Don't Judge me!

Judgement is one of those things the world has put on it's universal black list. In this day in age, the only person allowed to judge anyone must be seated on a pedestal, wearing black robes and holding a gavel. Unfortunately we still don't really let them judge anyone, we expect them to read off a paper: "You get this sentence because of this law, and a jury decided that legally we're bound to do this to you."

Anyone caught judging is immediately labeled as the worst in society: they are prejudiced, racist, bigoted. If you mention sin, the world has begun to learn a single Bible verse to use on Christians who will tell them that what they do is wrong: Luke 6:37 "Do not judge and you will not be judged, do not condemn and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven." Alternately, they also like to use Mat 7:1 "Do not judge or you too will be judged."

Interestingly you find yourself stuck in a conundrum to use this verse, because usually the tone is spoken with "You're going to hell because you judged me!" Unfortunately for the unbeliever these verses are grossly out of context when used this way, furthermore, the person who is concerned over their sin is most likely not judging them at all.

Judge, unfortunately, has several meanings, and the greek is no clearer than the english on this one. Too bad it's not like the greek "Love" having five different words. Judge in english should really be like snow to an eskimo. We need a bunch of meanings.

Judge can mean:

To form an opinion through careful weighing of evidence

To sit in judgement on

To determine or pronounce after deliberation or inquiry

To form an estimate or evaluation

To hold as opinion.

Too often I see people actually using opinion number one.

I judge that you are behaving sinfully because of careful weighing of your actions and my perception of your intent. And you immediately say "Don't judge me!" I haven't sat in judgement on you. I just compared your action to a list of actions and said "They look the same!" I haven't told you that you're going to hell, that you'll get herpes, or declared any punishment on you for your actions, to be honest I haven't even really ascribed any quality to you personally by noting that the actions you take are sin.

In essence I believe it is not our place to condemn another by placing our estimation of them as the final say in their eternal value and worth. I do not nor will I ever believe that we ought not carefully observe and weigh evidence to form an opinion, that's called foolishness, but this is what the world wants when they say don't judge.

They say "Just let them alone, they aren't hurting you" "What does it matter?" Basically they are saying that I ought not form my own opinions by weighing the facts. Of course, they came to this conclusion by weighing the facts of their discomfort over being called out on their sin. And they hypocritically tell me I shouldn't judge, then they go a step farther and sit in judgement over me because I dare to call sin sin.

I would ask that men do judge me. Weigh carefully, observe what I do. Form an opinion, and odds are this opinion will show more about you than it does about me. And should you decide you're big enough to sit in judgement and tell me my value, I will kindly disregard, because I judge you inadequate compared to the creator of the universe to estimate my value.

I'm gonna be an awesome parent. I know I'm tooting my own horn here, and the first response from everyone who actually has kids is something along the lines of "Just you wait..." or , "You want mine then?" You are all despicable! I'm going to be a great parent!

How do I know? Well, for starters they're on purpose. Now this is NOT to say that accident children can't have good parents, what I'm saying is that most of the people running around on the planet do things totally capriciously and with absolutely no fore thought. They live completely on accident, and then they wonder why they wind up old, overweight and bitter. My life has not been accidental for a very long time. My marriage was not a marriage build just on a passionate desire to have a hot chick. My marriage was thought out, planned, pursued with the single-mindedness of one running an Olympic sprint, and I still pursue it with that same determination. I can proudly say that I love my wife more than the day I married her, and we grow closer with each day we spend together.

There are principals I have been striving to model for my child from before I asked his mother to marry me. There are further principals we have developed together that we want to raise up in him, and for all the nay-sayers who will tell me "It'll start that way but you will get tired" You are thinking of when you try to instill principals in your child that you don't believe in. I am of the opinion that if the principals are worth instilling in my child they had better be big enough and robust enough to stand up in "real world" adult life. These principals challenge me on a daily basis, and my struggles to live them instill character in my life. Unless you are willing to live the principals you're trying to beat into your children, you will fail. This is because the degree your life matches your rules will give you the degree your child can respect you as a person. This is respect garnered completely separate from your position to them or even your relationship with them, this is respect that is completely for the person you are and live as, this is what will make the difference when your child is struggling with obeying you and having fun with his friends.

Perhaps the biggest of all that makes me assert I will be an awesome parent is this: I will uphold my children's actual needs above their perceived needs. This means rather than working over time at a job to get them new fancy gym shoes so they can fit in with all the cool kids wearing Adidas, I'll buy them pay less, and be home with them, teaching them through my life how they are to treat women and others by the way I treat their mother and them.

I don't know how many single moms I've seen in communications and counselling classes who get to the part where your actions reveal your actual values, and they have a crisis that "Do I really value my child? I'm putting them in daycare so I go to class!" and they quickly justify it with "But I'm getting this degree to provide for them better!" And they are usually lying! Often they have a degree they pursue as a status symbol, usually to prove something to an abusive first husband. They've told themselves that the degree will get them a better job, something that anyone who has gotten a degree in the last five years can tell you, is nothing to be assured of, and meanwhile their child gets raised by strangers. If I were to be utterly and brutally honest, I'd say to put their child first they should find a good, godly man who is desperately passionate about God, and children, get in his way, get married, and raise their children with someone who can help them model a healthy life of principal and character while they raise them and he does whatever he can to put food on the table.

I know it's not popular, but honestly, what is better for their children? Saying "Mommy makes 5 thousand more annually than she did when I was born, hey can I go to your house, there's no one at my house for three more hours" or "I can't wait to go home to mommy and daddy, they love me so much!" This is the difference I want to make for my children. Be there, love them, and help them discover and grow into whatever God intended them to be. This is why I'm going to be an awesome parent.

You Deserve It!

I find it amusing that people are all into what they "Deserve". They like it when they've earned something, when someone else has a legal obligation to them. This American infatuation with deservedness has pierced even into our emotional and personal lives, and has for a long time, to the point where I find songs in The Sound of Music claiming boldly "Nothing comes from nothing, nothing ever could; so somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something good." and songs like Butterfly Kisses declaring "With all I've done wrong; I musta done something right; to deserve hugs every morning, and butterfly kisses at night."

My short, easy, simple response is NO! Lets just start by exploding the idea of exactly what you do deserve. People get all bent out of shape about their freedoms, but all they will do is bitch about them, they won't actually TAKE them. People will complain when you tell them they can't pray in school, but they don't act like it's really their liberty. People will say "Why should you deserve to practice your religion when it offends the beliefs of Agnostic Johnny over there?" The answer is that practicing my religion by praying over my meal is not something deserved. It's (if you read the constitution) an inalienable right. That is, you can make a rule, but I can actually flip you off and do it anyway. In all truth I can pray and there is absolutely nothing you can do about it. It is a part of making me human, and while little agnostic Johnny will go bitch to the school board, the fact that I pray over a cup of peaches asking God to bless it neither indoctrinates Johnny nor does it prevent him from unbelief in God, any god, or the idea of a universal power, or, hell, even the power rangers or sunlight, or conservation of energy and matter! Johnny has the inalienable right to unbelief in all of these things, even if this unbelief is illogical, stupid, and will get him docked a grade.

