Stepping Back........

Principle Three: Sometimes positive change cannot occur until parents allow their children to experience the consequences of bad decisions.

Parents are accountable to teach their children to take responsibility for their actions. This is almost always a very hard thing to do and often may involve what seems to be a temporary abandonment. In a very real sense, parents can interfere with their children’s progress if they try to protect them from the consequences of their actions.

Our prototype here is Heavenly Father and His response to Adam and Eve after they had partaken of the forbidden fruit. He cast them out of the Garden of Eden, and to help them learn, He cursed the ground for their sake (see Gen. 3:17). While He promises that His grace will be sufficient for us, grace will not replace our experiencing consequences that are necessary to teach us something we need to know.

From: Ensign, July 2006, Families are forever and so is parenthood

Healthy Detachment – stepping back so that an individual can solve their own problems, learn from them, and then experiencing the growth that Heavenly Father desires for them

FHE Glass of Water..........

A young lady confidently walked around the room while explaining stress management to an audience. As she raised a glass of water, everyone was sure she was going to ask the ultimate question: 'Half empty or half full?' However, she fooled them all.
"How heavy is this glass of water?" she inquired with a smile.

Answers called out ranged from 8 oz. To 20 oz.

She replied, "The absolute weight doesn't matter. It depends on how long I hold it. If I hold it for a minute, that's not a problem. If I hold it for an hour, I'll have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you'll have to call an ambulance. In each case it's the same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes."

She continued, "That's the way it is with stress. If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, as the burden becomes increasingly heavy, we won't be able to carry on."

"As with the glass of water, you have to put it down for a while and rest before holding it again. When we're refreshed, we can carry on with the burden -- holding stress longer and better each time. So, as early in the evening as you can, put all your burdens down. Don't carry them through the evening and into the night.... Pick them up tomorrow.

"Whatever burdens you're carrying now, let them down for a moment. Relax; pick them up later after you've rested. Life is short. Enjoy it and the now 'supposed' stress that you've conquered!"

Tom Scheurn!!

San Tan Earnhardt is the number one Hyundai dealer again this year!!

Marrige....

“When we neglect setting boundaries with ourselves and focus instead on setting boundaries with those we think sorely need limits, we have limited our own spiritual growth.  As in any growth process, spiritual growth proceeds to the level that we invest in it.  When we only invest in changing someone else, they get the benefit of our efforts, but the important work we have to do has been neglected….

“If your spouse is…angry, irresponsible, inattentive, and self-centered, you will not grow if you continue to react to his sins. This is not seeking first God’s kingdom and righteousness (Matt.6:33); it is seeking satisfaction from another person (codependency.)

“We must become more deeply concerned about our own issues than our spouse’s.  We cannot overstate the importance of this idea.  One of the most frightening facts in existence is that God will someday call us to account for our lives here on earth: ‘For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad’ (2 Cor 5:10).  At that meeting we will not be able to blame, hide behind, or deflect to the sins and problems of our spouse.  It will be a one-on-one conversation with God. 

“Boundaries with yourself are a much bigger issue than boundaries in you marriage.  In the end, while we are only partly responsible for growing our marriages, we are completely responsible to God for developing our very souls.  You are responsible for half of your marriage and all of your soul. Boundaries on yourself are between you and God.”

Boundaries in Marriage,  Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend, p65-66

Life Is what Happens...

Someone has said that life is what happens to us while we are making other plans. Because of things over which we have no control, we cannot plan and bring to pass everything we desire in our lives….

So what should be done in the meantime? Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ prepares us for whatever life brings. This kind of faith prepares us to deal with life's opportunities—to take advantage of those that are received and to persist through the disappointments of those that are lost. In the exercise of that faith we should commit ourselves to the priorities and standards we will follow on matters we do not control and persist faithfully in those commitments whatever happens to us because of the agency of others or the timing of the Lord. When we do this, we will have a constancy in our lives that will give us direction and peace. Whatever the circumstances beyond our control, our commitments and standards can be constant.

Timing, BYU Speeches, Elder Dallin H. Oaks, Jan., 29, 2002

Women, Rejoice....By Elder Holland!

Elder Holland: Knowing women as I do and as the presiding Church officer here today, I want to say to you, “No, everything you have done is not wrong. No, you are not a failure. No, you are not personally to blame for every mishap in the world since the ark landed.” We are all pretty hard on ourselves, but it seems to me women are harder on themselves than men will ever be. Why is that so? We ask you not to do it. Repent when or where that is necessary, but then honor that other “R”—Rejoice! Make a resolve today that this is “your time” to be good to yourself. It will surprise you how much that helps you be good to all the others whom you want so much to bless in your life.

