover, our own experience may be left untapped and inarticulate and therefore not liberated…
“Thus I suggest that most of the Psalms can only be appropriately prayed by people who are living at the edge of our lives, sensitive to the raw hurts, the primitive passions, and the naive elations that are at the bottom of our life. For most of us, liturgical or devotional entry into the Psalms requires a real change of pace. It asks us to depart from the closely managed world of public survival, to move into the open, frightening, healing world of speech with the Holy One.”
Don’t Be Too Forward: 10 Don’ts of E-mail Forwarding and 1 Do
About.com reports about 210 billion e-mails are sent every day. That’s over 2 million sent every second. I’m guessing more than half of those are caused by those pesky chain e-mails that keep getting forwarded. What do you do? Your computer dings, dongs or makes whatever sound when you’ve been hit with an e-mail. The chain letter says you should pass it on or you’ll have 20 years of bad luck, your stocks will crash, your house will burn, your spouse will leave you, your soul will burn in hell and you obviously don’t care about the person who sent it to you. Sufficiently guilted, shamed and frightened you hit the forward button and dump every name of your employees, company, team, managers (maybe just your entire mailing list) in the address bar.
STOP!
Please, we’re already getting too many e-mails to keep up with and get our work done. Let me share 10 Don’ts of E-mail Forwarding so you won’t ever be considered Too Forward. Before we get to them, I’m sure there are exceptions to each of these rules. Please don’t harangue me with those exceptions. If you have an exception, let it be that…an exception. Recognize these as general rules that should generally be followed to preserve your career, your work relationships and the respect of your team.
1. Don’t send it unless you know it’s true.
I am so sick of receiving e-mails about Madelyn Murray O’Hair’s petition to get rid of all religious broadcasting. NEWSFLASH: She’s dead. She doesn’t have a petition out there and never did. That rumor started back in 1975 and is still going strong. I even once had a guy knock on my office door to get me to sign a petition to block O’Hair’s petition. FCC denies it. Of course, they could be in on the conspiracy.
Anyway, don’t send it unless you know it’s true. We already have enough misinformation out there. We don’t need any more.
2. Don’t send it with an admission that it might not be true.
I know some of you are sick of getting e-mail replies from people like me when you forward a message that’s not true with rebuttal and evidence. Please, please, please, do not start copping out and saying, “I don’t know if this is true, but…” Refer back to rule #1. If you don’t know if it’s true, don’t send it. By the way, even with your cop out, I’ll respond if it’s not true.
Okay, I’m not saying you need to spend hours of research with every forwarded e-mail. At least check out Snopes.com before you send it.
3. Don’t send it unless it is fair to all involved.
Listen, I’m no political fan of Barak Obama. However, I’m tired of getting e-mails that misquote his books in order to accuse him of being anything from an Islamic seditionist to the antichrist. Even if it’s about politicians we don’t like, when we are passing along information intended to defame someone (especially if it violates rule #1) it is still gossip and slander. Don’t taint your relationships with that.
4. Don’t send it if its crude, vulgar or prejudiced.
I don’t want your jokes about black people, Arabs or the Chinese. I don’t want to see pictures of the plumber’s butt crack. I don’t want to read the joke about the telephone repairman and the stripper. Of course, I don’t think you should be passing much of this around anyway. However, you should especially not forward this to co-workers, employees or managers. It’s inappropriate and offensive. Even if you think it is the funniest thing you’ve seen or heard in 25 years, not everyone will agree. You don’t need that kind of tension with your co-workers or team. If you must pass this on, reserve it only for your friends you’re absolutely sure will enjoy it.
(Okay, my guilty pleasure on this one, blonde jokes might be an exception.)
5. Don’t send it if you really didn’t want it.
This rules seems almost like a no-brainer. However, I’m sure there are tons of e-mails sent everyday by the very people who complain about getting all these forwards. I don’t get it. But I know it happens because I’ve heard people who have forwarded junk to me complain about all those forwards. I don’t know. Maybe it’s an addiction. Maybe some people just can’t help but hit the forward button. Here’s the deal, if you thought it was an intrusion on your day, so will almost everyone you send it to. If you thought it was stupid, so will most others. If you didn’t want to get it, don’t pass it on. Chances are no one else will want to get it either.
