Refresh: Limiting Beliefs – Things that Hold us Back
One bad experience often becomes two, three or four, not because it needs to, but because it impacts the way we think about ourself, undermining our confidence and restricting our willingness to try again. This Refresh post from June 2023 explores the hazard of limiting beliefs… Refresh: Liming Beliefs – Things that Hold us Back I was recently talking to someone who felt God had let them down badly. The marriage hadn’t gone well even though they felt they had done everything right. Of course they had indulged in a few little squabbles and minor bouts of selfishness, but nothing...
Read MoreChef or Ingredient. Which are You?
It seemed a strange question at the time. “Chef or ingredient. Which are you?” The more I have pondered it, the more I appreciate its relevance. What’s it getting at? I guess behind the question is the probe, “Are you essentially a pawn in someone else’s game – there because in some way you add something to it (a tasty additional ingredient) – or are you in control of the game, deciding what goes in, and what is excluded.” Most of us would say that it depends on the setting. Sometimes we are more chef than ingredient, other times more...
Read MoreRefresh: On Full Stops and Commas
This post from May 2022 is one of my favourites. It notes the difference between a full stop and a comma. The one signifies an end, the other, a brief pause. Confusing them can see us giving up prematurely – as I so nearly did with my writing. The post tells the story. BTW, while this 2022 post notes 6 published books, that number is now 7 (thanks to my 2024 book, Stirrers and Saints), and hopefully it will keep growing. Refresh: On Full Stops and Commas Let me start with a brag, and follow it with a confession. I won the English prize at school. True, that was not far off 50 years...
Read MoreTowards a Theology of Personal Development (7): Guided by Hope
Perhaps there is no word in the English language as depressing as “hopeless”. It’s the word we attach to seriously lost causes, or the resigned and despairing verdict we pronounce when a desired dream is clearly not going to eventuate – “It’s hopeless.” We might add, “So let’s give up now. Carrying on only makes it worse.” Yet hopeless is not really part of the Christian vocabulary. In Rom 15:13 Paul prays: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power...
Read MoreRefresh: Because Our Habits Form Us…
What are 5 habits you’d like to change? And 5 you’d like to keep? Because our habits shape so much of what we do, it’s important to check we are cultivating the right ones, as this Refresh post from Jan 2022 reminds us. Hope it’s helpful. Refresh: Because Our Habits Form Us Though I no longer remember her name, I remember the enthusiastic student teacher in my primary school teaching us about habits, and how important it is to form good ones. “A habit sticks with you,” she proclaimed. She wrote the word HABIT on the chalk board, systematically then rubbing out one...
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