My Riffs

Love can conquer fear. Fear is often due to the absence of love. Love seems to be the solution for almost every problem. 

Ends are also beginnings. Look for the new when the end of something comes. 

We may get 1000 invitations a day. An invitation to get angry at a social media post, an invitation to be upset at a news story, and on and on.  Here’s the thing, we don’t need to accept those invitations. Not everything we see, hear and feel require a response from us. It’s more than fine to move on and not be drawn into every little thing we become aware of. 

If you accept a thought, the next time it will be allowed a bit quicker and easier. Allow it enough times and it will become part of who you are and what you believe. People become absolutely sure of completely delusional ideas, because they simply accepted the idea too many times. We have to become our own best fact checker and idea destroyer. If we have a wrong idea or thought we need to seek it out and destroy it immediately. That way a bad thought won’t become a reality. 

Pain can lead to healing if we let it. Pain lets us know something is wrong. If we use that pain in the right way we can find healing. Ignoring pain never helps. It must be dealt with in a good way. 

Many people in todays world feel lonely. In a world where we’re all hyper-connected, it’s not cutting it. The connections are too shallow. People feel as lonely as they ever have. Real relationships are far too few. But they’re something almost all humans crave. The best times in life are usually when we put our phones down. 

Lots of people say they’re gonna do it. But it’s better to just do it and let that speak. Actions speak louder than words. 

We play things so safe. But really what and where is safe? The recent events in the world have shown us nothing is truly “safe”. Things happen beyond our imagination, so there’s no truly safe place. We can lose it all in a moment. Best to be grateful for what we have and hold our possessions loosely and our relationships tightly. 

Our inner voice is the one we end up believing. If we let nature take its course, that inner voice will naturally decline into negative thinking. We have to train and guide that inner voice to only speak life. We have to become destroyers of negative self talk. If we believe it we can achieve it. The opposite is unfortunately true. 

Fastest isn't always best. We treat many things as a race but not many things are in fact a race. Slowing down is counter cultural, but often the right approach.

Some want to change the world. That's a noble goal. To change the world, we must change ourselves. Are we willing to change ourselves?

Change is usually more than a single event. It’s usually a decision and then a continuation of making that decision over and over again.   

Don’t let ugly people make you ugly. You don’t have to take the offer to join in ugliness. Move along. 

Sometimes you need to be quick and others slow. Quick to forgive and quick to give. Slow to be angry and slow to judge. We're often hasty for the wrong things. If something comes quickly to you, make sure it's the right thing.

 There will be bumps in the road. How well will you nagivate them? It most likely depends on your attitude.

Life will take away your joy if you let it. You have to choose joy. It won't often come choosing you, it's something you have to go after. Joy doesn't always just happen, you have to choose it. Living a joyful life is a choice. Some moments may have joy in them, but they're fleeting. Choosing joy is much more permanent.

Your feelings matter. They should be acknowledged but not lived by. Living by our feelings makes for a very fickle life. Feelings change quickly and if we just follow them we become unstable.

One day it will be your last day. The best way to live is as if that could be today. Living as if you have time to spare isn’t really living. You begin living once you live as if you don’t have time to spare. 

When we're hurting it gives us an opportunity to work on our healing. Hurting means something still needs healing. When we hurt we can tend to that hurt and move it toward healing.

What’s holding you back? Well, you are. We can blame other people and circumstances but they aren’t really what’s holding us back. Only we can truly hold ourselves back. Our greatest limitation is our own thinking. If you can push past your own mental barriers you can elevate to whatever you want to accomplish. 

Blessed are the peacemakers. We need peacemakers not warmongers. There’s too many people stirring up war online and in person, causing division and hatred. Those who bring peace are the ones who are blessed though. 

The very famous Hymn says "oh what needless pain we bear...". This is so true. We carry so much excess unneeded baggage. 

You will always reap what you’ve sown. Not immediately and maybe not exactly what you sowed, but you will always reap the rewards of what you’ve sown. 

I saw a powerful illustration. A cup of water was filled with dirt and debris. They tried to pick out all the pieces individually. It didn’t work well. Instead they decided to pour a ton of fresh, clean water and overfilled the cup, cleaning out the dirt and debris. It was a good illustration of how to help people. We can nitpick them all we want but it likely won’t get results. Or we can pour huge love into them and drive away all the things that need to go. 

First isn’t always best. Try to be your best, not just the first. 

Life is too short for many things. Too short to carry grudges. Too short to waste time arguing. Too short to pursue meaningless things. Use the time to build, to love and to grow.

Yesterday was prejudice and today is pride. Pride and prejudice will sink you faster than almost anything else. It’s a Proverb that pride comes before a fall. Stick with humility. Humility will take you where you need to go. Pride will sink your ship.  

We’re all guilty of it. Pre-judgment. Assuming much without all the facts. Learning to reserve judgment is the mark of the wise and mature.