6. Don’t send it if you’re only doing so because you feel guilty or ashamed.
Personally, I have a rule that even if I liked the e-mail, if it has some guilt-ridden shaming statement at the end trying to manipulate me to pass it on, I can it. Sorry. If you go the rest of your life thinking I don’t love you just because I didn’t pass on your e-mail to 10 people and send a copy back to you, that just shows you have emotional issues. There are 12 step programs for that. Avail yourself of them, please. Jesus never asked me to forward your e-mail so I could go to heaven. The stock market and the safety of my home is not predicated on how many times I send out your e-mail. If my work fails, it will not be because I don’t care about the children in your e-mail. My teeth won’t fall out. Neither will my hair. I won’t get in a car wreck. I won’t die a painful death just because I didn’t pass on your e-mail. I refuse to be manipulated by attempts to shame me or make me feel guilty.
You don’t have to have as firm a rule on this as I do. However, if you wouldn’t sent it on because you want to but are only doing so because the last paragraph made you feel like you weren’t a good enough Christian, like you didn’t care about people, like you don’t love soldiers or whatever, don’t send it.
7. Don’t send it if it will guilt and shame other people.
Maybe you really liked the e-mail even though it had all that shaming language in it. If you want to pass that on, cut out all the shaming and guilt stuff and just pass it on for the fun of it. Let the other person decide if they want to send it on. Don’t try to guilt them into it.
“But this is really important and I’m afraid they won’t forward it.” SO!? If it’s not important enough to them to forward it on their own, it’s probably not that important. If it really is important or moving or funny, they’ll likely forward it to friends on their own.
Please, quit trying to manipulate people to get them to send stuff to others.
8. Don’t send it unless it will increase goodwill and better relationships.
I’m not a Rotarian, but I love their 4-Way Test. I love this part of it. You see, I’m not saying never forward anything. I’ve received some of the funniest stuff ever in forwarded e-mails. I’ve read some of the most beautiful poetry and watched the most moving videos and pictures. I’ve received lots of awesome forwards that I passed on. I received one just yesterday that led me to a great video. But with each one, I thought it was a blessing. I was convinced it would bring a blessing to the recipient and to our relationship. Don’t send it unless it will increase goodwill and better your relationships.
9. Don’t send it if it will steal time.
This is specifically a rule for co-workers, employees, etc. Don’t send an e-mail if you know it’s going to steal time. I’m sure that game you found last night is great. However, if you forward it to your team, they’re going to want to check it out. Three hours later they’ll still be checking it out. Don’t send them those funny pics from that hilarious website if it will cause them to look up the website and spend hours browsing the hilarity. I’m merely suggesting caution on this one. I’ve received some great stuff that I loved in the moment, but three or four hours later wished I’d never seen it. Don’t do that to your team.
10. Don’t if you’re in doubt.
Are you unsure if you should pass a particular e-mail along? Don’t.
There is 1 Do for e-mail forwarding.
1. If you get this post in your e-mail feed, forward it to as many people as you know.
If you don’t, you will forever be inundated with inane e-mails that fill you with guilt or steal your time. If that happens, you may lose your job. Your spouse may leave you. Your kids may hate you. Your house will burn. You’ll probably lose your soul. It will mean you don’t love Jesus, the little children, those starving in Africa or me.
Sorry, couldn’t help myself.
Please, don’t be too forward.
Help Your Kids Stay Off Drugs, Let Them Feel
Most families learn and live by three major but unhealthy rules.
1. Don’t Feel.
We’ll talk about the others over the next few weeks; today the first one is on my mind. I have been tested on this two times in as many days.
