What Confucius Can Teach You About Living a Happier Life

By 

Henrik Edberg.

“It is better to play than do nothing.”

 

“Men’s natures are alike; it is their habits that separate them.”

“Only the wisest and stupidest of men never change.”

About 2500 years ago there lived a man called Confucius. He was Chinese philosopher and thinker and has had a big influence on life and thought systems in countries like China, Korea and Japan for a long, long time. His teachings became the system of philosophy called Confucianism.

Today I’d like to share a few of my favorite happiness tips from Confucius.

What goes around, comes around.

“What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.”

• A very simple rule for how life often works. The Law of Reciprocity is strong in people. How you treat others, they are likely to treat you. So be honest and think about what you do to others and what they are doing to you. And think about how you can change and improve what you do to them.
• The payoff may not be instant though. So let go of your need for instant gratification and continue to act in a way that you feel is right rather than quickly giving up doing positive things just because you didn’t get validation and positive feedback right away.

You have to do to understand.

“I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”

• This is a key piece of advice. It’s easy to confuse what you read in a book or see happen to someone else as having an idea of how it is to do or experience such a thing for yourself. Sometimes it gives you a good idea of what it is about. Other times it’s quite different than you thought it would be.
• So while books and seeing someone doing something can be useful, the key to really understanding what something is about is to do it yourself. You can argue with yourself or others about an idea for years. Have logical discussions and theories. But until you actually try it for yourself you won’t understand it.

Shoot for something.

“If you shoot for the stars and hit the moon, it’s OK. But you’ve got to shoot for something. A lot of people don’t even shoot.”

• The most important thing is to start and to do. You may fail, you may stumble. And that’s OK. You may not wind up exactly where you wanted to go. And that’s OK too.
• But if you don’t try then nothing will ever get started. You’ll probably just spend days, months and years sitting around waiting for something to happen.

Focus on what you want.

“The more man meditates upon good thoughts, the better will be his world and the world at large.”

• What you focus on, you will see in your world. Changing what you think about most of the time can change the world around you radically. Things you never noticed before come into focus. Things you previously spent a lot of time thinking and worrying about seem insignificant and sink into the background of your world.
• And your actions tend to align with your dominant thoughts. So if you replace negative thoughts with positive thoughts then you will probably start to take more positive action in your world and so you world tends to become a better world. This can of course spread outside your own little world since people tend to treat other people as they are being treated. And so a positive, upward spiral of thought and action can grow.

Let go of the past.

“To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it.” 

“Things that are done, it is needless to speak about…things that are past, it is needless to blame.”

• People can hold on to things that have happened long, long after they happened. One reason for that is that it inflates the ego. If you have or have had important problems then well, you must be a person of importance. Or so you can tell yourself and others to gain sympathy and attention.
• So you feel a sense of importance by bringing these past things up in your mind and perhaps by discussing or arguing with others about them. This may be seen as normal and something a whole lot of people do. But it is not useful. It is not necessary. You get some pleasure out of it but in the end it always leads to a lot more misery and suffering.
• So ask yourself: “what is in it for me?”. Or: “who cares?”.
• Is it really a lot of value in it for you to be thinking and feeling negatively for perhaps hours each week about things that is already in the past, things you can’t change anyway?
• Now, just saying that you should drop negative stuff that happened to you in the past is easy. Doing it isn’t always that easy. These memories have a tendency to want to cling to you. Or jump out at you once again even though you thought you had moved past them.
• But with time, they can become less and less frequent visitors. Until one day, you may even have forgotten about them altogether.

Delay the impulse and avoid the consequences.

“When anger rises, think of the consequences.”

• No matter if you train your mind, you are still human and in the heat of the moment it’s easy to take less helpful path. In those moments it’s good to look into the future. It is easy to get lost in the anger and act based upon that. But is it worth it? And what may happen if you do?
• When anger rises, take 10 breaths and think about that.

You are here.

“And remember, no matter where you go, there you are.”

• It’s easy to get lost in the past or future. But you aren’t there now. You are right here right now. Most of the moments you spend thinking and feeling about the past or future is simply you being stuck in an unnecessary habit and it is a distraction from what is here in front of you.
• So return to where you are right now by focusing on your breathing for a minute or two. Or by focusing on what is in front of you and around you right now. Then be where you are.

Recognize the simplicity of life.

“Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.”

• The mind loves to think. So it thinks and thinks about things. Making them more and more complex than they ever really were. And so you bog yourself down with too many thoughts and perhaps a lack of action due to things just seeming too complicated and hard.
• Don’t get lost in details and unimportant things. Realize what is most important in your life and discard what you don’t need.
• Then spend more time and energy on the important things in your life. And stop thinking so much and instead take action to gain a better understanding of life and of yourself.

Copyright 2006-2010 Henrik Edberg.

It’s Not the Title, It’s the Testimony

By: Pastor Marvin Moss

Published: July 22, 2010

The time has come for the church, church folk, the children of God, Christians to realize that it’s not the title, it’s the testimony. It’s the story that we tell with the way we live our lives. It’s the story that we tell by the way we execute the word of God. It’s in the execution that one recognizes another as a child of God or a child of the devil.

It’s what people see you do that makes all of the difference in the world. When you’re trying to get a job, it’s good to have the degree relative to the position you’re applying for, but you still have to undergo a battery of tests. Then there are interviews, more tests, and more interviews. That degree, diploma, and certificate are good but you still have to prove that what you’re saying is true.

They may call you Doctor, but are you board certified?
They may call you Attorney, but have you passed the bar?
They may call you Reverend, but is there anything about your life that would testify to the fact that you’re anything other than a Reverend?

It’s not the title, it’s the testimony.

