Category: Personal Growth

All right. Resisting Happiness. Well, this book was, I don’t know. I don’t know where I got this. It’s from Father’s Stand, Paris Life Committee gave it to somebody. No idea. Matthew Kelly. Oh, this is three years ago, but it seems like he travels around. The dynamic Catholic. So there we go. Just to give everybody fair warning. This is a God book, or not God, but it’s a Catholic book. Excuse me. Okay. The quest for happiness, making sense of everything. falling in love, no visitors, Tuesday nights, living soulfully, get busy living, four words.

I like when it’s like four words, then we know what we’re getting ourselves into. You know, we got four different topics we’re going to talk about. It’s four words, hopefully. You know, that’s never the truth. They always want to throw us a screwball, right? 36. Interesting people. Let’s, hold on. Let me see what this is talking about. Interesting people. If you want to be an interesting person, read books. Oh, wow. I’m in love with this book already. Couldn’t have said it better myself, right? Literally. I’m going to show you. Look, look, look. You guys see that? So I’m not the only crazy one out here that’s like reading books, right? It even says it’s a Catholic thing to do, read books. All right. Let’s see what else it says. This is what one of my high school teachers told us. At the time I didn’t think too much about it, but time has proven proved him not only right, but also wise. The most interesting people I know are book readers. They love books.

Many of the best conversations I have begin with, what are you reading at the moment? There are so many good books in this world, and I don’t have much time to read these days. So I find it fascinating to hear about what other, what people are reading. I must admit, I didn’t care much about reading before my spiritual awakening. You see, even today, I’m a very slow reader. People don’t believe me when I say it. And this is one of the reasons I’m so passionate about audio books, because I read painfully slow.

Now, what were we talking about? The four words. That one was interesting people. That’s so far, wait, let’s go a little bit. Oh, man. He just had to bring it back to God, right? So I just don’t like peddling God, that’s all. Key points out of being an interesting person is the more people who regularly read the Bible make better decisions. I reluctantly have to say that, I really reluctantly have to say that. Action steps that a few aside, a few minutes each day to read and reflect on the passage from the Bible, begin with Matthew, Proverbs or Psalms.

Maybe that will work for you. However, don’t just, just because, remember this is a Catholic Christian book. So grab in the goodness, right? If you’re a Christian Catholic and that’s your thing, great. But if that’s not your thing, you know what I’m saying? That does not necessarily mean that what he’s saying doesn’t have validity. It has great validity. Just pick your, just pick whatever Bible suits you, right? So his Bible is the Bible we all say that has Bible on the front. But each society, each niche to what you love has its own Bible in a sense, right? So what it’s kind of saying is people who regularly read their Bible, their Holy book, their niche loving thing, whatever it is that they’re super passionate about, you make better decisions because it keeps you focused. Now let’s get to the four words. 36.

But where are the four words? I don’t see any. Look. I thought I was going to get a list of four words, right? I told you they like throwing us a screw ball. All right. Let’s read the bold and see what he has to say. There are four words that embody the challenge of the Christian life. We find them in the fifth line of Our Father, thy will be done. These four words present the greatest challenge of Christianity. Okay. Thy will be done. Those are the most important words. Yeah. Yeah, I’m very curious to see how he ties that all together. I’m very curious, actually.

Let’s read this. We are all so busy. I meet up with friends who have retired from their many full-time jobs and they tell me they’re busier than they ever have been. Resistance loves to keep us busy. When we are too busy to reflect on how we are living our lives, it is almost certain that we’re too busy doing the right, that we’re not busy doing the right things. How do you react to these four words? What do you think? What do they make you think? How do they make you feel? When you first read them, how did your body react?

Whoa, that’s a good question. All right, I see. I see how he’s pulling it together. I get it. I see it. I see it. So it’s kind of like, all right, so thy will be done, right? You see how I looked at it the first time I read it. I didn’t, I was like, right? But the more I think about thy will be done, that is true. Kind of like what he’s saying right here. Resistance loves to keep us busy. And then what it also comes down to, when we are too busy to reflect on how we are living our lives, it is almost certain that we are not busy doing the right things, right? I love that because I hear everyone always tells me that they’re too busy to do this, they’re too busy to do that. Blahzy, blahzy, blahzy, blahzy, blahzy. And then at the end of the day, they really hadn’t done, accomplished anything. So it’s like busy work. I’m so busy, I have no time for anything. But at the end of the day if you were to reflect on what you actually did, you didn’t do anything.

