Do you ever feel like you’re in a rut… that each day is just like the last – same old, same old? Are your routines and habits starting to feel like prisons that keep you from experiencing new things – same old, same old? Maybe it’s preconceived notions or even prejudices that keep you from meeting new and different people – same old, same old. Maybe you are locked into an unsatisfying job, or personal relationship and don’t see any way out – same old, same old.
At the root of all of those scenarios may be the same cause – lack of self-confidence. Perhaps the reason that the walls of the rut that you feel you are in are so dauntingly tall is that you lack the confidence in yourself to overcome those obstacles and experience new things. Confidence can be a fleeting thing and it came be influenced by others. Vince Lombardi said – “Confidence is contagious. So is lack of confidence.”
Perhaps you caught your lack of confidence by being around others who were not confident in themselves – siblings or friends. Maybe you were told as a child that you would never amount to anything or that you looked funny and you believe it because it
was coming from a parent or other adult. Maybe you were bullied and never overcame that fear. It could be that you were not encouraged to try again when you failed at something as a child. Whatever the reason, if you now find yourself stuck in a rut and you really want to find a way out and take a different path in life; maybe it’s time to find your confidence.
The foundation upon which confidence is built is self-love. I’ve posted here a few times about loving yourself before you can love others (see Look within first). The same thoughts that I posted about being able to love others by first loving yourself apply to 
building self-confidence. You can’t be confident in yourself if you don’t like yourself. When I was in Corporate life I took a transactional relationships course called “I’m OK, You’re OK” which was based upon the work of Anthony Thomas Harris in his book of the same name. The course taught one how to analyze any social interaction from the perspective on understand where you are coming from and where the other person is coming from. One precept of the course was identifying and accepting yourself and your starting point of view. I would add that you not only need to accept who you are, but also love who you are.
The key to accepting and loving yourself is first to accept the love of God. If you believe
that God loves your and accepts you as you are, nothing else matters. God’s love for you provides the foundation upon which you can base your love for yourself and your confidence in yourself. After all, we read in Romans 8:31 – “If God is with us, who can be against us?” How confidence building is that?
In 1945, Gen. Robert Lee Scott Jr. wrote a book that was later made into a movie titled – God Is My Co-Pilot. Maybe that is a good way to build confidence in yourself, knowing that God right there with you. Make God your co-pilot and you’ll never lack for confidence. Does that means that we will win or succeed every time? No; but, it does mean that God will give us the self-confidence and strength to persevere and keep trying. It does mean that God still loves us, even if we fail.
To close the circle on this post; you can get out of the same old, same old ruts that you may find yourself in; but first, you must find your self-confidence. A good place to look for that is in prayer. You may find that like the Lion and the Scarecrow and the Tin Man in the Wizard of OZ, you had it in you all the while; you just needed God’s love to let it out.
Have a self-confident day! Who can be against you?
Posted by Norm Werner 
continue down the path it is on, unless some force is applied that causes it to change direction. That “force” can be some external event or it can be an internal change of attitude, which causes you to react differently and take a new direction. One could sit around and hope that something happens to change things in your life or one can take the first steps of changing your attitude towards life.
life more than accepting God’s role in your life and learning how to see and do what God has in mind for you. You may not understand the “why” of it all and maybe you cannot yet be able see the “how” it will all play out; but, if you accept the will of God in your life, as in “not my will, but Thy will be done”, the outcome in your life will definitely change.
goals. They find that having the items does not bring happiness, only a temporary sense of achievement of that goal; then it is on to the next goal.
answer, their lives are altered and their goals change. They find satisfaction and a sense of accomplishment in service to others as they progress towards that ultimate goal.
for themselves and others around them.
I suspect that the load that Holtz was referring to had more to do with the loads of obligations or stress or guilt or remorse or sadness that we all pick up in life over time. For many, the “life” loads that occur are not carried well and they end up breaking down under the load. Some point to the inability to deal with (to carry) these loads as the root cause of depression and suicide.
loved one, the end to a relationship, the loss of a job come to mind. However, the loads can also include the regret at having made a thoughtless remark about someone or the guilt that comes after passing by the person in need of help.
gone or that the relationship is over or that the job went away or that you did do what you now regret is a first step. Turning that acceptance into a memory that finds its place in your knowledge bank is the next step. Using that knowledge to go on with life is the final step. Dwelling in a pit of disbelief or remorse or regret is a sure formula for depression. It happened. It’s over. You need to move on. Grab your strap of faith and move that event to its proper place in your memories and then PUT IT DOWN.
Maybe you can refocus all of the energy that you have been putting into regret over the loss of that old job into doing better at your new job. Maybe you can turn the remorse of having made that insensitive remark to a fellow worker into motivation for being a better person towards others.
that you just put them down without thinking about it. That is the hand of God and he is on both ends of the strap that is lifting you up. Let God carry your load; you’ve things to do helping others with their loads. Don’t worry. It won’t break you down. You know how to carry those loads – God is on the other end of your strap.
things that they could have done differently; or, things that maybe should have done but did not. Maybe they see the ugliness of their prejudices or the hurt that their hate for others causes. Maybe the distorted face of cynicism stares back at them and they don’t like it. For many it may just be the look of guilt for having been away from God for so long.