What we feel however is that we deserve to practice these things without anyone making life difficult for us. Let me just clear this up right now:

You Deserve Nothing (except punishment for the bad things you've done)

Even if you write up a contract with someone, if that person is at root dishonest, you don't actually deserve the money, you were stupid enough to make a contract with a dishonest person. The courts can even side with you, but you will still at base level have agreed to do something for someone who makes it a practice to give no one anything, therefore it should be assumed going in that you're essentially doing this for free plus the cost of court fees and a lifetime of frustration that you'll be unwilling to collect on this bill.

You don't get love from your children because you deserve it, and you don't give them love because they deserve it.

You don't practise your religion because you deserve it.

What you do get off of deserving are things like traffic tickets and hell. You agreed to the rules of the road when you hopped in the car, you agreed to the rules of the country when you moved in, and you agreed to the ticket when you parked in front of the fire hydrant. It's pretty simple to grasp.

You are made to worship God, You are made to be like him, God's nature precludes sin from his presence, guess where sin by definition deserves to wind up?

Furthermore, people in this country have the audacity to believe that buying a girl a meal and a movie entitles them to sexual favors.

We even go so far as to believe that because you have received it in the past you were deserving of it to begin with, or because you meet qualifications to receive charity that you deserve the charity. Note well-fare.

I hope that in my life I can get through life with little I deserve dropping into my life and much undeserved charity and grace (like getting a good paying job, and having a healthy family) and that I can be correctly thankful for these gifts rather than implying to myself that "Well Gee, I must have been really good somewhere in my life to get a good paying job and healthy kids, and that slob over there with the mentally handicapped child was just a jackass growing up."

What's the Difference?

A friend of mine posted a great, intelligent question that I feel I'll qualify my response for, but I LOVED the question. His question: What is the difference between Christians and Non-Christians?

Furthermore I loved the variety of responses he garnered from the question. Everything from "No one really knows, even the Bible doesn't really say" to "I'm sorry you feel challenged in your faith." There was even a few run of the mill "Well if you don't believe in Christianity they are wrong and stupid and hypocritical and judgmental and mean and jerks and....." It was even suggested that the real Christians are the ones that live like the Jews did. You know, the ones Jesus pissed off to the point they tried to stone him several times and finally manipulated the government system into allowing them to crucify him. They were mostly pissed at him btw for his disregard for their laws and the ways they showed off their holiness.

My friend said, almost in conclusion to the variety of posts "There is no observable difference"

So, when you walk into a church, how do you play the Where's Waldo? game of finding the real Christians and setting them apart from the posers? Considering the mass confusion of what exactly makes a Christian on the inside that came off of just this post, and the much larger confusion I see in the general public, I can understand how Christians get labled "hypocrites" and "judgmental" and "Jerks" and so on. Most of the people addressed Ideologically what makes one a Christian and many of them appeared to be answering from outside the camp, and a couple from inside a church building.

What I want to tackle is actually the much stickier "When you walk into a church building in US of A, how do you tell who is really a Christian" Who gets the doctrine the evangelical, trinitarian, Christian church pulls from the Bible? (which is, by the way, according to the JW magazine the view you would adopt if you read the Bible apart from their SPECIAL insight into it)

It's tough, you walk in, there's usually a greeter who hands you some booklets, and smiles at you, shows you a seat, and everyone seems to look at you a little funny. Somehow you manage to feel both like an unwanted intruder and a piece of meat at the same time. The pastor rambles about stuff that doesn't make a lot of sense, church breaks, and people split off into their pre-designated groups that don't include you. On your way out the door people invite you to come with them to a restaurant you didn't plan on going, so you head off, they talk about stuff that isn't relevant in your life, they ask you very few questions about yourself, and you wind up paying for more than you intended when you showed up. If you continued going the invitations to do other things would quit coming, and getting involved in small groups very often could make you feel more and more of an outsider because anyone that doesn't just thoughtlessly swallow their particular denominational dogma gets the cold stare until they shut up and let the "grown ups" talk which consists of stupid rhetoric like this "When the Bible says 'not even a sparrow falls to the ground unnoticed' what's it saying, put it in your own words" and it's answered with "Well I think it's saying that if a poor little sparrow falls to the ground God knows about it, and we're a lot bigger than sparrows, so God's gonna pay attention to us!" And everyone nods with glazed over eyes as thought the verse really was talking about God's attention to seismic disturbances across the face of the earth.

What I find truly amusing is that those who clearly do not affiliate with the church will look at me wondering why I go to church and how I know such things, and those who are always at the church will shake their finger at me for saying it.

I find a LOT of fakers in the american church, I find it truly amusing that in the JWs, Mormons, and Catholics, there's actually a decent number of people who misunderstand the religions preached there for Christianity and will likely wind up in heaven because they were not correctly taught the false teachings being pushed by others. Though I'd push this is not the ideal way to get into heaven.

First I want to make a clear-cut internal distinction between a Real Deal, True Blue, covered in Christ's blood Christian, and the guy that no one is sure about. The real Christian has absolutely no doubt in his mind that Christ is the only answer for sin, that sin is so severe, so crippling, so cancerous that without Christ, death, the second death, is the only option and direction. I often find the guy that is questionable see-sawing. I find him saying "Well if you don't believe in hell you won't go there." Really? that's the answer? The only people who will go to hell are the ones who believe in it? Well then the solution is not Christianity, it's repression of the knowledge and idea of hell, ultimately in my mind, the solution would be to redefine hell as like Heaven, but with weed and sex. You'll often find them claiming the "blessed are the peace keepers" in the beatitudes, and saying things like "You can't just pick a sin and tell people they'll go to hell for it" they will also say stuff like "Oh, if you read the Bible literally like that, you should sew four tassels on your coat and grow a beard!"

Externally, Cory is very close, at first glance there is absolutely no difference between the Christ-following and the non, between those who are daring enough to take the Bible at what it says, dive into the difficulties, and let it change their lives, and those who use select portions of the Bible as a beating stick to make everyone play nice together.

What I find is as you get to know a person, the truth leaks out. Unfortunately, not many in the world, and, hell, even in the church get close enough to tell the difference, and I believe I know why: Being around a real Christian is a little like getting sunburned all the time. They are gracious, they don't condemn you, and yet, at the suggestion that sin isn't that big a deal, that it'd be okay to sleep with your boyfriend, or tell them about what so and so did the other night, and a sudden hardness appears. They might not even say anything, they certainly won't tell you that you're going to hell for it, but it's like you crossed some invisible line in the sand, and they are extremely uncomfortable about it and are watching you from the other side of the line. You'll resent this because often it is mistaken for them being morally superior. If you looked closer you'd detect concern and sadness, not superiority. Indeed an analysis of your feelings would show that the anger at their 'moral superiority' is actually emanating from your own attitudes. It also irks you that when you chastise them for doing things you don't approve of (like not congratulating your gay friend on his recent move-in with his boyfriend) You feel that same sad hardness like they are pitying you from across the line, rather than them feeling bad for offending your ethics.