How are you living? What kind of report would your family give about you? Is there a good report on you outside of the church as well as in the church?
It’s not the title, it’s the testimony.

Peter. Bold, big mouthed, boisterous Peter, has just allowed himself to be used by God to perform a miracle. You know the story, Peter and john were heading to the temple one afternoon to take part in the afternoon prayer. As they approached the temple, a man lame from birth was being carried in. Each day he was put beside the temple gate so he could beg from the people going into the temple. When he saw Peter and John about to enter, he asked them for some money.

Peter looked at the man intently and said, “Look at us! I don’t have any money for you. But I’ll give you what I do have, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, get up and walk!” Up until this point, Peter and John were just like everybody else. They were two people who could meet the beggar’s need or what the beggar thought his need was. All too often, we think that it’s us meeting the needs of those whom God has trusted us with. This is where the ego comes into play; where we begin to wear our feelings on our sleeves. This is where we want to take credit for everything that only God can do.

God uses us as instruments to fulfill His purpose. We are called and the call has more to do with God’s divine purpose. It’s not about you! We’ve all been called to be leaders. We’re to lead the lost to the lamb. We’re to lead the left out to the One who can let them in.

God calls us to lead not by title but by testimony. How can you tell somebody else about the goodness of God if you’ve never experienced it for yourself? You might be able to tell them what you’ve seen happen to somebody else. You might be to tell them what somebody else has told you. But oh, there’s nothing like a firsthand account. Isaiah said in the year king Uzziah died, “I saw the lord.”

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, walked through the fiery furnace with an angel of the Lord. Somebody has been walking with Him all week. Somebody called on Him the midnight hour. And when they called on the name of Jesus, He answered them.

He turned their midnight into morning.
He turned their sorrow into a shout,
He turned their problem into praise.
He turned their worry into worship.
He gave them a testimony.

It’s not your title, but it’s your testimony.

Scripture Of The Day: " ...And why look at us as though we had made this man walk by our own power and godliness? For it is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, the God of all our ancestors who has brought glory to his servant Jesus by doing this..." - Acts 3:12-13v (NLT)

Pastor Marvin Moss is senior pastor of Cascade United Methodist Church, located in Atlanta, Georgia. Pastor Moss is extremely active within the Atlanta community, and serves on the Board of Trustees at Gammon Theological Seminary.

For more information about Pastor Moss, log onto http://www.cascadeumc.org.

The Power of Your Testimony

In our justice system, one of the most powerful pieces of evidence is eyewitness testimony. In the days before DNA and other scientific and forensic advances, the testimony of an eyewitness could make or break a case. An eyewitness could identify the guilty party or solidify an alibi and free an innocent person. The assignment for an eyewitness is to tell the truth about what they saw, heard, and experienced.

When Jesus ended his earthly ministry and gave us the Great Commission, he declared, "You will be my witnesses." We are called - commanded, even - to be eyewitnesses to the saving, healing grace of Jesus. In the Bible, there is a wonderful story of someone who did just that. The story in found in the 9th chapter of John. The story begins with a theological discussion, continues with a miracle, and ends with a powerful testimony.

As Jesus and His disciples were traveling, they saw a man who had been blind since birth. The Disciples (sadly like many of us sometimes) were more interested in the theological ramifications of the man's situation than they were in the man himself. "why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents' sins?" they asked Jesus. Jesus replied, "It was not because of his sins or his parents' sins. This happened so the power of God could be seen in him."

Jesus then told His disciples, "We need to be energetically at work for the One who sent me here, working while the sun shines. When night falls, the workday is over." For many years, I didn't understand why He said this - it didn't seem to fit with the rest of the story. But I believe what Jesus was saying to the disciples was you are wasting precious time trying to find someone to blame for this man's blindness when you should be ministering to him. (There's a sermon unto itself there, but that is a devotional for another day...)

Immediately after saying this, Jesus made mud, put it on the man's eyes and told him to go wash in the Pool of Siloam, which ironically means "sent." As soon as the man obeyed, he was able to see for the first time in his life! The town, which had known him all his life as a blind beggar, was buzzing with the news that he could now see. There was such a change in him that people who had known him all his life didn't think it was the same person.

There was a problem, though. The man had been healed on the Sabbath, and that was, according to Pharisaic Law, not legal. So they marched this man to the Pharisees to see what they thought. When they heard the story, there was a deep division among the Pharisees. Some of them were still spiritually minded enough to realize this was of God. Others, sadly were so mired in their self-imposed legalism that they refused to believe this was of God or that Jesus might be a prophet, much less the messiah.

They called the formerly blind man to appear before them to hear his story.

Some of the Pharisees thought they were being tricked, so they hauled the man's parents in front of them to identify him. The parents, who were deathly afraid of the Jewish leaders, acknowledged this man was their son and that he used to be blind, but said they had no idea what had happened to him. "He is of age, ask him yourself" they said.

The Pharisees would love to have discredited this man and thereby discredited Jesus. One thing stood in their way: his simple yet powerful personal eyewitness testimony.

"All I know is this: Once I was blind, and now I can see!"

You and I are often given the opportunity to use the power of our eyewitness testimony to persuade others of God's grace, love and mercy and to encourage our brothers and sisters. Let's be alert for opportunities that the Holy Spirit will give us today to tell our story of His working in our lives!

Scripture Of The Day: "Then I heard a strong voice out of Heaven saying, "Salvation and power are established! Kingdom of our God, authority of his Messiah! The Accuser of our brothers and sisters is thrown out, who accused them day and night before God. They defeated him through the blood of the Lamb and the bold word of their witness." - Revelation 12:10-11 (The Message)

Karen Clark and FAMU GOSPEL CHOIR I Won t Complain