Are you Looking to Get, or to Give?
Are you seeking more to get than you are to give, giving only to those who’ll give back to you?
Rather than wanting to get what’s sickening, it’s way better to get fulfilled, by giving what’s healthy.
Are you trying to Figure somebody out, to Fix them?
Better to judge yourself than others; take the log out of your own eye first, and let God fix you. (Mathew 7)
Are you Restlessly Comparing (Image Management), or Gratefully Content?
Are you trying to make yourself look different to attract others?
Or are you trying to become comfortable in your own skin, just by being yourself?
Who’s Helping Who here?
Are you thinking what others could do to help you with what you’re doing?
Or are you thinking how you can help others with the healthy things they are doing?
Is your mind’s eye seeing life like your eyeballs do, with you at the center of your world?
Are you seeing yourself and others in the natural, focusing on the ego, the selfish self, the false self
we’ve all made (up) to avoid pain and get pleasure, to calm and protect ourselves?
Are you judging the motives or character of other people, or worried they’re judging you?
Are you running from your pain, or using it to connect with others?
Can you see through pain to your true self, the core person longing to give and receive life?
Do you see the soul created in the image of a loving God, all of us siblings in the human family?
ANOTHER PLACE TO LOOK
You can give more freely when you trust you’re always getting fresh supplies from wellsprings within and without. Besides the nine natural resources the BLT measures (truth, safety, respect, etc.), here are nine more soul foods to look at, the nine “A-foods”. Each of these can be healthy or toxic, depending on where they come from and where they are given out:
Attention, Acceptance, Approval, Affection, Appreciation, Acknowledgement, Admiration, Attraction, Allegiance
The big secret:
When you are sharing healthy gifts of these A-foods (giving to bless), the more of these you give away, the more you have to give, from your wellsprings inside and out. And when you seek or share the toxic versions of these resources (giving to get from your whirlpools), the more you get, the more you want, and the harder it is to keep on giving.