If you're a Christian, or close to becoming one, their presence becomes a little like a soothing balm you dread to open. You'll find yourself asking their opinion on questions that are none of their damn business, because somehow if they say it's okay you can shut your conscience up about the whole issue, and you know what they'll say, and when you say it, you blame them, but at the same time the fact that they will always let you come back, they will not bring up your past offenses over and over, gives a stability to the relationship that you'll often begin to crave. They aren't too hot on the rules, they let people do a lot of things their own way, but they are rock solid and can seem downright mean on what they say the Bible says. But there's something immovable under there. They genuinely believe in this Jesus, that him dying on the cross changed something fundamental and relevant to their lives, and you find them tying it into unexpected things, but they won't tie it into others you might expect them to.

They'll talk of love, but their love is weird. You'll go off on love and sometimes you run against that sad resistance to your words when you thought you were trying to lift up love just like them. Most of all, perhaps most frustratingly of all, when you ask them questions, they'll irritatingly explain in terms of a relationship to Jesus. I'm not talking "what do you want for lunch" questions. I mean questions that start off almost as jokes and then they start to take a serious turn. "Do you have regrets?" starts with telling about a bad haircut, and somehow you wind up listening to a story of them doing things you didn't think they could ever have done, and they smile with relief as they talk about Jesus removing their shame. Unfortunately usually the non-believer will walk away confused, feeling like the person they've been getting to know is a hypocrite or a liar. Either they never did what they say they did, or they aren't the good person you thought because they have done some of the things that they look at you sadly for doing.

I think the big miss in this is that Christianity is a completed belief. It's not a "try harder" or "Do harder" or "Live better" philosophy, it's a "Jesus did it, and I'm free" that when embraced, and once set loose in your life, attacks you on a personal level, and dynamically alters your perception of your self and the world, and will work this alteration in you until the day you die.

So it becomes vastly confusing to a non-christian and I don't mean someone who doesn't go to church, I mean someone who has never just trusted Jesus act of salvation and trusted and allowed the Holy Spirit to literally beat the hell out of them. It is confusing because this person has done wrong, and still condemns it, most importantly, condemns it in themselves.

One of the most effective witnesses I ever gave was to a person who challenged me that if I had never been where she was I should shut up because I don't know what it was like. When she found that I HAD been there, she got quiet for a moment and told me "Well, it's okay" and I had the incredible opportunity to look at her and say "No, it wasn't and it isn't, and I can't change it." that THIS is why Jesus is the necessity.

So yah, when you walk in the door and see the greeter, you have to go in understanding that entrance, and a name on the membership roll and knowing all the songs, being in the praise band, shouting Amen, wriggling on the floor, and raising your hands do not define you as Christian. Further you need to be aware that many of them ARE Christians mechanically and on technicality, but they are dysfunctional, and like a dysfunctional family, they kind of work, but they damage themselves and those around them as they do. and finally that even if you walk into a church without a single real functional Christian, this does not negate the truth of the Good news that Jesus completed our righteousness and provided what we are dually undeserving of: salvation, that is the privilege and ability to abide in him, to be with him, to talk to him, to walk with him, and this is not just getting what we pray for, it's not the performance of miracles, it's not miraculous healing, it doesn't put a halo on our heads, or make us sprout wings, it doesn't make us rich, or give us nice houses, it doesn't end our pain, it doesn't remove our disease, it doesn't eliminate our sadness, it doesn't liberate us immediately from the curse, it opens the door for us to go and enjoy the relationship we were built to have. That in the end, the Gold in the streets of heaven is there because we all dropped it when we were able to enjoy the relationship with the God in heaven. Heaven is where Jesus is, and if you aren't into just Jesus, heaven will be significantly different from what you'd desire it to be.

How do you spot a Real Christian? I'd challenge you to stop trying to spot one, and just become one.

Come just as you are!

You ever heard this? "You can just come as you are, we don't care how you express yourself, we believe you are special!" or, "We love individuals!" or those great facebook quiz results, "You are special and people just need to learn to accept you for who you are! Some people don't like you but don't pay any attention to them." or the counsellors that feed you the line "You don't need to change for anyone, you need to be who you are!"

Whats amazing to me is how many people buy into this, perhaps more believe it now adays because they don't have good mothers to constantly hilight for them how inadequate and imperfect they really are, but I never once bought into this huge piece of BS. Even when I was in gradeschool, and someone says "Just be who you are" My first reaction is "Yuck, I don't like who I am, why should anyone else?" My problem was not low self-esteem. My problem was I was a depraved human being and I knew it. I wanted to break stuff, light things on fire, kill small animals. The kind of things serial killers do as children! I didn't act those things out, because I knew they were wrong. I was under the authority of Jesus, and so the way I acted made people say "Be who you are" their lack of knowledge of my inner workings cause them to say stupid things.

I find this behavior across the board, even into areas where people are engaging in behavior that is clearly harmful! Like the old standby of the foolish "You know I'm strong willed, I've always had to make my own mistakes." It is a great way to excuse one's idiocy. "He's an individual, you are just mad that he doesn't conform." Really? That's why the IRS fines people for tax evasion? Because they are "being and individual"? I think it's more an issue of them not filling an obligation of living in this society.

Sure there are lots of individual choices that have no bearing on your moral character. "I don't like tomato soup" is a good example. "I like rock music." Another great personal preference that emphasizes your individuality. But we all need to realize that we aren't that individual. The person who is individualistically wearing black, getting his nose pierced, and putting weird stickers on his car is actually just fitting in. He's not an individual at all. If these things made him an individual, then he'd need to dye his own clothes black and pierce his own nose, rather than going to an all-in-one boutique for emotional and disturbed teens who want to annoy and worry their parents.

At a certain point we all conform to stereo types, because it does take all types. Sure this kid over here doesn't like chocolate. But if you look you could easily find over 5 thousand kids matching that same description. Humans actually can be filed, and while the thought disturbs us, it's still true. I love that line from Pixar's "The Incredibles" "'Everyone is special Dash.' 'Which is the same as saying no-one is!'" They nailed it! You know what makes me special!? The fact that I'm not! I'm an ordinary white guy who goes to church, mows his lawn a little later than he should all the time, tries to pay his taxes to the best of his understanding, follows the laws, speeds occasionally, notices that not all races are the same, and has some opinions, and I'm perfectly content! That's what makes me special! I don't need to be a basket ball star. I don't need to be the next american idol. I'm just perfectly happy and content with my kids, my wife, my home, and my health!

And I didn't get here by being "just who you are" The best proof I can find is the case of the newborn. Everyone crowds around a new baby, and someone will eventually utter the phrase "Oh he's so perfect!" Really? He is? Well then the rest of his life shouldn't he be just as he is? A crying speechless, selfish, leeching, chubby, pink food-dumpster? With no manners, just expecting mom to lift up her shirt and feed him whenever he screams? This is perfect! That's who he is! Be Just as you are little baby! 'Till you're twenty-four, illiterate and breastfeeding!

NO. We need to grow, we need to learn. We come out not being tarnished except by inexperience! He's just not evil and screwed up because he hasn't had a chance yet, well, unless his mom was a raging drug addict and alcoholic, but you get my point. He hasn't had a chance to steal the neighbor kid's toys, his his sister, throw his food, cuss at dad, get drunk under age, etc. etc. The world is full of possibilities, and telling him to just "be who he is" rather than to use judgement and discernment and to Choose how he ought to be and conform to that will wind up with him being selfish, addicted and divorced.

