Welcome to How to Change and Grow

Welcome to How to Change and Grow. The answers to life is found in seeking the Creater of life. We serve a good God. He wants to help us. God's Word guides and directs our steps while the Holy Sprit empowers us to transform, mature, prosper and more. The fullness of God's love brings us to beyond striving, to satisfying all our needs and anything we could ever hope or wish for. God's way IS a better way! God bless you as you learn HIS WAYS to change and grow.

July 27, 2012

Moving into the Future

There is a process that leads to resolution. The Bible offers this guideline: “He who gets wisdom loves his own soul; he who cherishes understanding prospers” (Proverbs 19:8). You have moved beyond painful events in the past, when they no longer have any power and control over you. The following resolution concepts will help you move beyond walls that are blocking your future.

Examination: Take an honest look at your patterns you have developed and become a student of your own life. By looking at your life objectively, you can develop a plan that helps to stop the unhealthy reactions you usually have when things get uncomfortable. Look for the places that hold the most negative emotions like anger, fear and guilt, and what is behind those emotions. Resolving your issues is much easier than dealing with the consequences of failing to resolve them. (See Psalm 139:23).

Openness and confession: In order to get out from behind walls, we need to risk becoming open about the struggles we are going through. We also need to confess the sins we are committing. Openness provides an outlet to shame and stops it from adding up. Confession means we do not have to carry the shame with us. (See James 5:16).

Living in the present: Whatever happened in the past is over and done with. Begin to focus on what’s going on with you now like the good things in your life and the opportunities before you. (See Psalm 128:1-6, and Matthew 6:23-34).

Choosing to forgive: We must find a way to forgive the sins done to us and by us. There cannot be resolution without forgiveness. What the other person does is not the issue. You forgive to free yourself from the bondage to the person who has hurt you. (See Matthew 18:35, Mark 11:25, Luke 11:4, and Romans 12:14-21).

Choosing to let go: Choosing to let go is the act of turning your life and will over to God. Letting go is to believe and trust in God to control the outcome which allows you to be at peace and rest. (See 1Corinthians 13:3-13, James 3:13-18, and James 4:10).

Making amends and restitution: When people have hurt us, we want them to pay the price and make amends. On the other hand, others want the same from us if we have hurt them. We can live more comfortably with ourselves if we know we have done everything we can for the loss and pain we have caused. (See Proverbs 16:7).

Making a plan to protect yourself: It is very easy to fall back into your old ways and patterns that keep you stuck. By protecting yourself, you are less likely to have a relapse and get off track. You find protection by filling up your life with safe, healthy people who will help to guide and encourage you. Get plugged into a faith based group and get to know them, and let them get to know you. Practice spiritual disciplines including regular Bible reading and prayer (See Romans 8:5-11, and 1Peter 2:9).

Fulfilling the dream of reaching others: God has a purpose for your life. We need to secure our own growth by helping others in their process of healing. In doing so, we find meaning and purpose. (See Galatians 5:13 and 1Peter 4:10).

July 21, 2012

Getting a New Perspective

Getting unstuck is a process of giving up former views and attitudes. Getting a new perspective can help you get past your walls and move you toward healthier relationships, a life of contentment, a brighter future, and to begin living out the purpose God created you to accomplish.

Humility: The first step to getting a new perspective comes with humility. Humility allows us to see that we are all strugglers: “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard” (Romans 3:23). When we admit this fact, we take away our entitlement to blame and shame. We take the focus off the sin done to us and put more emphasis on the reality that we are human and therefore inclined to make mistakes. We must see ourselves as we really are; needy, broken, and in need of a savior.

The Holy Spirit: We do not have to live as a slave to our emotions and instincts, because God has given us a power that can control these troublesome impulses. If we want to move past walls, we must come to the place where we treat people better than they treat us. The power of the Holy Spirit that lives in us enables us to do that: “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you” (Acts 1:8). When humility and living in the power of God is added, walls come down: “Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me” (2Corinthians 12:9). Instead of focusing on the past and the bad that has happened, begin to see the people who hurt you as having the same needs and begin to pray for them. Remind yourself that you have greatness within you and that you can conquer anything: “I can do everything through Him who gives me strength” (Philippians 4:13).

Sharing the bond of imperfection: The next step toward widening your view of reality is an acknowledgment that the person who hurt you was raised in a broken world and most likely damaged in some way, which led them to become an abuser. It is simply being aware of the reality that all life on earth is imperfect. We share a bond of imperfection that comes out of God’s gift of free choice. The gift of choice frees you to make up your own mind and to choose your own priorities, but just as we make poor choices causing others to suffer, we also have felt the effects from the poor choices of others. If you can see your hurt in a context that we live in a broken world with broken people, it may lead you to a position where you gain a new perspective of your abuser and the event that has blocked your life.

Forgiving mind-set: The fourth step toward gaining a truer perspective is a mind-set that provides you with a new way of looking at the past and those who hurt you. In addition, it will allow you to connect with those in the present who continue to inflict pain and stir up trouble in your life. Not to be confused with the act of forgiveness, the spirit of forgiveness is a way of approaching all of life. You know that on any given day, you will have to forgive many slights, insults, and unintentional hurts. It becomes a daily habit of looking beyond the personal mistakes of others and making an effort to see good things that happen to you as God’s favor. In gratitude for God’s goodness, you gladly extend grace to others, including those who have hurt you. Are you ready to let go of resentment and begin to live your life in healthy freedom from the past?

