The spiritual side of you/me just cannot be ignored. Go ahead. Try. Focus only on the bank accounts and the progress reports and the touchy relationships. Devote yourself to expanding your territory. Join the driven market for more and then more to the point that one becomes convinced that enough is never enough. Trade sarcasm for insult. Believe that the world's troubles are always due to someone else. This is what the flesh gets us.
Or, awaken to the truth that we are very much spiritual participants. Exhilaration? Depression? Enthusiasm? Joy? Sadness? Peace? These are spiritual matters. Daily matters. Every individual matters. All of these are of the heart; the spirit side of us.
Outlook, on the surface, may seem to be the visible; the tangible. But it isn't. It begins with the opposite. Invisible and intangible are all about the spirit side of men and women. Outlook is not a quarterly report of a success ledger. Rather it is very much the flexibility of feelings; emotions and insights.
What excites me is that we are able to make perpetual upgrade. The process is quite simple. And, the progress is magic.
We are to live in the emotion of thanksgiving. The flesh gets moody. It likes and it doesn't like. The Spirit, however, is able to admit the frustration or discouragement; but is assured that wonder is going on in the midst of each obstacle. This is reality. The flesh doesn't buy it. And...the flesh is only happy on the up days; not the down.
To make an immediate upgrade on your outlook; engage in the spiritual discipline of being thankful for what the flesh would deem as successful as well as the unsuccessful. Our effectivity is dependent upon our ability to know that each moment contains life-offering hope to others. Jesus would have no story of coming back to life if he hadn't been killed. The Apostle Paul would never have had the report of the jail falling down if he hadn't first been unfairly mistreated and arrested.
This upgrade changes the way we pray. At first, I only prayed because I was expected to...I was the preacher. But it was boring and fruitless and I didn't care for it. But when I began to tell God everyday and everyday and everyday Thank You! for every pro and con, positive and negative, up and down moment, the world began to open for me. Life began to actually fit!
How to make an immediate upgrade to our outlook is to look into the very center of our problems and note that even these are carriers of God's wonder just waiting to burst upon the scene. Cry when we must...for we do take our turns...yet always be assured that such a moment is a vital bit of forward progress for your personal walk with the Eternal One.
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