Telling someone that they are an individual and they don't need to change a thing robs them of hope. Telling them that's "Just the way they are" means that they can't change it. Rapists will forever be rapists, alcoholics just alcoholics. People with disfunctional or abusive marriages have no hope to improve, and since they are just that way, and just attracted to those men, every marriage in the future has the same bleak outlook. They latch onto it, it becomes an excuse. They are victims of genetics, victims of their circumstances. And every time anyone invites them to live better, they just whine and complain and say "I'm not like that, that works for some people, but not me."

It's better to hate who you are today and be someone you like tomorrow than it is to try to accept this thing you've become and let it reign terror in your life.

The Bucket Theory

Sadly, no, this theory has nothing to do with Lolruses. Though it does involve blue and buckets (or bukkits if you prefer) This was a theory that I came up with later in highschool. I have observed people for some time and I find the principal behind this theory to have held true in all instances.

Do you remember a time when you were little and something happened that felt earth shattering? Your bestest friend told you you were a big meanie and they never ever wanted to talk to you again!? Another kid at school told you you had ugly glasses and you've never worn glasses again? You felt crushed, humiliated, and you go home and tell your mommy what happened and she didn't seem to care!!! She said "Oh it'll be allright, so and so will be your friend again, don't worry" or "Your glasses don't make you look ugly." But you know she's saying it because she's your mom and has to think you are cute. And it's said in this dismissive tone. This tone that suggests that rather than you've seen the four horsemen of the apocalypse, you just told her that there are some ants on the doorstep. She doesn't realize that this behavior over time is why you just started telling her school went "fine" in Jr. High and highschool, which she at that point complained about feeling alienated from you.

Now you look back and probably chuckle to yourself, saying, "How silly I was to worry about such small things, I don't eve know what that best friend is doing right now, I haven't heard from him in years!" What happened? Why are these earth shattering things not earth shattering? Because now you have different earth shattering things happening. You have a mortgage, and car loans. You have a jerk of a boss, or that co-worker who is an *** hole. What you haven't realized yet, is that these are actually the exact same things your mother dismissed in your life and you are willing to dismiss in your child's life. They are current, and they are your size, so they are "big" problems. Also they are falling into your life, not someone else's so they are your problems furthermore, making them appear bigger.

And here comes, the bucket theory:

Take a 5-gallon bucket and a shot glass, and fill them to the brim with water. (I don't mean near the brim, I mean I want to see surface tension over the rim) This is your life and your child's lives while you are under stress. You are full to the brim with the sum of your worries and experiences. Your worries today are actually partially generated by your experience from yesterday. Your child has 2 ounces of experience, you get 5 gallons. Now take a bottle of food coloring (blue because I promised there'd be blue) and drip a single drop into the shot glass. Notice: If you filled it like I told you to, you probably got some drippage over the side, also the entire shot glass will become a very brilliant blue in fairly short order.

At this point we are where you were at 5 years old telling your mom that your bestest friend hates you now. You experience it, you care about it, and you measure it against the 3 months of your friendship, during the entire time your friend has only said nice things to you. This new experience will color everything you see, likely for the rest of your life. You can add another drop of color because your mom doesn't own your problems with you. The drop is not in her bucket, she is not empathizing. See how much worse it just got made? Now you have another drop because mom has always wanted to hear about yoru problems and fix them and get you grilled cheese when you are hungry and get you a bike for Christmas and now she doesn't care when your bestest friend hates you! Your mom hates you too! again, at this point, the bucket is pristinely clear, and the shot glass is a deep deep blue and has run over onto the counter, and you've learned a lesson you'll carry with you for the rest of your life: Don't let people too close, don't let what they say matter. When you grow up, and you have your five gallon bucket, your water will still be blue from these drops that tainted your life. You won't even remember why it's blue, to you, that's just how life is!

Now lets say your mom empathizes with you. We add a blue drop to the 5 gallon bucket. Odds are you'll have no spillage, and the water will only turn lightly blue. It's a passing concern for mom still, because she is weighing it against her entire life of fairweather friends coming and going and she can pull comfort from the one or two close friends she's had for nearly twenty years! But this way she can instead tell you, That was't nice, was it? with a tone that acknowledges that you've seen the horsemen of the apocalypse, not an insect on the step outside.

Now let's fast forward to your mortgage payment. You've got 5 years of payments left and you realize that you've fallen behind on an electric bill you didn't catch. Now you have to pay for 3 missed months that your spouse was supposed to be paying, and you will miss this mortgage payment, the bank will get angry, your credit score will drop and you now look and see in the last few years you've stretched yourself so tight you worry you might not make it through the end of the mortgage at all! and what if you lose your job, or get hurt? You're taking two years of experience and dumping it into your five gallon bucket, at this point dump the shotglass into the bucket. It turns much bluer, and you get splash over. You get moody, cry, snap at your kids, because this is your problem that you are owning and it's your size.

What we all need to take a moment to realize is that these problems are proportionately similar. You realizing you've mismanaged for two years and all it's reprocussions are equivalent to your five year old self seeing 3 months of friendship get apparently flushed away with angry words. The passion and anger you feel right now is the same as the passion and disappointment you felt at 5. It's not that their problems aren't small, it's that how they feel about them are just as big as how you feel about yours.

The teenager who gets rejected by a girl feels as much rejection as the wife whose husband tells her that she's kind of let herself go after their last child was born 6 years ago. But we tell the teenager to suck it up, we yell at the husband for being insensitive.

The point of the bucket illustration is to demonstrate that disturbances in your life are proportionate. When you are 25 and your 5 year old sees a year's worth of work in jeapordy, you need to relate to that in terms of you sing 5 years of your life in jeapordy. Not passing Kintergarten can feel like having your college degree revoked! Having one girl say you are ugly at age 10 can feel the same as 5% of the women you know spontaneously telling you you are ugly (that would be one brutal month, let me tell you, if one in 20 women you knew just came up to you over the course of a month and told you that you are ugly!) Having your first crush reject you is like having every woman you asked out reject you (because to them, 100% of the girls they asked out said no!)

So when dealing with children, let's get down on their level and imagine a shotglass getting dropped into our bucket when they tell us about their bad day, and realize that a bad day for a 3 year old is like a bad week for a 30 year old and a bad month for a 90 year old! Suddenly the No Good Very Bad Day seems worse when it's your No Good Very Bad Week! or No Good Very Bad Month without a bowel movement!

Next time you find yourself wanting to open a big can of "I Don't Care" Recall the Bucket Theory.

Missing the Passion.

Passion is an interesting word. I'm sure we were all equally confused when Mel Gibson released "The Passion of the Christ" Unfortunately with the surroundings of "The DaVinci Code" I wonder how many people were surprised that Mary Magdelene made nothing more than a cameo appearance. Passion means everything from suffering to affection and love. I find it to be no coincidence that this one word means both indescribable pain and love at the same time.