You might’ve done a lot of busy work, like that has no value, but if you, like that’s what he’s saying. If you’re too busy, if you’re too busy to reflect on how we are living our lives, then 9 out of 10 you’re living it bad. So if you’re too busy to slow down and look at the things that’s going on in your life, right? Then you’re probably not living your life how you’re supposed to be. I enjoy that. It has no religion in it. Perfect. That’s all, that got Erik Johnson written all over it. You know what I’m saying? I love it. I love it. I can’t wait to read more.

Yeah, let’s see what another bold says. It’s bold right here. We’re going to read just the two bolds. We’re getting close to time, so we’re going to read two bolds and then we’re ha, right? Okay. We live in a culture that says the meaning of life is to get what we want and that when we get what we want, then we will be happy. We yearn for happiness because we were created for it. So we fall for the lie. We race off into the world to get what we want. But sooner or later, we all realize that getting what we want doesn’t make us happy.

Hmm, smart, smart. Let’s see. When did you last ask God to divide, to advise you about a big decision you had to make? I don’t know about you guys. I kind of talk to God every day. My parents died when I was little. So, you know, I’m talking to somebody. I don’t know if it’s God, I kind of consider it mom and dad, right? But I’m praying to somebody every day. So for me, I mean, my every decision I make is, well, the older I’m getting. When I was younger, I was more of an idiot. But the older I get, the more like I do kind of ask for wisdom, not from anyone else, because no one knows anything anyways. So I usually ask for them, I usually get a good answer. But yeah, Resisting Happiness. I enjoy it. The chapter, the four words, thy will be done, thy will be done. Wham. Under 10 minutes. Perfect.

All right. The last one in box number six. Let’s go over this box just in case you forgot.

We had The Cold War. We learned a little bit about poker. Right here, The Broken Covenant, right here, learning that we are a chosen people out of America.

Why Does Popcorn Pop? Remember we learned about-, do you remember? Do you really remember? I don’t think so. We learned about oysters, we learned about lobster, and then we learned about tea.

Scientific Man, right here, or The Scientific and Bible man, Howard Atwood Kelly. Mr. Kelly was a scientist at John Hopkins, but he was also a very religious man and wrote a whole bunch of articles and boom. Went boom. Turned a little subscription thing, adding 1200 new members daily, up to 30,000. So just imagine what he was saying. He was basically bridging the gap from believing in Adam and Eve, and also believing in science, and he explained how it works.

And then we had The Private History, Revelations of the Medieval World. I’ll remind you, we’re going to go over the power of the people. Wait, is that this one? See, I went through a lot of them. Yep, remember, private power and public power, look forward to reading that, and making the video and writing an article. Excuse me, it’s been a long day. But yeah, this was pretty interesting.

Also, let’s not forget this one. The Broadman Bible Commentary, where we discussed the murder of somebody in the Bible, Jihab, something like that.

So last, but most definitely not least, The Way We’re Working Isn’t Working by Tony Schwartz. Let’s see what he has to say.

Okay, A new way of working, more and less, less and less. Chapter two, we can’t change what we don’t notice. We’re creatures of habit. Part two, sustainability. Physical, feeling a pulse, sleep or die, making waves, use it or lose it, less is more. Chapter nine, creating a culture that pulses. Section three, security, emotional. Part four, self-expression and mental. Part five, significance and spiritual.

The first one that kind of got me was ‘sleep or die’. I want to see what he has to say about sleeping.