Test #1
Over the weekend, Ryan cut his upper lip. It formed an unattractive scab underneath his nose. In fact, to be honest, it kind of stood out like a sore thumb. On Monday morning, I walked into his room and he had put a band-aid on. But he was also covering his mouth and saying, “I don’t want to go to school today.” The whole reason is he was embarrassed by the bandage and the cut. For an instant, my old sin enslaved self started to rear up. I reached for the band-aid to yank it off and harshly rebuke him saying, “You don’t need that stupid band-aid, take it off.” Fortunately, none of that happened. I caught myself and I stopped myself. Instead, I hugged him. Told him it was okay to be embarrassed but that he couldn’t stay home from school just because he had a cut lip. He was going to have to work through it. I also told him I didn’t think he needed the band-aid, but he was having none of that.
I was proud of him when just before he left to go wait on the driveway for the bus, I noticed the band-aid was off and he was happy.
Test #2
Last night, the weather report was that we were going to get snow. Ethan is only 9. He assumed the weather report had to be true. He wanted to stay up since he wasn’t going to school today. I had to explain to him the weather is wrong sometimes and we needed to go ahead and act like school was on schedule. Sadly, when Ethan’s alarm went off this morning. He looked outside and there was no snow.
As I was getting ready, I thought I heard some strange noises coming from the boys’ bedroom. I walked in and Ethan was lying face down on the bed crying. The old sin-enslaved me started to rear up again. For an instant, I wanted to say, “Quit your whining and acting like a cry baby. We don’t always get what we want. Now buck up and finish getting ready for school.” Fortunately, that didn’t happen. Instead, I called him to me and gave him a hug. I let him know it was okay to be sad because he didn’t get the snow he wanted. However, even though he was sad, the next right thing was to get ready for school. Of course, I explained that we don’t always get what we want and it’s okay to be sad about that. However, we still have to keep our responsibilities. He laid back down for a few minutes and then finished getting ready.
The Springboard
Sadly, because the feelings of our children are often inconvenient (trust me, I don’t pass this test every time), we often act like their feelings are inappropriate or invalid. Even more sadly, when we do this, the message our kids get is not, “Buck up and move on,” but rather, “You are not valid.” Certainly, I know we should not be governed strictly by our feelings and emotions. However, we should be free to feel them.
Consider Ephesians 4:26, “Be angry and do not sin…” First, you need to know the phrase “be angry” is passive. That is, it is not talking about someone who is just angry. Rather, it is talking about someone who has been caused to be angry. But the anger is not wrong. They are allowed to feel the anger. Of course, when they are angered, they still have responsibilities. They cannot allow their anger to lead them to sin. But, they are allowed to feel the anger.
This is a guide for me for all emotions. My kids are allowed to be angry. They are allowed to be happy. They are allowed to be sad. They are allowed to be embarrassed. They are allowed to feel lonely, guilty, ashamed or afraid. They are allowed to feel frustrated. My job is not to squelch or strike these emotions out of their life. My job is to help them deal with them in a healthy way. My job is to help them avoid sin when they are feeling these emotions.
Why the Title About Drugs?
I didn’t just put the title in to pique your interest. What we are discussing here is actually the heart of addictions–whether substance or process addictions. You see, the number one cause for addiction is not simply experimentation (though I don’t advise experimentation). The number one cause for addiction is having to deal with feelings I have become convinced are not valid. The anger, fear, sadness, loneliness, etc. will be there even if we try to beat it out of our kids (You know, “Stop crying or I’ll give you a reason…”).
If we allow our kids to feel and use those as opportunities to teach them how to respond appropriately to feelings, they’ll be healthy. On the other hand, if we don’t let them feel, they’ll need to start doing something with those feelings. They’ll need to medicate them. Drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling, television, internet, video games, food, they can all become addictive.
Don’t get me wrong, there is no fail proof way to keep your kids from any of those things. But the number one key to give them a leg up and a push in the right direction is don’t give them a reason to medicate their feelings. Let them feel, affirm them in their feelings, guide them in their feelings, teach them how to deal with those feelings.
Of course, you cant’ give what you don’t have. If you’re constantly medicating your own feelings, get help or you’ll just perpetuate the cycle with your kids.
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