Spiritual Growth

Spiritual growth is the process of replacing self-absorption with Christ-absorption. To become like Jesus we must fill our lives with his Word.

• All scripture is God-breathed and useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. I Timothy 3:16
• Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth but meditate on it day and night, so that you will be careful to do everything written in it. Joshuah 1: 8
• Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers; but his delight in in the law of the Lord and on this law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Psalm 1:1-3
• Jesus said, "The words I have spoken to you are spirit and life." John 6:63

A New Treatment for Back Pain: The Proadjuster

When Chiropractors palpate your spine, they are checking for joint fluidity, motion and or rigidity. Improper motion effecting the nerve function is called a subluxation. In a similar fashion to palpation, the ProAdjuster can determine whether the vertebra's motion is too rigid or too fluid. 

     A light force is introduced into the vertebra to check motion, it is reflected back to the piezoelectric sensor, which measures the reflective force, sending it to the computer for interpretation. The ProAdjuster utilizes a precise oscillating force with uninterrupted motion. It is able to increase the mobility of the spinal segments by reducing or enabling motion in the abnormal areas. In other words, the ProAdjuster reduces subluxation by “unsticking” the joint.

By applying the ProAdjuster's resonant force impulses precisely to the affected areas, you will receive gentle, effective treatment to that specific area. This will relieve the pressure on the nerve, allowing the nerve to heal and restore the nerve's ability to transmit signals to and from the brain more freely--and, most important, relieve the pain!  For more information goggle: proadjuster lifestyle

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ECLAMPSIA

Preeclampsia is the development of high blood pressure and edema between the 20th week of pregnancy and a week after the birth of a child. Eclampsia consists of convulsive seizures or coma without any other cause for these symptoms. The cause is unknown. Treatment consists of control of blood pressure, magnesium sulfate, restoration of proper body fluids via IV infusion, and anti-seizure medication.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO ASK A QUESTION ABOUT ECLAMPSIA OR POST A COMMENT? 

ABANDONMENT

A girl was abandoned by her parents. The neighbors reported the parents gone. When to police found the child she was reduced to skin-and-bones (literally). She had a protuberant abdomen and looked like the starving kids you see pictured in National Geographic. She was subsequently adopted by a man and woman who sexually abused her. Despite these traumas she developed her musical talents, was popular in school, graduated from a major university, and was happily married for 23 years until her husband abandoned her for a younger women. She began drinking heavily and became addicted to prescription drugs.

WOULD YOU LIKE TO DISCUSS ABANDONMENT AND ITS CONSEQUENCES?

Self Mutilating Behavior

• An example  self-mutilating behavior is cutting the skin until blood has been drawn.
• Self-mutilating behavior is a symptom seen in both men and women with various psychiatric disorders, but the majority of those who self-mutilate are women with borderline personality disorder.

The most extreme case seen by this scribe was a man with insulin dependent diabes mellitus and end-stage renal disease requiring dialysis to maintain proper body fluids and salts, bit his fingers off.  

 WOULD YOU LIKE TO ASK A QUESTION OR MAKE A COMMENT ABOUT SELF-MUTILATING BEHAVIOR?

One-handed Division-I Basketbal Player

CEDAR CITY, Utah - It was a conversation with which Dax Crum was all too familiar.

Southern Utah University coach Roger Reid had called Crum into his office. And Crum knew exactly what was coming.

"I told him he could come out for the team, but the chances of playing were very, very slim," Reid said. "In my mind, I didn't think there was any chance he'd ever play. No way."

	Meet Dax Crum
Southern Utah provided us with team footage of the Thunderbirds' game with the University of Missouri-Kansas City, in which Dax Crum played 16 minutes, hit a 3-pointer and managed to make the opposition forget he was born without a right hand.

However, a half season into Reid's tenure at the school, Crum, who was born without a right hand, has forced his coach into playing him significant minutes.

The 6-foot-2 senior guard logged a career-high 16 minutes, made a 3-pointer and slowed down Missouri-Kansas City's leading scorer, Dane Brumagin, for much of the second half in a 63-60 loss earlier in the month.

"I've coached this game for a long time and they ought to build a monument of him," Reid said. "Dax is all about defying the odds and playing for the right reasons."

Crum was born without nearly his entire right hand. Just a tiny finger sticks out of his nub and is barely noticeable. Crum's parents were given the option of transplanting a toe to act as another finger, but they declined due to concerns with post-surgical rejection.