‘Sleep or Die’. All right, ‘if physical energy is the foundation of all dimensions of energy, sleep is the foundation of physical energy’. Let’s read that one more. ‘If physical energy is the foundation of all dimensions of energy, sleep is the foundation of physical energy. The circadian rhythm refers to the biological process that occur over a 24 hour cycle. We’re genetically programmed to be awake during the day, and to sleep at night. We operate best physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually when we align with that rhythm. For example, the [inaudible 00:04:21] melatonin, which tends to induce sleep, is almost non-existent in our bodies during daytime hours, and it reaches a peak between 11:00 PM and 3:00 AM. The same is true for our core body temperature, which reaches its lowest level in the middle of the night and its highest level during the morning’.

Who is this person? Tony Schwartz. We’re going to keep going. I don’t a hundred percent agree with this. I wake up at 2:30 in the morning, I’m usually burning up inside. It’s hot, not cold.

‘We challenge our circadian rhythms at our peril, whether we do so by working during the night, traveling across time zones, or failing to fall asleep sufficiently, the consequences include extreme fatigue, compromised cognitive capability or capacity, emotional instability, lower productivity and greater susceptibility to illness’. Okay, let’s see what else he’s talking about, sleep or die. ‘Fatter, dumber, more dangerous’, right? This is more in this ‘sleep or die’. All right, let’s see.

‘Overwhelming evidence suggests that sleep deprivation takes a toll in nearly every aspect of our lives, including performance. In ‘Dream On: Sleep in the 24/7 Society’, Charles Leadbeater summed up the cost this way. “Lack of sleep makes us more inefficient at work, and more dangerous behind the wheel of a car. It undermines the quality of our lives and makes us more vulnerable to illness. It is also responsible for making us less able to respond creativity to problems and opportunities, and less original, flexible and divergent in our thinking, and thus less likely to generate new ideas. At the most basic level, prolonged sleep deprivation has a negative impact on our health. Several studies have shown that immune response drops significantly among people who sleep less than seven to eight hours a night”.

Let’s see what else he’s talking about. I do agree that sleep deprivation, if you’re extremely tired, your immune system is a lot weaker. Because that’s personally happened to me, but that’s because I’d been on a 24 hour, no sleeping. And I was barely able to walk, and I got stung by a bee and my body couldn’t defend it. I’ve been stung since and nothing’s really happened, but at that point in time in my body, I mean, I almost died.

Okay, well, let’s look at this. ‘Similar, if less broadly, catastrophic accidents occur in hospitals with frightening regularity every night. A 2004 work hours health and safety group study at Harvard, overseen by Charles Czeisler and his research team, found that medical interns working 24 hour shifts made 36% more medical errors than those working 16 hour shifts, and five times the number of diagnostic errors. Interns working 24 hour shifts also had a 61% greater risk of stabbing themselves with a needle or scalpel, almost twice the risk of crashing their cars when they drove home, and five times the risk of a near-miss accident’.

Well, it kind of makes you think. These are the people working at the hospital. Wouldn’t they be the ones that know that working 24 hour shifts is not a smart idea? Sleep deprivation? Yeah, I understand this, I’m thinking that they’re talking about -, well, there you go, I even said I was up for 24 hours and my immune system was basically shot. Here you go. These people are on 24 hour shifts. 16 hours, okay, because then that’s eight hours you can sleep, and then you’re right back up, six hours of sleep, but it doesn’t give you much time to eat. But the 24 hour shifts, that’s just illogical.

‘So powerful are the body’s natural rhythms that it’s virtually impossible to fully adjust to working at night and sleeping during the day. Ours is the only species [inaudible 00:09:34] acronym, in sex, eat, sleep, drink, dream, that lights up its biological night, that overrides its own rhythms, crosses time zones, and works and sleeps at times that run counter to its internal clocks. We ignore what our clocks remember at our own peril. As just one example, shift workers who have no choice but to sleep in the daytime, get an average of three to four hours less sleep than the rest of us, and sleep less deeply.

We’ll go into more sleep. That was very interesting.

What is this ‘feeling the pulse’? I like this little picture right here. Yeah, there you go. Enough time for you to screenshot it. So right there, I don’t know. We’ll look at that. That was pretty interesting. Might read a little bit more, not really quite sure. But nonetheless, that was pretty interesting.