Back on Track

By Xlibris US

As we journey on the highway of life, circumstances and events affect us and shift our course. This shift takes place slowly and subtly. Without conscious attention, we could soon find ourselves off course. Situations derail us, and we need to get back on track in order to resume our journey.

This book is your GPS to get you back on track. You will never be comfortable or confident off your track. As you read, there are times that you need to put this book down in order to reflect on some thoughts and allow the wow moments to illuminate your consciousness. The writings would cause you to look at your present, consider your past, and dream of your greater future.

I recommend that you read one chapter a day and ruminate on its contents. You may have to read over some parts to fully grasp hidden pearls. The key is to incorporate some of the messages you will find in these pages that will make you a better person and put your life back on track.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Aug 12, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499059953

Book preview

Chapter 1

The Purpose Built You

It is quite amazing when I speak with people daily how many have no idea what is their purpose in life. To me that is the most important quest in life and the most important question to answer.

Life without a purpose is like a ship without a rudder. You drift aimlessly through life. If everything in life has a purpose why shouldn’t you? Rudderless people live a purposeless life.

Most people settle for the blows of life. It is where the hits of life land them that they make their existence. These people do not chart the course of their own life. They run aground on any shore at every port. They live passively along their uncharted path.

It is not that a girl plans to drop out of school to pursue parenting; it is that she just happens to get pregnant and had to give up schooling to take care of an unplanned child. It is not that a boy plans to save money to purchase the niceties of life. It is that he was just selling drugs to make a fast buck and was caught by the authorities and was incarcerated. Both of these instances are rudderless living. That is not purposeful living. That is drifting with the currents of circumstances.

Those with a definite purpose know to invest energy into existing in their purpose. The fish was made to swim the ocean and therefore would not spend time devising how to exist on the land. It is quite at home in an environment conducive to its purpose. We are a much more highly developed creation and therefore should consider our purpose and find that place, environment, ethos, if you will, that promotes the best expression of that purpose.

The subjects that a child chooses to study should lead to the job or career that is in alignment with that purpose. The key to your purpose is locked into that talent/skill you were born with and is expressed naturally and comfortably in you. You don’t have to painfully work at your natural ability. You execute it with a measure of joy and satisfaction. If therefore a student is studying or involved in a course of training that is lined up with his/ her natural skills, wouldn’t that course of study appear easier and more enjoyable? If job seekers pursue careers that align with their purpose, isn’t it what they like to do and what they do naturally? Would they not serve customers with more enthusiasm and courtesy? It is when the opposite obtains that stress and frustration dominate in our lives. This does not mean that some things would not be difficult but at least purpose driven people do not surrender to the pressure of circumstances. They conquer it or create conducive circumstances by intentional action. There are heroes who have shown us that it is possible; men such as Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and the great Paul of the scriptures.

What about your relationships? If your relationships compliment you in ways to help you fulfil your purpose, wouldn’t your relationships be more fulfilling? Isn’t the key to happiness in relationships not therefore rooted in who we choose to invest with our time and life? Who can be dissatisfied with someone who advances us closer to our true destiny in life? Rather, we get upset with people whom we see as taking us away from our true potential and goals.

When someone is rudderless, or without a purpose, everything, everybody and every circumstance becomes unsatisfactory. That is why some people just cannot be pleased. The enemy is within them. Les Brown quoted another writer when he said, When there is no enemy within, the enemy without can do you no harm.

Purposeful people do not allow circumstances to dictate their lives. They seize opportunities every moment, every day and everywhere. If existing circumstances are not favourable to them they make the circumstances that are.

People who understand their purpose and are busy moving towards it are full of hope and energy. A person who is suicidal sees no hope, for only hopeless people contemplate suicide. The way to help these people is to help them to find hope. To find hope is to identify your purpose and go after it with full throttle.

Chapter 2

The Blessing in Giving is in Receiving

We have been taught from very young that we should be good givers. Our religious teachings promote freewill giving. No one discounts therefore the virtue in giving, after all the bible itself quoted Jesus when Paul himself reminded us of His statement, It is more blessed to give than to receive. I wish to challenge your minds a bit however and focus on the blessings in receiving.

I admit that it is indeed more blessed to give than to receive. The translation means It is happier (or richer) to give than to receive. It did not say that there are no blessings or happiness in receiving. It is just that there are more blessings in giving than in receiving.

What is the blessing in receiving? Well for one thing, it is the receiver who blesses the giver. It is the receiver who brings happiness to the giver. Yes, God is the one who blesses overall. That is a fact. Consider also for a moment, where does the happiness in giving come from? I wish to suggest that it comes from the attitude of a grateful receiver.

You see, a giver without a receiver is just a person with good intent. If a receiver rejects the gift of a giver there is no giving because you cannot force a receiver to receive. It is therefore the open heart of gratitude that makes a genuine giver happy. The more thankful the receiver the more it brings joy and happiness to the giver, making the giver want to give more. Even God calls for us to be thankful for things we receive and to praise Him for all he gives to us. It is a good thing to give God thanks. God is happy when we receive in thankfulness and God is grieved when we are ungrateful. God’s happiness is generated from those who receive properly.

How would you feel if, with financial sacrifice you bought clothes for a needy person and that person scoffed at you and threw away the new clothes you bought for them? How would you feel? Of course the average person would feel that that person was ungrateful. The happiness of the giver is tremendously reduced. The receiver has taken that away. You may continue to give because it is the right thing to do, but you do not have the same level of happiness as if the person were thankful.

If you do something exciting for your spouse and he/she does not receive it with gratitude, the absence of the expressions of joy robs you of the feel good moment. Your happiness in giving comes from the gratitude of the person receiving. The reason that it is MORE blessed to give than to receive is because God blesses givers just by their act of giving. Additionally, the giver feels a sense of joy and worthiness by doing something good for someone else. Therefore God’s blessings coupled with your own inner joy so you have a double portion of blessings.

The deeper a person’s need is the more thankful they usually are. People who lack nothing are less grateful to receive. That is why giving to those who have, does not carry the kind of blessings as giving to those who are in need.

If you have accepted the foregoing, then you must accept the fact that you and I must learn to be good receivers as well as givers. No one wants to be a burden to others or to feel they are needy so we refuse offers from people who really want the joys of giving to us. When you refuse a giver you rob him/her of the joys and blessings of giving. If we all give, who would receive and if we all received who would be the givers? Some need to learn to be gracious receivers and do not feel guilty about it. In fact it may even be selfish to give and not receive since the person who wishes to give to you seeks a blessing or happiness. Do not rob them of that joy. There is blessing in receiving. Be a good receiver and you could bless others with what you receive by giving it away. It is a continuous cycle of giving and receiving.

Chapter 3

Junk in the Trunk

Resist the temptations to use the fear of the past to predict your future, lest your past become your future.

Have you ever seen a slick vehicle with an attractive paint job, good tires, clean and expensive interior but when you go to the trunk it is full of discarded stuff, used parts and just plain junk? It was hard to tell from the exterior. Or maybe you have your house and the living room smells good, clean furniture but when you lift the mat or rug below it is full of dust, dirt and grime?

You often meet people who are in similar situations. From their exterior when you meet them you cannot detect what hides deep down inside them. You judge them by the in-style they wear, the expensive car they drive and the well-paying job that they hold down.

Junk consist of the stuff that weigh us down and influence our mood negatively. It arises from the events of our past that we refuse to surrender to the past. We allow the past to constantly dog us into the future. Those issues may be the relics of a dysfunctional family, the unhealed wounds of painful past relationships, traumatic events that we had no control over such as rape, incest and loss of loved ones. They become