What Time Is This? Elder Jeffrey R. Holland and Patricia T. Holland, Friday, May 4, 2007, at the BYU Women’s Conference

Despair / Faith........

Despair--how many of us suffer from it?  Yet we do not realize that it is purely the absence of faith.  We cannot despair as long as we are willing to turn to God for help in our extremity.  When we are troubled, and can’t see a way out, it is only because we imagine that all solutions depend upon us.  We must remind ourselves that our human wisdom and ingenuity have often failed to bring the hoped for results.

Perhaps our too-heavy burdens have made us lose what faith we once had in our Heavenly Father.  Perhaps faith was never a part of our lives and we are not convinced we need it.

The reality and efficacy of faith, as a force for good, can be demonstrated.  When we let go of an overwhelming problem and let God handle it for us, we find that Divine Principle truly has a part in our lives.

A natural faith is indeed a gift, yet it is never denied to those who feel the need of something to cling to and are willing to reach out for it.  Knock and it shall be opened, seek and ye shall find, ask and ye shall receive.   When I consciously surrender my will to God’s will, I see faith at work in my life.

God answers our prayers for our best good.  When what we perceive as a bad outcome may be exactly what needs to happen so that we (or our loved one) can become who God knows we can become.  Where there is no struggle there is no strength.

“One Day at a Time in Alanon”

Before A Radical Step....

When I feel I must take a radical and irrevocable step, shouldn’t I make sure I am not motivated by resentment, hatred, anger?  I will remind myself that, once having taken a radical step, there is no turning back.  Should I not try again, with the help of God to improve my own capacity for dealing with my problems?  God can give me the power to set my world in order.

When a family situation becomes really desperate, and we think we just can’t go on another day living in uncertainty, fear, deprivation and general misery, we may decide to take action.  That’s good, But what action?  So much depends on taking the right course.  Let me consider:

Is my present frame of mind, whether of anger, bitterness or confusion, one in which I can make a wise choice:  Have I yielded to readily to friendly advice, well-meant, but based on only limited knowledge of all the factors?

Today’s Reminder

If I have come to the end of my rope, I have lived in this turmoil for a long time.  Let me be patient a little longer while I weigh the alternatives.  Will a radical change really work out better for me, for my children and yes, for my spouse?

Before I make a decision, or take a step, I will redouble my efforts to apply the ARP program.  It could bring me to an entirely different, more constructive solution than the drastic ones I was considering.

“Make sure that the medicine you decide on in a rash and desperate moment doesn’t turn out to be worse than the malady.” Excerpts from ODAT

Quit Talking About It.....

The strategy for foolish people is simple:  Quit talking about the problem and clearly communicate that because talking is not helping, you are going to take steps to protect what is important to you, the mission or other people.  Give limits that stop the collateral damage of their refusal to change, and where appropriate, give consequences that will cause them to feel the pain of their choice to not listen.

The necessary ending that you have to initiate with people caught in their own foolishness is to end the pattern. You cannot control them or get them to change.  What you can do is create an ending to the effects their refusal to take responsibility is having on you or others.  By so doing, you have accomplished two things that nagging did not do.  You have limited the effects of their behavior on you and others, thus quarantining their ownership disease from further infecting your life, the team or the mission, and you may have done the one thing that can influence them to change.  Talking will not help, but doing something that causes them to feel the consequences of their behavior may be what finally turns them around.”

Necessary Endings,  Dr. Henry Cloud, p 139-140

He needs To Do It...Co-dependency....

“I frequently hear…others say to a person…’I told him he needs to do it, but he still doesn’t.”

I usually say it is not true that he needs to do it.  ‘Apparently he does not need to at all, or he would be doing it.  It sounds as though you are the only one who feels the need for him to perform.  He obviously feels no need at all.  I think what we have to talk about is how to transfer the need for him to perform from your shoulders onto his, as he is the only person who can do anything about it.’  Consequences are the way to do that.  When people begin to feel consequences for their behavior or performance…the need has finally been transferred from the shoulders of the people who should not be experiencing it to the shoulders of the one who should.

When a spouse says to the alcoholic, ‘You need to go to AA,’ that is obviously not true.  The addict feels no need to do that at all, and isn’t. But when she says, ‘I am moving out and will be open to getting back together when you are getting treatment for your addiction,’ then all of sudden the addict feels ‘I need to get some help or I am going to lose my marriage.’  The need has been transferred….When he feels the pain, he will feel the need to change.

A plan that has hope is one that limits your exposure to the foolish person’s issues and forces him to feel the consequences of his performances so that he might have hope of waking up and changing.”

Necessary Endings,  Dr. Henry Cloud, p 141-142