It's crazy, but many opposing players, coaches and fans are often shocked when told of Crum's handicap after watching him play or practice. UMKC sports information director James Allen was completely unaware throughout the entire game. Southern Utah assistant Ron Carling's wife had no idea after watching Crum play for nearly three weeks.

"Honestly, you can't even really tell he has a disability," said Brumagin, who is averaging 18.6 points per game. "You've got to treat him like everyone else. He's playing Division I basketball and he's a good player. He was right up there with anyone else who has guarded me this year, but he's pretty inspirational. It's amazing."

Crum, 23, was nudged into playing sports by his father, Richard, a former star at Kirtland Central in New Mexico.

"Honestly, when Dax was born, I was angry with God," Richard Crum said. "How can you send me a one-handed boy when you know my sons are going to be athletes?

"But he's taught me that you can do anything," he said. "He's changed my life in so many ways."

Richard and Valerie, who died of cancer a little more than three years ago, decided to go with shoelaces instead of taking the easy way out and buying Velcro sneakers for their son. Four-year-old Dax wasn't allowed to go to school until he was able to tie them on his own.

Once Dax figured it out, his two grandfathers were called into the room.

"Dax sat down in the middle of the floor and at the end, two old grandfathers had tears streaming down their eyes," Richard Crum said. "One of them, a World War II Navy veteran, said, 'You're my hero.'"

Dax Crum could have taken a Division I soccer scholarship, but he was determined to play D-I basketball. And he is. (Deb Hill / Special to FOXSports.com)

Not everyone was as supportive. Richard remembers one woman asking him to take his son away because Dax was scaring her daughter. Another wanted him to have Dax put his arm in his pocket. Little boys stared. Little girls squealed.

Richard and Valerie resisted hiding his handicap.

"It was an awkward situation," Richard said. "But for me to do it would have sent the wrong message."

Crum persevered, especially with his passion on the basketball court, where he earned all-star honors at BYU's camp when he was 12. However, the coach the following year hardly played Crum.

"They treated me like I was 3 years old," Crum said.

His father made certain that wasn't going to happen again. He took a teaching position at Kirtland Central and was also an assistant on the basketball team. When Dax wasn't in the high-school gym with his father, the two of them were in the nearby church working on his game.

Crum became a first-team all-state player at Kirtland Central, winning three state titles, and also starred in soccer, baseball and track. After either the second or third state crown, father and son just smirked at each other when the public address announcer asked everyone to give Crum a hand.

"The irony of it was huge," Richard Crum said. "I just nodded at Dax and he winked back at me."

Despite his success on the hardwood, there were no Division I suitors coming out of high school. He played two sports at Arizona Western Junior College while on a soccer scholarship.

Crum started the second half of his sophomore season for an Arizona Western team that was ranked No. 1 in the country and finished 31-3.

"When I first got there, it was 'good for him,'" Crum said. "Then I started taking some of their playing time and some of them weren't so happy. Nobody likes being beaten by the one-handed kid.

"There were some guys who loved me and others didn't think I deserved to be on the court," he said. "I heard guys saying, 'How good can you be? Dax took your spot.' I just let it go. I just go out and play."

After his two-year stint at Arizona Western, Crum turned down a D-I soccer scholarship at Dayton for an opportunity to play basketball as a walk-on at Southern Utah.

"I wanted to be a Division I basketball player," Crum said. "I wanted to do something that no one has done."

Crum played sparingly two seasons ago under former coach Bill Evans. He redshirted last season and wound up on the football team — as a kicker/punter who also played some cornerback.

Shortly after Reid, who spent seven seasons as the head coach at BYU from 1989-97, took the reigns, Crum decided he wanted to give it another try in his final season of eligibility.

 

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That's when Reid did everything in his power to shoot down the idea.

"I don't blame him. Every coach I've ever had worries about the same thing," Crum said. "If I put him on the floor, are they going to take advantage of him? I wonder if I was coaching me, would I put myself in the game?"

Then Reid watched Crum outwork all of his teammates in practice.

It's a remarkable sight, how much passion and energy he displays when he's on the court. His nickname at Arizona Western was "The Pest." At Southern Utah, they've dubbed him the "Dax-inator" because of his unwavering defensive prowess.

"It's a good thing now," said Southern Utah assistant Austin Ainge, who played against Crum when he was a player at BYU. "I like it as a coach, but I hated it when he was guarding me.

