It is all on where you focus…

April 5, 2021

“Focus upon an ocean of positives, not a puddle of negative” – as seen on a social media graphic post.

I get a daily graphic for social media posts to my Facebook real estate business page through my company. It’s helpful, because one cannot always think of something to post and certainly can’t always find a nice graphic to go with the thought. Today’s “quote” was on the graphic that I got this morning.

I was going to use the headline “Which you would rather dive into?” I think we’d all feel a bit safer and more comfortable taking a dive into the ocean rather than diving headfirst into a puddle. Yet, in life we may seem to be surrounded by puddles. The news media tends towards telling us all of the negative news of the day, because they think that we want to see and hear it, plus they think it “sells” and makes them more money. I wonder how a show called “The Nightly Good News” would fare?

Being surrounded by negative puddles means that we will occasionally step into one. We may not have dived in headfirst, but we still get wetted by negativity none the less. A key to not sitting in that puddle and wallowing in negativity and self pity, is to be more like a bungy jumper and bounce back before you hit bottom. The bungy cord that makes that happen and keeps you from becoming mired in negativity is your faith.

Faith takes our eyes off the negatives in life and refocuses them on the positives. We have just gone through the biggest refocus of all – Easter. Easter reassures us each year that we can take our minds off the puddle of death and focus instead on the ocean of everlasting life with Jesus. Easter shouts “He is risen!” and assures us that we will, too. Easter forces us to look away from His death on the cross and towards His resurrection and the promise of our own.

So, use the bungie cord of your faith to bounce back out of life’s puddles. Refocus your life around the positives. Easter is our ocean of positivity. Dive in! The water’s fine.

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Posted by Norm Werner

“Leave it!” – Life lessons learned from walking my dog.

April 3, 2021

I walk my dog, Sadie, 4-5 times a day. I can do that because I work from home at jobs which afford me a lot of flexibility. I know that my dog is spoiled by all of this, but she’s a good dog and really doesn’t demand very much to be happy – a little food, some water, a few treats and the chance to get out for walks.

Sadie is what is called a blue-tick coon hound, which means she is a German Shorthair crossed with a hound of some sort. She basically looks like a German Shorthair (only with the tail not bobbed off) with a black and white coat instead of the red or brown coats that purebred German Shorthair dogs usually have.

Being a hound, she is a natural hunter; although, the fact that she is gun-shy is probably why she was in the rescue shelter where we found her. Nothing makes a hunting dog more useless to the hunter than being gun-shy.

Be that as it may, she still is instinctively on the hunt as we take our walks. When she spots another animal (almost any animal) she goes into stalking mode and locks onto her prey. Squirrels and Chipmunks, in particular, get her undivided attention.

When she’s in stalking mode it is very hard to get her attention back to the walk. I find myself yelling “Leave it” or “Let it go” at her, as if she understood what that means. She probably understands the tugging on her lead better than anything that I yell.

“Leave it” is probably great advice for life. Many times, in life we can become fixated on some event or some person and loose sight of all else. It may be a setback or failure that consumes us or perhaps some real or perceived slight or rejection by another. We just can’t let go of it and there is usually no one there to yell “Leave it” or to tug on our imaginary lead.

I’ve also noticed that Sadie remembers exactly where the squirrel or chipmunk sighting took place and thinks that they are still there the next time that we walk by that spot. Life can be like that too, with us constantly re-living events in our minds, hoping that somehow the results will turn out differently. I have to remind Sadie to “Leave it” when we walk by that spot and we all have to remind ourselves to let it go when recalling some disappointing event.

In life, as with Sadie, there is always the next walk, the next opportunity and we must be ready for it by letting go of the last walk or disappointment. That means not constantly re-living a failure or disappointment. It means not beating yourself up for something left undone. It means learning from your mistakes and not just second guessing the decisions that you made at the time. Leave it. Let go. Move on.

It is Spring as I write this and Easter weekend. Both of those point to a new beginning; however, new beginnings require that you let go of the past. So, “Leave it”. What’s done is done, and what lies ahead requires your full attention. Use Easter not only to celebrate the resurrection of Christ, but to mark the starting point of the rest of your life by leaving behind the baggage that has been burdening your life – let it go, leave it. Now start fresh.

Christ is risen, indeed, let go of the past and fixate on that. You will be rewarded with a new life.

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Posted by Norm Werner

Believe…you don’t want to be wrong.

February 26, 2021

I recently stumbled across a number of quotes from noted French philosopher and novelist Albert Camus . This is one that caught my attention – “I would rather live my life as if there is a God and die to find out there isn’t, than live as if there isn’t and to die to find out that there is.”

There is a phrase about “backing into something” that seems to cover this thought. Faith based upon the thought that you really don’t want to be wrong about God’s existence is probably better than no faith at all, but it is sort of backing into belief.

We are in the Lenten season, which could be a real downer, since we know that it is leading to the suffering and crucifixion of Jesus. There are many somber ceremonies associated with the Lenten season – the imposition of ashes on Ash Wednesday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday – yet we also know that ultimately they lead to the most joyous occasion of all Jesus’ resurrection on Easter. Even the Earth itself celebrates the resurrection with Spring and the re-birth of plants and reemergence of animals that may have been hibernating. Easter and Spring is an annual refresh of our belief in God.

Believing in God brings a certain orderliness to life that otherwise might appear to be very random and thus very confusing and unsatisfying. Faith helps us explain things – things that happen around us and things that happen to us. Faith also helps us get through things as they happen, because faith leads to hope and hope fuels perseverance.