It takes pain to make love. And I find increasingly that we do not have enough pain for ourselves in American society. Especially the Christian. We tune into Christian radio, and what do we hear? That God is good, and Jesus loves us, and how blessed we all are. Don't get me wrong, these are true. But we never feel a passion for the lost. We feel content to say "I don't want to push my beliefs on others, because it will only push them away from Jesus." The older I get, the more and more I find that these people are running from Jesus. They find comfort with the people who know Jesus (in the loosest sense possible) and do not condemn their sinful behavior. They take this to mean somehow, they are justified in their actions before God. This person knows God, right?

I think one of the most damaging things we can do as Christians is deny that sin is sin, and all too often we do this inadvertantly by not admitting to the caustic, dark, evil nature of sin. We treat it like every sin is just an "oops" and everyone is a well meaning human being so it won't hurt anyone will it? We ignore the fact that the very nature of Sin separates us from our creator and sustainer. When we live with unrepentant sin we're like an engine with a hole in the oil pan. The one thing keeping us from self destructing is slowly leaking away, and we like to say, "It's just a small leak."

The world has been advancing on the church, where the church is supposed to be invading the world. Have we become so stagnant that we get to discuss whether we should take part in our own governments as Christians? Let me clear this up right now, Separation of church and state is for the Church's protection from the state, not the other way around. Sure there should be a freedom of belief. Sure the government should not tell us what to believe. But the Government has been endowed with the power to tell us what to do, and the power to punish us if we choose to ignore it. Since our government takes it's direction from us, we have an obligation to ensure that the laws are Just, and give protection for the weakest among us, that these laws encourage righteousness, and not lawlessness. That these laws provide a framework that can bring a person to God, and when they find God, they will never need worry about man's government again, because their government beats so in tune with the Truth, that nothing good is illegal, and nothing illegal is good.

Yet again and again I find myself arguing with Christians who want laws repealed or want laws unmade that protect the weak, and encourage righteousness. Instead they want people of the world to have freedom to make themselves more captives of their sinful desires, furthermore, in ways that hurt and kill themselves and others. Christians who will support laws that force me to wear a seatbelt and a helmet, and yet allow others to kill their offspring, and their own bodies slowly.

So often their excuses are paltry: "we can't fully enforce it..." Right, we can't enforce the speed limit, so maybe we should get rid of that too. Hell, murder has been illegal for centuries, but it keeps happening, we suck at enforcing that, maybe we should just give up and let people do whatever they want! When will they grasp? The world has been lawless since Eve ate the apple, and Adam who was with her joined her in her rebellion. The lawless break laws, that is what they do! The laws are there to show them the right way to do things, They speak with their conscience. Instead we'd rather have people killing themselves with their conscience, and heaping more guilt on their own heads as punishment, while society looks idly by and tells them "You've done nothing wrong."

I'm just getting so tired of a church that lives like the world and defends the world's sinful and lawless actions. Yes I can't expect them to live like Christians, but I can expect those who profess Christ to mirror him, and Christ never told anyone "Go and keep on sinning, because you don't know me, it's ok." Every single person Christ touched helped and healed his full intention was to deliver them from Sin. Christ didn't abolish God's law, he didn't break God's law. He filled it so in him we could have the perfection we can't attain. And now Christians refuse to tell the world that they Need him for fear of "pushing them away" Instead we grant them a safe haven where they can reprimand their conscience. "This person is holy and they say I'm allright, so shut up, what I'm doing is not wrong!"

I think really we're afraid of what they'll say, afriad of what they'll think. We're the doctor who won't amputate an infected limb because we don't have enough anasthetic to make it not hurt, so instead we watch the patient die.

Maybe we Christians should act like Christians, just as the doctor should be a doctor, put a stick in the guy's mouth, put on a tourniquet, and hack off the limb, to save the man's life. We need to stop condoning sin by our silence, and encourage repentance that leads to salvation.

Generally speaking.

It was recently commented to me that we shouldn't generalize. The comment was relating to my generalizing of a people group, and they though't they'd strike home by saying I shouldn't generalize that group any more than they should generalize a list of groups they believed I belonged to. The issue: I think they SHOULD generalize these groups, especially if I am a member, and furthermore it's of paramount interest to me to see what "groups" people think I am in.

For starters, when they do it, I get for free what many corporations in america pay MILLIONS for: gague of public perception. Do you know how much Wal-Mart, for example, spends just to find out what people generally think of them? Enough that if they just gave it to me, I could comfortably retire right now, and never worry about money again. Why do people get so uptight about generalizations? I'm guessing it's because they took those labels, applied them to themselves, and now they think that they are "black" or "white" or "Christian" or "Atheist" which is rediculous. You may sympathize with many in one or all of these groups, but unless you're dense you know that everyone who shows up with these groups aren't actually a part of these groups. Case in point: our lovely president who seems to ignore his white side alltogether when more than a small amount of white stereotypes fit him very well!

"But they're offensive...." Yah, sure, they're offensive, and dog poop smells, get used to it! If they are offensive, you have yourself and everyone you know in your group to blame for it and no one else. What I've found generally is that generalizations are the unabashedly honest assessment of the majority in your group that appear to the public eye. Hence the statement of "Christians are Hypocrites" for starters, we haven't done a good job of correcting their definition, what they actually mean half the time is "Christians are sinners!" and if you disagree with that statement, you might want to recheck your theology to see if you really belong to Christianity, because you sound more like a product of modern psychology. The other half where they are correct, let's face it, we haven't done a good enough job of loudly decrying the teleevangelists who took the money and ran. We think that complaining about it in our christian books is enough, as if the rest of the world is reading those. (the rest of the world either can't read or chooses to watch the movie instead, or would rather read about making money, or flattening their abs) We really ought to loudly and publically decry those who profess one thing and live another. Not just in front of the church, but before the community as well.

Will this mean those church members cheating on their wives and abusing their children will get pushed away from the church? Probably. It also means that people look at the church and say "They mean what they preach, and they kick out the person who doesn't live it" Sure there's a place for outreach, like sunday morning, the superbowl party, wednesday nights... But there also needs to be an inner sanctum of members who define generally who we are as Christians. The people who are referenced in the generalization. And sad to say, generalizations as unflattering as they are... are usually right!

Where we run into trouble with generalizations is when we apply the entire group's generalizations to that guy. Sure white people are arrogant, ignorant, intolerant, and lacking in attention span... but when you go and point to mother theresa and say she's arrogant, ignorant, intolerant and lacking attention span, merely because she happens to be white... well there we begin to have a bit of friction.

The solution, if you dislike your stereotype, is simple: Disassociate from the group with the stereotype, or expell those who build the stereotype while living in such a way that anyone who meets you has to check their perception. All the while taking offense is an utter waste of time.

Trying to reason with the world using their rules will get your butt kicked every time. They don't only control the rules, they control the definitions and the labels. They will justify everything they do, and find someone to say what it is they want to hear, then they will lift them up as an authority, bestow an honorary PHD (or Nobel peace prize) for their hard work and point out that you don't have either of those things so clearly your opinion doesn't matter. Thus is the result of trying to shame the world into being accepting of you, just as they do to everyone else.