"The amazing thing is he can still go right," said Ainge. "He finds a way. He's clever."

In addition to his pestering defense, Crum is somehow able to make shots with consistency. He rests the ball on his nub, uses his left hand to shoot and is a legitimate 3-point threat with a quick release. He rarely drops a pass and his teammates are unable to take the ball away from him in practice despite only having one hand to dribble the ball.

"To tell you the truth, I didn't know he had one hand for the first three days," said Southern Utah senior forward Tate Sorenson. "He handles himself pretty good and it's not just a charity case. He can play."

"He's the best perimeter defender we have," Carling said.

Crum is also extremely open and light-hearted. One time prior to a soccer game, he walked out for rock-paper-scissors, which would determine what team started the game with the ball. When both players threw out their hands, Crum tossed out his right hand and chuckled.

At times when he's dribbling the ball up the court, he'll hold up his hand with the one finger, smile and yell "Four" to call a play. Crum still gets a kick out of opposing players' reactions in the postgame handshake line.

"It's funny," Crum said.

"He's the first one to make a joke about it," Sorenson said.

The letters have come in from young children and adults. One man lost his arm in a farm accident and wanted to know how Crum does everything. Others want to know how he cuts steak or ties his shoes.

"It just takes me a little time to figure it out my way," Crum said.

Crum is married, has a 3.7 GPA and is working on his MBA. The plan is for him to go into the financial world for a while — at least long enough to support wife Ashley's medical schools bills — before he goes into coaching.

Crum, who worked three jobs until he was given a scholarship by Reid for the second semester, didn't get off the bench in eight of the team's first 13 games.

"The past three years have been rough," Crum said. "I haven't really played. I'll go into a game for one or two minutes, have a turnover and say, "Why am I doing this?'"

Crum knows the answer.

"You work for a couple years just to get a chance," Crum said. "Once you get a chance, it's like, 'Wow.' Just those 16 minutes against UMKC were worth it all to me. That's how much fun it is."

Sunday Rounds

To hospital at o600. Patients still asleep. Woke them to find out how they were doing. Made notes quickly. Finished rounds in one hour. Usually Sunday rounds are perfunctory unless admissions or problem patients. Want to get to church and worship on Sunday. Great nurses. Can trust them to watch over patients and notify me of problems.

Sunday School lesson on hypocrisy. One cause of sin, not hypocrisy, is caused by wanting to follow the rules and having no contact with spirit. 

Read in National Geographic about Black Pharaohs, descendants of Ham via Cush.

W. called to report on back treatment. She is getting Proadjuster treatment from chiropractor. Going well. She believes in the spinal nerve maldistribution as cause of many illnesses. So does recorder. Much truth to acupuncture points and Chukkas. Not spiritual truth, but physiologic truth.

B. called excited that his BB team of 12 year-old boys won close game.

Happiness versus Joy

Happiness	Unhappiness	Joy
Red Lamborghini	Totaled Corvette with a $15,000 unpaid note	A walk in the park
Corner office in Petronas Towers	Windowless basement office	Contentment in all things
Night with a desperate housewife	Sexually transmitted disease	A wife of noble character
Executive power	Servitude	A willing and obedient heart
Fully funded 401-K	Bear market at retirement	Generosity
Fame and fortune	Harassed and helpless	Humble and grateful service
Tequila Sunrise	Hangover	A fruitful vine
Intelligent and knowledgeable	Ignorant and apathetic	Wise and discerning
Superiority	Inferiority	Selflessness
Possessing worldly things	Craving, lusting, boasting	A virtuous life
Pride in accomplishments	Arrogance and hubris	Warm-hearted appreciation

Noncompliance

Two admissions today. One was discharged yesterday. Went home to find she had been robbed of TV, Stereo, and money. Decompensated began to devil was inside her. This lady so washed out on drugs she has a vacuous appearance. Very flat and no life. Discharged her yesterday because we felt nothing else could be done. Thought that she might immediately return to drugs because cocaine is only substance that can bring life to her attitude. Sadly, every time she uses cocaine she depletes more dopamine from brain which only increases her apathy and craving. Had no money for drugs and decompensated. When go to hospital delusional and hallucinating with downcast gaze and no life in eyes.

Second admission was discharged about nine months ago. Said discharge meds helped a great deal, but never returned to MHMR to get a refill of meds and slowly developed delusions, suicidal thoughts, and voices telling her to kill self.