Faith also fills what otherwise would be a huge void in our lives – the meaning of life itself – and gives us purpose.  It is through faith that we accept what we cannot understand, trusting in the God of our faith to handle those things. Faith overcomes our fear of the unknown by placing those things in the hands of God.

So, have faith and go through life confident that you are right and that, in the end, you will receive the reward of everlasting life that you have been promised. There is no alternative that makes any sense and you certainly don’t want to be wrong. Back into faith if you have to, but get into it any way that you can.

Have a wonderful and faithful day.

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Posted by Norm Werner

Is Winter a state of mind?

January 13, 2021

Two recent posts to the blog Jack’s Winning Words just seem to belong together and point to our ability to deal with the season we call winter –

“Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the face.”  (Victor Hugo)

-and-

“Even in winter it shall be green in my heart.”  (Frederik Chopin)

Chopin and Hugo both point to solutions to the gloom and depression that winter can bring on. The shorter days and cloudy darkness, especially in northern areas can exacerbate effects of the cold and being forced to stay indoors so much. This year in particular with the COVID-19 pandemic overlaid on top of the winter weather, it can be an especially tough time. Yet, like other events in our lives, we hold the key to how we react to the dark and unhospitable physical environment of winter.

Pastor Freed wrote that Chopin was a romantic and that it showed in his music. Romanics, I believe, also tend to be optimistic about life, since they imagine successful romantic outcomes to situations. Victor Hugo was also an important figure in the French Romantic Movement.

Perhaps the difference is that the romantic looks ahead and imagines the end of winter and the rebirth offered by spring. In the heart of the romantic, they imagine the green of Spring and that vision sustains them through the gloom of winter. The romantic might also find things to laugh at amidst the gloom and that helps keep winter at bay.

Like everything else in life, taking a passive approach doesn’t really work. One can’t just sit there and say, “All right, make me laugh” or “Show me the green”. The effects of winter on us mentally has even got a name (doesn’t every thing these days). It is called Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD). So, if you are sad because of SAD, here is a link to a nice article of things that you can do about it. As you read the article notice that much of the advice revolves around how to implement the advice of Hugo and Chopin.

All of this points to the conclusion that the title of this post aims at. While the winter season is very real, it is the “Winter” in our minds that we must deal with. We must not let gloom and doom creep into our lives along with the cold of the season. We must work at finding the things that we can laugh at and maintain the hope of sprint, the sure knowledge that better days are ahead.

For the Christian that hope is found in Easter, which portends the Spring in our lives. We first had Christmas to brighten up the beginning of winter and now we have Easter to chase winter away and usher in the rebirth of Spring. We can laugh in the face of the gloom and maintain the green in our hearts because we know what is coming and what is next.

So, is the Winter in my mind one of gloom and sadness? No, that is not my state of mind; for I am already looking forward to Easter and the rebirth for the earth and for me personally that it heralds. It is green in my mind already and that makes me want to laugh at winter.  How about you?

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Posted by Norm Werner

Three little words – the greatest three of all time

April 4, 2015

It is Easter tomorrow and we will be using these three words. I belong to a church that is a part of the Christian Faith, in my case Holy Spirit Lutheran Church, an ELCA congregation in West Bloomfield, Michigan. There are many religions other than Christianity. Most of them also have a book (we have the Bible – Old and New Testaments) that contains the historical foundation of their beliefs, whether it is the Talmud, The Bhagavad-Gita, The Vedas, Qur’an, Zhuan Falun, New World Translation of the Scriptures,The Book of Mormon or Adi Granth. Most religions also have some concept of an afterlife, somewhere one goes or some state that one achieves after the death of their earthly body. I would submit for your consideration that Christianity is the only religion that has documented proof. Lawyers, whether on the prosecution or defense side of a case would probably tell you that there is no stronger evidence than corroborated testimony from eye witnesses to the events being adjudicated.  In the case of Christianity, there is compelling and corroborated testimony by several eye witnesses to a remarkable event that confirms our belief in an afterlife. What those witnesses saw and reported can be summed up in the same three little words – He is risen.

The book that we use as our foundation – the Bible – has multiple, independent versions of the same events in the life of Jesus, his death and his resurrection. There are many other corroborating accounts in the books that were left out of the modern Canonical version of the Bible. Had He not come back multiple times to meet with the Disciples and confirm for them his resurrection the story would have moved forward with the belief that someone had somehow stolen His body and perhaps the whole Christian movement would have faded into history. However, accounts from the time record that He did return to appear before Mary Magdalen at the tomb and twice in a locked room with the Disciples and against on the road as two of the disciples travels to another town. There is a fascinating Web site that documents the many accounts of witnesses to this remarkable event. The evidence of these eye witness accounts is very convincing and confirms that He is risen.

Throughout his life Jesus went about doing the things that fulfilled various predictions of the future (prophesies) that had been made and recorded in the old testament, which was the historical basis of the Jewish faith.  Even his death on the cross was foretold and the empty tomb gave silent testimony to  the final fulfilment of the prophesies – the fact that on the third day after his death He is risen.

So, tomorrow morning we will all greet each other with those three little words – He is risen – and reply to that greeting with the retort “He is risen indeed.” We will hear sermons about the resurrection, then we will go home and celebrate the traditional, non-religious version of the holiday with Easter Bunnies, and Easter Eggs and family gatherings. We will feast on the Easter meal and perhaps end the day tired and in a stupor from too much food and drink. But somewhere, just before we drift off to sleep and head into another ordinary day in our lives, empty tombsomewhere in the back of our minds we will feel a sense of well-being and peace that comes from again hearing the echo of those three little words – He is risen.

Have a happy Easter because, He is risen indeed!

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Posted by Norm Werner