we need to look beyond that reflection to find God in the mirror. Whatever one initially sees in God’s mirror; if you look beyond the ego that is reflected there and find God, the shame and guilt and remorse will all melt away as God forgives your sins and welcomes you back into the fold. Continue to look and ask for forgiveness and you will be rewarded with God’s peace.
forgiveness for the things you have done wrong or the things left undone that you should have done. Don’t start the day and the week with leftover baggage from the past. Unburden yourself and start anew by taking your problems to God. Look in the mirror and smile. You’ve seen the face of God there and he was smiling back at you.
take time away from the demands of day to day life, to let our minds settle and to get a fresh start. That is easier said than done in today’s 24/7 world, where we seem to always be booked with something that “we have to do”. Weekends, which used to be times to relax, are now times of constant activities. We have golf tee times or a tennis court reserved; we have to get out on the boat; we have children in sports or dance or other competitive activities. If there is not a weekend tournament, there is practice to get to or something that we need to go buy “for the team”. We don’t have time for church on Sunday morning because that’s when the big tournament is or that’s when the team could get ice time at the rink. It’s go, go, go all weekend long. Some even welcome Mondays, so that they can get back to the comfort of work.
spend it staring down at our phone to see what might be going on that we missed. We schedule our lives there in our calendar apps and our lives are chronicled and shared there on the various social media that we use. It seems so important to us that we also check to see what others are doing and sharing about their lives that we have little time left for anything else.
do it; maybe not. One good way to make that time and use that time is to set aside a short period for prayer each day. Starting each day with some prayer time is a good way to do that; but, it can be any time during the day.
There is a little plaque on our kitchen wall that says, “Take time for quiet moments, for the world is loud and God whispers.” You really need to make time for those quiet moments in your life, so that you can listen for the whispers of God in your life. Don’t worry; everything else in life will wait for you to reboot. Have a peaceful weekend and find time to listen for the whisper.
school or at work. Maybe you have fallen into an abusive relationship where control is achieve by constantly tearing you down. Maybe some or all of that has happened to you.
eyes. He forgives you whatever sins you may have committed and opens His arms to welcome you.
that no matter how dark it may seem or how deep the hole is that you find yourself in; you are not alone. God is there with you and He is always ready to help, if you will only let Him in. The way to do that is simple – surrender yourself to Him. I have written here many times about the simple, short prayer that I’ve used in times when I needed God’s help – “Not my will, but thy will be done.” The results can be immediate and dramatic.
yourself and that is the ultimate in self-esteem.
soul. They will never forget, but they had forgiven.
need to understand is man’s ego coming out and the need to try to control things. Faith is admitting that we are not in control and putting our trust in the one who is – God. Faith starts with the little prayer “Not my will, but thy will be done.”
It’s going to be a great day.
Maybe you had a tough week last week or the weekend didn’t turn out as you had hoped. Whatever the disappointment or set-back from the past, today is a new day and you still have the opportunity to make it a better day, a great day. Even if the problems that you were facing yesterday, or last week, are still there and still must be faced; you can make it a better day by approaching them with a new attitude and a new resolve to get through them and make it a better day.
happened. The only thing that you control is how you react to those happenings. You can give up and let them drag you down into the pit of despair and depression or you can take a deep breath and begin to work things out. There may not be a “solution” to what happened, but there is a way to accept it and move on with life.
there with us and that if we trust Him everything will be all right. He didn’t say that there would be no pain, no hardship, or no grieving. He said that if we believe in Him through those things we will be rewarded with a peace that passes all understanding. I have found that nothing helps more in life to get through life’s crises than to be at peace when all of those around you are in panic. That peace starts by going to God and
saying, “Not my will, but thy will be done.”
Sometimes we are faced with situations for which there just doesn’t seem to be a way forward that isn’t lined with danger or pain or fears. We become paralyzed by our fears, uncertainty and doubts. Our imaginations take over in those times and conjure up the worst possible outcomes. We envision failure, rather than visualizing success. During those times we may feel very alone, which adds to our fears.
many times about giving up the self-delusion that we are in control, that we can work our way out of whatever the situation is purely through our own efforts. Life is too big to get our arms around and control. We are swept along with events that occur around us and the only thing that we can perhaps control is how we react to them. We can’t stand pat. We must choose a way forward. Sometimes the only way to see that 
way forward is to let God show us. Ask for His help and trust in Him to guide us forward.
things will change, flowers will bloom again and all will feel good again. So it is with life. It is hard to imagine getting through some things that occur in life, but we do. Life goes on and things get better. The pain of a loss dulls over time, replaced by fond memories. The sharp disappointment of a failure fades and is replaced by wisdom from the experience. The depressing weight of our fears, uncertainties and doubts give way to the joy of success in new experiences. It’s going to be a very pleasant spring.
to get through the trials and tribulations of life by believing in God and his love for us. That belief helps us look forward to the better times ahead that He has promised. Our adversities melt away once we pray, “not my will but thy will be done”. We stop focusing upon the past and look once again to the future. It’s going to be a very pleasant spring.
flowers pushing their way through the snow to announce that spring is finally here. So, we soldier on, slogging through the slush or slipping along on the ice, in the certain belief that spring will arrive soon. In life, we go on in the certain belief that God is with us and that things will be all right if we just trust Him. We may be in the midst of a hardship or feeling the pain of some event in our lives; but we must continue to believe in God. It’s going to be a very pleasant spring.
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