LYRICA IN THE TREATMENT OF FIBROMYALGIA

Lyrica, the first treatment for neuropathic pain associated with Diabetic Peripheral Neuropathy, is indicated for the management of Fibromyalgia, Postherpetic Neuralgia, and as adjunctive therapy for adults with Partial Onset Seizures.

CHARACTERISTICS OF FIBROMYALGIA

v    Core symptom of fibromyalgia is chronic widespread pain, associated with diffuse tenderness

v    Patients demonstrate pain on palpation in at least 11 of 18 tender points

v    Fibromyalgia is believed to be a dysfunctional hyperexcitability in pain processing

MECHANISM OF ACTION OF LYRICA

v    Although the exact mechanism of action is unknown, results from animal models indicate that the analgesic effects of Lyrica may be associated with the following functions:

ü     Lyrica crosses the blood-brain barrier to bind to the 2-delta subunit to close presynaptic calcium channels diminishing excessive neuronal activity.

ü     Decreases the release of the excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate

ü     Decreases substance P

ü     May work in the central nervous system to reduce the level of perceived pain

ONSET OF ACTION

v    Can reduce neuropathic pain and anxiety in one week.  

METABOLISM

v    No liver metabolism

v    Hepatic impairment mandates no dose adjustment

v    Lyrica is excreted renally 

v    Can be removed by hemodialysis.

Dosing recommendations

v    Initial dose = 75 mg. twice daily 

v    At week one as needed increase to 150 mg. twice daily

v    Maximum dose = 225 mg twice daily (450 mg daily)

v    Discontinue gradually over minimum of one week

o      Flat pricing across dosage strengths

SIDE EFFECTS

v    Dizziness

v    Somnolence

v    Cognitive slowing, difficulty concentrating, or poor attention span

v    Fatigue

v    Dry mouth

v    Blurred vision

v    Weight gain

v    Edema

v    Patients with a creatinine clearance of 30 to 60 mL/min had a greater incidence of discontinuation due to adverse reactions than patients with normal creatinine clearance

Consults

Called for consult at SJRMC. BHU, in Navasota is about 35 miles from SJRMC making consults difficult. About the only thing dreadful about the recorders job. Lady had complications from gastric stapling surgery June 2007. Has been in hospital taking care of multiple surgical complications for 6 1/2 months so far. Was depressed and crying when seen a couple of days before. Placed her on Geodon 20 mg IM feeling better, but can't keep giving injections. Having trouble sleeping. Discontinued IM Geodon and started on Seroquel 20 mg--very low dose to improve sleep and also workup to therapeutic dose for depression. Placed on Remeron for depressing which will also help with sleep. Meds had to be given via GI tube.

SMART GOALS

Goal directed planning provides a guideline for helping others. Goals can be achieved by following the SMART acronym:

o      Smart goals. The eternal question is this: Will we live to achieve our personal goals, comfort and pleasure, or will we establish goals that direct us toward serving God and others? The eternal way, the smart way, enables us to establish goals designed to use our talents, gifts, skills and abilities to serve others and honor God.

o      Measurable—Goals must be specific as “I will write from 6-7 AM Monday-Saturday.”

o      Achievable—Goals must be sensible. Anyone can write an hour daily if they are motivated.  

o      Realistic—Establishing a goal to write 8 hours daily is impossible unless you are Stephen King who writes from 8 AM to 5 PM each day.

o      Time oriented—An absence of a specific time to accomplish your goals makes measuring your progress impossible.

ANXIETY AND WORRY CAUSING PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS

Disorder	Symptoms	Examples
Somatoform Disorder	Physical complaints with no physical findings	·      Fibromyalgia ·      Hypochondriasis ·      Somatization disorder
Conversion Disorder	Anxiety/Anger converted into one symptom that cannot be explained by a medical condition	·      Paralysis of an extremity with normal reflexes ·      Pseudoseizures (false seizures) ·      Vomiting with no physical causes ·      Pain without physical findings ·      Blindness with pupils that dilate when exposed to light
Psychosomatic Illness	Physical illness in which emotional factors contribute	·      Ulcers ·      Most headaches ·      High blood pressure ·      Irritable bowel syndrome ·      Heart attack ·      Asthma

Foosball

A Foosball table has 8 rods. Figures placed along the rods are used for hitting the ball when the rod is twisted. The object of the game is to knock your ball into your opponent's goal  by twisting and turning your attached rods. Your opponent tries to get his ball into your hole. This is a fast moving game. People who have played  video games have the advantage. Older people with reduced reflexes have  a disadvantage. Even though the old people lose, they have fun trying.  Young and old notice their pulse racing and everyone breathes harder than usual. Some people sweat a little. Everybody laughs. It's fun even if you lose.  You hardly ever get bored playing this game.

