Words and thinking

May 13, 2009 · Filed Under renewing our mind · Comment 

Form BobHamp.com

By the time we are 3, many of our neurological pathways are already firmly in place. Ways of processing sensory input are all but locked in. So as we grow and start learning language, we must realize that words connect to these pathways and ways of processing data. It only takes one session of marriage counseling to realize that two different people can assign radically different meanings to the same word. While husband and wife may share the same definition of a word, the emotional charge attached to it can be 180 degrees different.

Words are the bits that program our minds, as they connect to real objects and experiences. The word “dog” can create physiological reactions in someone who has been bit by one. It does not necessarily matter if an actual dog is present, the word is sufficient to create experience. For another person the same word, “dog” can produce peace and calm.

So as we try to learn about the central and anchoring issues of living life, as we pursue God, and His plan for us, the words we use have incredible power. Words that are healing to one, may frighten another, while words that bring life to one, may produce guilt in another. Is it any wonder God found it necessary to make “The Word” a person.

Is it any wonder The Person spoke in stories and said things like, “you have heard it said… (religious tradition) but I say to you… (the heart issue)”. He had a lot of neurological pathways to re-route. Even the word “repent” which refers to the change of these ways of processing, has come to mean something completely different to many. Many people are put off by the word, because of what it has come to mean.

I might say, “you have heard it said that ‘repent’ means to feel bad and clean up your life, but I say to you, repentance is a way of opening your mind to a whole new way of seeing the world”.

Today open your eyes, slow down, breathe. If you were still and peaceful how would you see the world differently. Consider that some words contain life but they have seemed undesirable to you. Like green beans.

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Can we really be free (Part 4)

May 7, 2009 · Filed Under freedom · Comment 

From BobHamp.com

Steering our soul through life is difficult without a map to guide us. Regret, frustration, tedious attempts at transformation, all these obstacles can seem to be the rule and not the exception. Though I usually resist formulas, I want to describe here how our will functions, so we can most effectively begin to alter our experience.

Here is the path:

    Perception > Desire > Choice > Action > Experience > Impact

Don’t read over this too fast. Look at it again. The advertising companies understand this as a science. We act and experience based on our desires but our desires come from our perceptions. If we want to change a person’s action, we begin by discovering their desires. But hidden below their desires is perception: the thing that drives us all. (see Alan Smith’s Blog).

For real and lasting life change, we must begin to examine our perceptions. (also see earlier post; Ways of Seeing: Contact lenses and Sausage machines). If I want to affect your behavior I must get you to see in a new way. The Bible calls this “repentance”. This does not mean feeling bad enough to change, it means seeing in a new way.

Something appears desirable, my desire engages, I decide and then act. Once I have acted, this begins to shape my experience, and then it shapes how others experience me. It can also affect how others experience themselves around me.

If I see everything through the eyes that my life experiences have given me, it is possible, even likely that I will reproduce my life experiences. Is it possible to have new eyes?

Every day, I pray this: “God open up the eyes in my heart and give me Your Spirit which allows me to see differently, if you do, then I can see and know (experience) the amazing things you have done, are doing, and continue to do in and around me.”

If that sounds like a clever prayer, I cannot take credit for it. Paul prayed this very thing for the young church at Ephesus. Try it on today, it looks good on you.

You can know the Truth… and guess what it will do for you?

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