Generally: Generalizations are necessary to cope with people you've never met, and valuable to find out how each of us as groups are doing. Some groups that have used the generalization to their advantage (to perform Public Relations work to change the perception) Homosexuals, Blacks, Agnostics, and recently Atheists. Some groups that will just sit back and bitch at others who can see the generalizations (they didn't make them up themselves you know, they are hardly that clever) Whites, Christians, The French.

Raising Childrens

Here's the big problem with talking about children when you technically haven't any to call your own. (Sure I could STEAL some but then I couldn't tell anyone about them which would defeat the whole credibility thing I'm going for) You always get responses like "You think you have plans, but they'll all go out the window once you have kids!" I find these responses amusing because they come from people who have "Oh $#!+" babies. The ones who slept together after senior prom, or because one of them was a migrant worker and the other one felt like they could make love with no consequences.... And BAM there they are, all pregnified and stuff! They NEVER had a plan, and here they are telling me my plans are no good.

I understand that you can't perfectly predict your children, they have this really great knack for throwing you for a loop the moment you think you have them figured out. But the fact that I know this immediately puts me ahead of the "I got knocked up in highschool by a guy I didn't really like that much" crowd. Sorry if I offend. That being said, there's nothing wrong with planning. In fact planning and re-planning once real life shatters your cute plans is one thing I do really well.

My plan is to build a list... a list of qualities that make up a great character in a human being, one that is sophisticated enough that I could use it for myself if I weren't so hypocritical. Then go thorugh and flesh it out with examples of what these qualities look like when you live them at different ages. For example, when you are five years old, generosity looks like sharing your popcicle with your friend, when you are ten, you let your buddy ride your bike, when you're 16 you drive people around in your car, when you're 20, you spend time with people who look up to you, when you are 30 you give to charities, and spend time with people you don't like, when you are 40, you take care of your parents even though they are senile and a pain in your @$$, and at 60, you give candybars to creeped out teenagers that aren't even your grandchild. That kind of thing, basing it all off the Bible.

Why do I want to do this? Because I get tired of the parental "because I said so" BS that they expect their kids to swallow, while they themselves balk at other adults that use this logic on them. If they don't buy it why do they think it's good enough for their children? Do they think their children are stupid? Or are they stupid? I don't think "because I said so" is good enough for anything, even if it's for your child's good. Let's compare:

Why can't I hang out with suzie? "Because I said so" Gee when you put it that way, mom, I suddenly realize the vast wisdom you posess and will respectfully tell suzie I cannot hang out with her.

Compare to:

Why can't I hang out with Suzie? "For safety, to begin with, For your witness for another, For Sobriety, for self control, for modesty, and because Suzie is an arrogant little whore whose parents let her drink, smoke, and abort the children she concieves with half-sober morons of boys she lies to and calls men" Wow, that's harsh, but I really can't argue, because it is sadly true. You suck Suzie.

See the difference?

This is one of the many things I want to give my children. I want to give them reason, I want to give them truth, I want to give them standards big enough to last them their whole lives, standards that they can call me to account with, standards big enough that mom and dad come and apologise when they fail to live up to them, because the standards are right, given by the only one with real authority over our souls.

But hey, what do I know, I'm just the guy proving you wrong about the first year of marriage being horrible, and that you fall out of love after five years.

Jurisdiction

So I hear from Yahoo News that the proposition 8, that Californians in California voted on to alter California's constitution is being upheld in court!  *GASP*  who would have thought that a majority of people voting in a democracy would put in place a change in laws that would be upheld by the court!  I thought that we just voted for fun and the courts just did whatever the special interest groups that bitched the loudest told them to do, now apparently there's this link between the separate branches of government where they are actually supposed to cooperatively function using standards set forth by the people for the people!  

Everyone seems really surprised at this, all I can say to that is: What the hell?  Someone needs to go read Roberts rules of order and brush up on the fact that the whole democratic meeting and voting thing is for the RULE of the MAJORITY and merely the RIGHTS of the MINORITY.  That is, a minority can bitch about something before the majority stuffs it back in their whiney assed faces.  And at that point, the rule is a rule as made by the majority and the minority, having voiced their concerns can go home and pout, but everyone had a chance to speak on the issue.  And I find it interesting that homosexual special rights groups speak the loudest and most often on the issue and yet the majority STILL voted that gay marriage isn't marriage.  

Now they are all surprised that their supreme court which is supposed to enforce and uphold a proper interpretation of the constitution agrees with the change to the constitution.  Except for one of them, who, in my opinion, needs to go back to school and take some classes on politics and how systems of governments work, based on his quote:  "The rule the majority crafts today not only allows same-sex couples to be stripped of the right to marry that this court recognized [in last year's opinion], it places at risk the state constitutional rights of all disfavored minorities," Moreno wrote. "It weakens the status of our state Constitution as a bulwark of fundamental rights for minorities protected from the will of the majority." (taken from yahoo news) 

He is complaining because the rule of the majority doesn't just give the minorities it disagrees with everything they want? He complains because a courts ruling before a constitutional change is different from after a constitutional change?  Perhaps he'd like to bitch that women can vote, since, before that ammendment was made women were convicted of voting illegally and given jail time for it.   When the constitution changes by the will of the people, that is now the new standard and what it was last year, or, hell, even ten minutes ago, doesn't matter unless everyone gets together to re-amend it out.  Further, as noted by the head justice, it is not the job of the court to change the constitution, merely to uphold it.  

Furthermore, for Moreno to say that the constitution (even California's alone) is a bulwark of fundamental rights for minorities is pure BS!  That's not what it was for, a constitution is to protect the rights of the citizens (the majority of citizens) from it's own government, not to protect the minority from the majority.  

Further amusing is the basic assumption that the constitution is in the wrong, from the tone I have read in Yahoo news, to the quotes, to the people who bitch the loudest on facebook, everyone starts with the assumption that it is wrong.  Wait a minute!!! these are the same sources that told me that our morality is fluid, and changes to fit the opinion of the public, and stuff is okay now that wasn't fifty years ago because times have changed... well, here times change again and suddenly they all say "our morals are not fluid! just because everyone agrees with it doesn't make it right!"  it's very revealing that the media has an agenda and when everyone disagrees they bitch and when everyone aggrees they use it as an ontological proof for their position.  Pure hypocrisy!  

How about everyone who doesn't live in california quits bitching about what california does as a state.  They can hand out pez dispensers filled with PCP on every street corner in California for all I care, I don't live there.  But if the majority votes for it, the minority can bitch, but the majority will rule, and the courts will not convict people for handing out Pez dispensers with PCP in them.  

Lets all point and laugh!

There are a few topics that are so sacred that you cannot joke about them.  Their sacredness is proven by the fact that when you joke about them, horror quickly ensues:  Example:  The sacrifice of Christ on the cross.  Sure, laugh!  then you burn in hell for eternity.  I contend however, that if laughing at a thing is not the punishment for laughing at it, it is free and clear to be laughed at.  

People like to take humor and turn it into  "Hate" or "irreverence"  or "prejudice"  meanwhile hypocritically claiming that they themselves are freed of these vices.  To tell the truth I'd rather be encumbered with these vices and have the benefit of a strong and healthy sense of humor to protect me from myself. 