A Cabin off Hickory Nut Gap Road near Banner Elk, North Carolina

Driving north toward Banner Elk from Sugar Mountain on State Highway 184 turn left onto Hickory Nut Gap Road. Drive up the mountain via numerous switch backs for 7 or 8 miles and you will come to a gate on the left that when opened allows you to drive up a gravel road to a cabin. Enter the small foyer and peak to your left to see a small kitchen . Straight ahead is a modest living area with a fireplace on the back wall. Sliding doors lead to a deck. Between the kitchen and the living area is a dinning table that will seat eight comfortably. If you wander back toward the small kitchen and look to your left, you will find a bedroom with a king size bed. To your right is a similar bedroom with another king size bed. The bedroom on the right has a stone shower. The other bedroom has a tub sitting on legs.The upstairs loft has a bunk bed and two single beds. No bathroom, but comfortable. In the basement is a nice pool table and a foosball machine. Outside is a charcoal grill. There are several hiking trails from he cabin. Some lead to the creek below; others meander in meadows. It is a very pleasant cabin. The nicest we have enjoyed in North Carolina.

Luck

A big part of my game plan is...luck.

True Power

Take from me all pride and vanity, all boasting and forwardness, and give me the true courage that shows itself by gentleness, the true wisdom that shows itself by simplicity, and the true power that shows itself by humility.

Attitude is Everything

Two shoe salesmen were given a new territory on a Pacific island. Immediately upon arrival, the first sales­man placed an urgent call to the home office:  "Get me out of here. No one on this island wears shoes."

The second salesman sent an e-mail request to the factory, "Please put everybody on overtime. Will need as many shoes as you can manufacture. No one on this island has any shoes."

Attitude determines the difference between shoed or shoeless. Attitude is more critical than events. It's more significant than what's happened or what's hap­pening. Attitude is more consequential than the past, than genetics, than education, than money. Attitude is more important than what other people think... say, or do. It is more important than appearance or tal­ent. Attitude will make or break an individual, a home, a company, or a country.

Whether we are running hot, running cold, or sim­ply running on overload, we can take charge of our atti­tude by choosing enthusiasm. Corporate presidents voted enthusiasm the most valuable personality trait. Enthusiasm is the biggest single factor in successful selling. Enthusiam wins ball games. Inspires audiences. Enhances learning. Builds team spirit. Propels careers.

Because attitude determines whether we are happy or unhappy, the positive perspective assures us that we can never fail. A hopeful attitude guarantees internal success. Attitude—the altitude adjuster—determines whether we fly high or low, crash or soar, glide or slide.

Attitude Aphorisms

Whether we are running hot, running cold, or sim­ply running on overload, we can take charge of our atti­tude by remembering these aphorisms:

• Success has more to do with our emotional disposition than with our social position.
  
• Kites rise against the wind, not with it.
  
• A rubber band becomes effective only when it's stretched.
  
• More opportunities exist than there are people willing to seize them.
  
• What matters is what happens in us not to us.
  
• You can tell when you are on the road to success.  It's uphill all the way.
  
• When Goliath appeared, David said, "He's so big, I can't miss."
  
• Wait until the lows pass and you will feel on top            of things.
  
• Choices, not circumstances, determine how we think.
  
• Because action cures misery change your motion to create positive emotion.
  
• Where there is no faith in the future, there is no power in the present.
  
• To accept failure as final is to be finally a failure.
  
• Failure is the line of least persistence.
  
• Others can stop us temporarily, but we are the only ones who can stop ourselves permanently.
  

The Power of Optimism

A fishing guide once said that catching a trout depends more on who's holding the pole than the bait that's on the hook. "Optimists catch more fish," he said. "They believe they're going to catch 'em and they catch 'em."

Optimism helps athletes. Swimmers were given a psychological test that measured attitude. Those who scored high on optimism performed better after a defeat. Swimmers who scored low on optimism performed worse after a defeat.

Optimism helps students. Psychologists gave col­lege freshmen tests to measure optimism. Four years later, the psychologists found that optimism predicted grades better than SAT scores or high-school grades.