July 14, 2012

Getting Unstuck

Reaching a new perspective that gets you unstuck from your past is a combination of humility, awareness, spiritual focus, and grace. These four components can provide a corrective lens through which you can see anything from the past or in the present. They can help you get past your walls and move on toward a bright future.

Why we live in the past: We stay stuck behind walls because we find certain benefits from staying there. One benefit is that we do not have to participate fully in life because staying the same is easier than doing the hard work of change. Another benefit of staying stuck in the past is we justify not trying new things or taking new risks. People will not become vulnerable and not make themselves open to new possibilities, if they think they are only going to get hurt again. Another common benefit of living in the past is the hurts experienced long ago become the excuse for over indulgence in the present. These attitudes become a replacement for dealing with the past and our life gets out of balance. These “benefits” remove us from the responsibility for our dysfunctional behavior and allow us to stay the same.

Reframe your thoughts, change your life: Almost always, we who are stuck behind walls have developed a distorted, inaccurate view of the past. When you are stuck behind walls, you hold on to thoughts and feelings that distort your outlook and damage your health. More than we realize, it is our thinking about events of the past that keeps us unhealthy, unhappy, and stuck behind walls. “Your problem is not your problem. How you see your problem is your problem.” When we are willing to change our thinking, we become able to see that our walls are not created by the trauma of the past but by our reaction to the original trauma. This change in thinking requires that we see the picture through a new frame. Putting a new frame on the past will not change it, but it can change our outlook on the events that traumatized us. The knowledge of our past will still be there, but its negative impact will be wiped out. Seeing the past through a new frame involves looking at yourself and at the people who have hurt you, seeing everything in a more accurate perspective. A radical shift in your perspective could enable you to view the past more accurately and see the truth in a way that frees you from your wall.

Jesus shows us new perspectives: Jesus often removed walls by putting a new perspective on the realities of people’s lives. When others saw the widow’s gift as worthless because it had very little monetary value, Jesus over turned this worldly perspective to see the gift in terms of sacrifice, which showed to be one of the largest gifts ever given in honor of God. When people were ready to throw stones at the woman caught in adultery, Jesus forced them to see the woman in light of their own sins. When he showed them that her reality was also their reality, they dropped their stones and left. The Sermon on the Mount is a guide to seeing life from a true perspective. It invites us to see people and events in a different light. It says the weak will be strong; the powerless are often the greatest; and that sufferers will be given special attention rather than be treated as outcasts. A change in perspective allows you to get out from behind walls that keep you stuck and started down a new and brighter path. How can you change your perspective on your past? Do you still see yourself as a victim?

July 7, 2012

Phantom Walls

Much of the time the walls that hold us back, are barriers built in our minds from incomplete or misunderstood pieces of reality and combined half-truths woven together in such a way, that builds a false perception of the truth. In that sense what prevents us from moving forward with our lives are phantom walls; walls that are not really there. They are fabricated, at least in part in our own minds from our limited perspectives. We take fragments of reality and parts of the truth, and build ideas that are not complete or accurate. We build barriers of anger and resentment about things others have done, or guilt about things that were not our fault. Maybe you have built a phantom wall by making someone else responsible for something that is clearly your own doing. Playing the victim role, and blaming others for what’s wrong in your life, becomes a wall in your mind that holds you back.

Get a new perspective: Getting past phantom walls requires a new perspective. We often carry destructive thoughts around with us that may not exactly fit the real facts. In our pain, resentment, or anger, we may have assumed things that were not true. The new perspective we need in getting past our walls is more than just seeing the upside of the difficult experiences in life. It is not a matter of merely seeing the glass as half full. It is looking at life from a broader perspective and more than just what has happened in the past. Getting a new perspective requires looking deeper into all of the facts surrounding the past rather than personalizing the hurt.

Look at the history: Getting past a wall could mean learning more about the history of the person who rejected or abused you and discovering the origins of the rejection or abuse. Many parents and children are estranged from each other, not realizing that they actually share a bond of neglect, a common experience of pain, and a mutual battle to move beyond walls of resentment and bitterness. When an abandoned or abused person comes up for air from a life of bitterness, anger, or resentment, they can come to see that they did not have the whole story. The person who inflicted the hurt may have found healing, and the pain the victim feels may be that person’s biggest regret.

Understanding reality removes walls: As we read the Bible we find that Jesus was intent on getting people to see the truth. He often challenged people the way they looked at life and each other. Sometimes He would say, “You have heard it said…” and then quote some established belief. Then He would counter that common wisdom with, “But, I say….” And proceed to astound listeners with an amazing new perspective on the old way of thinking. Jesus philosophy could be summarized this way: Life is not all about you, it is not all about things, and it is not even about this world. It is not all about feeling good or getting what you want. It is not about what you think you need right now. It is about another world beyond Earth and an inner world of the heart without conflict or pretense. Jesus made a difference two thousand years ago because He challenged people to see things from a perspective based on truth and reality. The old way of thinking created barriers because it is not based on truth and reality. Living in the truth sets us free. It is another way of saying that understanding reality removes walls.