People who take themselves too seriously poison everyone around them.  

Yes there is someone who set me off on this rant!  I will explain, specifically, so that you can see what I mean. 

I had a friend whose status message states "I am passionate about two things: Abolishing Abortion and human trafficking"  here they get stuck in the sticky compounding problem.  

If we are going to be drab and serious and shove an entire pack of preparation H up our backsides followed by a heated spiny twisting stick, we will acknowledge that Abolishing is a verb modified jointly by abortion and human trafficking as intended, 

however, barring the pointy stick in the rectum, abolishing is a single verb.  They said they were passionate about two things.  So clearly abolishing can't be the only thing they are passionate about.  this means the other thing they are passionate about is human trafficking, this leads me to conjecture that perhaps there is a causal relationship going on here:  Abortion reduces the number of humans, this means less stock for the human traffickers, therefore, anyone who is passionate about human trafficking could reasonably be against abortion, just as a cattle farmer is against wolves showing up and eating his stock!

Here's where the hole puckers, because people don't like human trafficking.  Actually that's an unfair generalization.  SOMEONE must like it because it happens requiring a buyer and a seller, in seperate parts of the world so you can thusly traffick the peoples aforementioned.   Anyhow, the majority of white americans are unfomfortable with it because they retain a vestegial attachment to the past, and this hits too close to home... for people who lived like 200 years ago... and were wealthy enough to own slaves... who were sold by their own people living across the ocean... who are still trafficking people and we sit and wonder about it... anyway, I digress. 

The point is that the higher the pucker factor, I contend the more we ought to be able to laugh at ourselves and the topic.  Take the comic The Far Side for example.  The poor author has been dogged again and again by the find people of amnesty international because he portrays a few comical torture-related situations.  I mean, come on, the idea that a torturer who hates his job and thusly is being tortured by torturing doesn't strike you in the least funny?  Its like a hay farmer with hay fever, it's a cruel (but still grossly amusing) irony!  and all they want to do is pucker up on the spiny twirling stick, and torture themselves about it by complaining to the author (which adds another level to the cruel irony as the people who are against torture are offended by the idea that a torturer might be tortured by having to torture people) 

At any rate, we have trouble laughing at things, and often at that point we really NEED to laugh at them.  Otherwise we'll die from some heart-related disease.  

If laughing doesn't punish you, by all means laugh!  if others will punish you for laughing, laugh at them, and then for your ballsyness, bravado, and ignorance, laugh at yourself.  And if you can't do any of those things, you'd better call amnesty international and ask them to help you end your life because you are spending the duration torturing yourself!

Obesity, for real!

I started a diet recently.  It's really ingenious, actually.  Ingenious in that it relies on discipline, hard work, measurable goals, and real science that has proofs with it.  

My scale performs some really cool functions:  It not only tells me my mass, but it also provides me with approximate fat and water percentages.  This gives me basically everything I need to lose weight. 

Now, to lose weight healthfully, I needed a bit more information, so I did research, for example, everyone I look at says you should not try to lose more than 2 lbs per week of dieting,  This is unhealthy.  Healthy body fat for a male is between 9 and 15%.  In most cases, BMI actually does work with this if you measure yourself.  I have found the focus on fat reduction is completely missing from pretty much every fad diet.  They make really stupid assumptions:  Let me line them out for you:

Assumption 1:  If I weigh less, it's better!  Completely false if you lose the weight by reducing your hydration level.  You can also lose weight by digesting muscle fiber and internal organs, or amputating a limb.  No one's goal should be an arbitrary number of pounds because it sounds great.  No one's goal should be a dress or pant size.  To be honest, even a BMI range is of very limited usefulness because of the wide variation we see in the human species. to set up my diet, I actually ignored how many pounds I weigh, and even my BMI, and I looked to the ideal setup of an average human being, and related that to how realistic it is for me with consideration to my relation to the average human being in overall health, size, and build. 

Assumption 2: You are what you eat!  While it is true that if you eat just fat all day you get fat, and if you eat only carrots you turn orange, you are NOT what you eat.  Your body manipulates everything you ingest through both simple and extremely complicated chemical processes, and it's assenine to assume that your ass is made of what comes in your mouth.  If you are what you eat, why do we not regularly eat seratonin, or insulin?  Our bodies take what we eat and process the crap out of it!  (literally actually, it processes the crap out of it and excretes the crap)  I really don't know how my hamburger turns into the chemicals and hormones I need, but it does.  The lesson I can take, however, is that even if I eat no fat, only simple carbs... my body is talented enough to string those carbohydrates together in the right order to store it as fat.  Just cutting your fat doesn't mean you're less fat, it means you eat less fat.  This is why Atkins actually can reduce your fat weight, because fat that goes in doesn't necessarily stay as fat in your bloodstream.  

Assumption 3: Less is more.  Many diets kind of assume that if you just eat less, you'll get skinny.  It works for the african orphans, right?  This, of course is coupled with the idea that we just want to lose weight, not change proportions of anything.  Weight watchers improperly practised is the epitome of this false assumption.  As long as you only eat your allotted 20 weight watcher's points, you'll weigh less!  I'm aware that real weight watchers involves a bit more, but let's face it, the way it's planned must be offset by the way it's practiced.  The belief of how weight watchers works is starve yourself, lose weight, fit into jeans!

Assumption 4:  Weightloss is aesthetic!  To be honest most diet places need to push this line to get people convinced they should lose weight.  It often fits with the "you should be this size" falsehood.  Alternately people also fall into the lie of everyone is beautiful, and we are losing weight to let that inner beauty out, or some crap like that.  To be honest, the majority of dieting that should occur needs to happen with complete disregard of how you look.  If you are underweight, you need to gain weight.  I don't care if you are getting love handles.  A healthy fat percentage for women is around 20 to 25 percent you'll see a variation of 2 to 3% depending on the source.  And everyone stores fat differently, unfortunately, ladies, your body doesn't let you choose to store all your fat in your boobs, and you need more fat on you than men, we'd be better off if you just get yourself in a healthy range and when anyone calls you fat, you kick their skinny ass down the street.  Aesthetics cannot influence you in weightloss, because for starters, it's vain, secondly, it's only a small part of the picture of your aesthetic value, and finally, you will be ugly anyway when you're old.  It'd be nice though, to be ugly and not have an amputated foot because you were too busy stuffing krispy kremes down your craw, or to be ugly but not in a wheel chair because you removed too much body cavity fat in your quest for a hot body, and now your body can't sustain itself because you abused it with unhealthy weight levels. 

Assumption 5:  Losing weight on your own is unhealthy!  This is my pet peeve.  If you are going to leave a judgement telling me to be careful about losing weight without a "professional plan"  prepare for me to tell you to stick it where the sun don't shine.  I mean that, I'll print it out, show up at your house with rubber gloves and give you an enema with your own comments, then light them on fire.  Losing weight without a plan is unhealthy, and as I've said, losing weight just for weight loss is unhealthy.  You don't need a huge group to give you mail order food, you just need to follow some simple rules to stay healthy. 