Optimism helps sales people. About three quarters of insurance, salesmen quit in their first three years. Guess what? Pessimists quit twice as often as optimists. Optimistic insurance sales people sell almost forty per­cent more insurance than pessimists sell.

An insurance company hired a special group of applicants who failed the normal screening tests, but scored high on optimism. The first year on the job the "dumb" optimists sold 21% more insurance than 'the "smart" pessimists. The second year, the optimists sold 57% more insurance than the pessimists. "Dumb" opti­mists sell more insurance than "smart" pessimists.

By a mountain stream, in classrooms, on an athletic field, or while making sales calls, optimists do better. Empirical findings and scientific studies indicate that optimists are more successful in all aspects of life than pessimists. Because optimists are more resilient, they turn defeat into victory.

Overcoming Procrastination

Procrastination, doing low-priority tasks before high priority activities, robs us of valuable time. We usually do the least important things first because they are easier. We put off the most important things because they are hardier. When we work on the unimportant, we worry about the crucial tasks that aren't getting done. We get tension headaches. Ulcers. High blood pressure.  Our doctors get rich, but we still haven't done what's most important. There are four major reasons for pro­crastination:

1. Laziness

To defeat laziness, begin. Once moving, you'll tend to keep going. It takes greater energy to start an activi­ty than to sustain it. For example, if you're writing a screen play, put something on paper. Forget about sharpening pencils, arranging paper, reading one more script for inspiration. Write. Writers write.

2. The Quest for Perfection

  Nobody is perfect. Nothing created by anybody is perfect. Stop fretting about getting everything just right. Learn to do your best and accept the results. Expecting perfection never gets anything accomplished. To continue with the writing analogy, get that first draft done. Forget semicolons, active verbs, dangling participles, mixed metaphors. Just get something down on  paper. You can revise and rewrite the screenplay later.

3. Indecisiveness

 To overcome indecisiveness, use the ready, fire, aim approach. Fire it up there. Then aim it. Make some mistakes. Learn. Adjust. Move on.

4. Difficult Tasks

Break down a difficult task into easy steps. Just do a little at a time. You write a screenplay or a book one page at a time. Write one page a day and at the end of a year you will have written 365 pages.

A Rhetorical Question: What Makes a Man Abusive?

In the eyes of society he is successful. He has been married almost 50 years. He is a retired insurance executive. He is a lay preacher. He reads the Bible daily. He prays twice daily. He beats his wife every few days. He won't repent. He says she deserves the beatings because she disappoints him.

How can this happen? I don't know. I can't explain it.

I do know that I can't judge others, because I myself sin daily. My worst sins are those that I know are wrong and yet I do them anyway. At other times, I sin and am not even aware of my transgressions. I tend to make excuses and blame others.  I may not beat my wife, but I still fall short of the glory of God.

For her physical safety and for her self-esteem, the abused woman must leave her husband. She probably won't.

How can she not leave? I don't know. I can't explain it.

Some family member must protect the abused wife by convincing her to leave her husband. Adult Protective Services should be notified.

The rest of us can pray. Pray for the abusive husband. Pray for the abused wife. Ask God to forgive our sins. Prayer answers all rhetorical questions.

Everyone is Special

 A low-self imagine comes from a society that devalues the average. Our society emphasizes looks, intelligence, athletic achievement, and wealth. God views each person as a precious gem. God loves each of us equally. All of us have a unique gift. That unique gift is God's love and acceptance. In the eyes of God, the plain girl and the less intelligent man have just as much worth as those valued by society. Society's view is temporary. God's view is eternal. 

The ABCDs of Behavior.

The trained mind knows that thoughts about events are more powerful than the events themselves. When we learn to shape our thinking, we use our minds to overcome a series of unfortunate events. We can improve our attitude by using the ABCDs of behavior.

Ø    A = Activating event—Someone may criticize your tendency to dominate meetings.

Ø    B = Belief about the event—You initially believe that the critical person is a jerk. As you reflect on the situation, you conclude that this criticism may be valid. In the past, people have joked about your dominating personality. They have rolled their eyes and looked bored when you talked. You decide the critical person is correct in the assessment.

Ø    C = Consequence of the belief—You feel a strong determination to change your behavior while, at the same time, you feel grateful that you have received constructive criticism.

Ø    D = Doing—The action you take is based on your belief, not on the activating event. You begin to talk less and listen more.