Here's some of the concepts that are key to my diet:

My ideal body fat is between 9 and 15%,  My current body fat is around 23%

I am and want to continue to be at least average muscularity.  

I have a target to be able to perform arduous cardio tasks.  An example of an arduous cardio task is to walk three miles carrying 45lbs in 45 minutes.  This is a standard from fire fighting, you can find other arduous standards from the US military, Marines, and other branches of the armed service.  When it comes to activity abilities, I suggest these as sources because they rely routinely on the fitness of the human body and have a decent understaning of what your average human should be able to do.  Now, just because I want to be able to perform arduous tasks does not mean that an arduous task is a regular part of my exercise.  The word arduous should be a tip off.  THIS SHOULD NOT BE ROUTINE!!!  It should be something I do perhaps monthly, while and ONLY while performing moderately difficult cardio activities as a REGULAR part of my exercise, and these moderately difficult activities should be walked into starting at easy and working upward steadily until I reach a point where I notice I am having difficulty in my daily exercise.  At this point, my exercise needs to be felt through.  I decrease the difficulty slightly so that I am not hurting at the end of the routine, and then each week I gradually increase the difficulty until I find my threshhold for difficulty again, this way you work your body into the difficulty level.  Once you reach a point of moderate to difficult cardio activity, you don't need to increase it.  Just stick with it, there's no reason to perform insane cardiovascular tasks on a daily basis.  It's often very hard on other parts of your body, like your joints and ligaments.  

I am routinely underhydrated.  There are two ways to check this out.  My scale is one: it gives me a percentage, the quick test is urine color.  Yellow bad, clear good! when it's light brown or comes out in powdered form, it's time to break out the 3 liter jug and chug. 

one pound of human fat is approximately 3500 dietary calories.  I use this as my baseline.  I want to lose around 2 pounds of fat per week, this means I need to know my resting metabolic needs, the needs for my activities, and how much I'm eating.  This is all really easy information to find, and the calories become instinctive, (much like carbs for diabetics) with practise and just watching what you are ingesting.  (one albertson's cookie, 115 calories, a milky way dark 240 calories)  I know that to lose 2 lbs of fat I need a 7000 calorie deficit in a week, This comes to in a week I should have a 1000 calorie deficit every day.  My metabolic calorie need (calculatable) is around 2100 calories, my usual daily routine provides an additional 600 - 700 calories, putting my consumption level at around 1800 calories.  If I put in an extra 200 calories of exercise (rough equivalent of me walking casually 2 miles)  then I'm up to the very very easy 2000 calorie daily guideline.

The exercise in there is not optional.  It's utterly necessary because your body is very adaptable.  It will actually shut down nonessential stuff to conserve calories if it sees you trying to starve it.  Like when you unplug your laptop and it dims the screen to save batteries.  By exercising you increase your metabolism for about the next 12 hours after you exercise.  Like when you hit the button on your cell phone and your screen is bright for another 30 seconds.  The exercise is how I keep hitting the button on my body, keeping the screen bright, continuing to burn up the big battery attached to my thighs and tummy.  

Eat your vitamins... with food... preferably fat ones. Also drink a full glass of water. Vitamins are not a food replacement, actually most vitamins need something to bind with for proper uptake, take Vitamin K, for example is soluable in fat, and when you add fat to your green spinach, it increases the availability.  The principle remains the same for your centrum.  You get better usage when the vitamins have something to hang on to.  As far as time of day, I've found no one who really scientifically suggests that morning or night is better for absorption.  Any recommendations I've seen are actually based on the psychology of forming habits, which I ignore.  Your body needs these vitamins, and the multivitamin is there to fill in holes that may be in your diet one day or another, it's not to replace your food.  The water is also needed because your body absorbs water very well, and lots of vitamins dissolve in the water, making an ideal delivery system through your intestines.  I personally take a multivitamin, similar to Centrum, a LOT of vitamin C (water soluable and non-toxic at high levels)  a L-Lysine which is supposed to give immune system health benefits, Calcium with other stuff to help with absorption, and a flax seed oil, which we originally got for Whitney but I hate to let it go to waste and it's too big for her little throat.  I don't know what it does other than be really big and hard to swallow.  You need the vitamins because in losing fat, your body has to do more conversions than you've been doing, or at least do them in the reverse order.  You've been fad dieting wrong so it's been taking your carbs and tying them together in fat chains, or worse, taking the fat you eat and making minor conversions and storing them as-is: fat.  Now it has to take those fat chains and break them into a form useable on the cellular level.  This needs catalysts and stuff, which the vitamins are apparently useful for. 

My favorite delivery for vitamins is almonds, which can be chewed into a paste and then about four pills thrown into your mouth which are undetectable when mixed into the almond paste.  Almonds themselves are great for you, one of the closest things I've seen to a miracle food, they are pretty well balanced have good fats in them, one serving is roughly a handful (about 25 almonds) and you can buy a huge bag at bulk stores for under 10 bucks.  Skip the organic crap that costs 10 bucks for a couple servings.  

Follow your food pyramid.  Really, I promise.  They didn't lie to you in grade school, contrary to what your harvard profs might say as they try to push their vegetarian agendas down your throat.  But honestly, there's nothing wrong with a good couple servings of beef.  The problem is that we generally eat beef 4 servings at a time.  Did you know that two double quarter pounders with Cheese from McDonalds has about twice the amount of meat you need that day, and about 100% of the calories?  I'm not saying don't eat a double quarter pounder with cheese, I'm just saying keep in mind you should be having fruit and cottage cheese for dinner. 

Eat your breakfast!  Not the most important meal of the day, but you'll notice if you eat breakfast you are more hungry by lunch.  This is because your body knows there's food today, and fires up your metabolism.  helpful for losing weight.  

Coffee and pop are not bad!  I get so sick of this I could scream.  People berate me for drinking my diet coke.  "Caffeine is bad for you"  they say, "It's a diaheurretic"  they claim (they are wrong, it's actually one of  the substances caffeine is metabolized into by the liver that is a diaheurretic, and these levels are around only 4% the caffeine consumed, and in all but extreme cases are purely incidental)  Also the amount of water in Diet Coke vastly outdoes the diaheurretic effect of the caffeine contained in the diet coke.  The next complaint is "There's sodium in Diet coke"  yah, there is, read the label, 40 mg of sodium to be exact,  if you read the can it says "VERY LOW SODIUM"  what is very low?  for US reference, Normal saline (injected directly into your blood stream to treat extreme dehydration) has about 266mg per Oz, Diet coke has about 3.3 mg per Oz, which means Normal Saline is about 80 times more concentrated with sodium than Diet coke.  So, yes, Diet Coke actually hydrates you.  Some people attack the carbonation (most of it comes out during the drinking process, and your cells naturally give off CO2 during metabolism, hence we breathe it out)  and some say "There's acid and it can dissolve a stake (or steak)"  check out myth busters.  It cannot.  The key to acid is molality.  Diet coke is WAY less acidic than, say, an orange, or vinegar, both of which I routinely ingest with no one whining.  

Drink your diet coke!  It has less than a calorie per serving, and unless your pregnant, I really can't find a relevant arguement against drinking sane amounts of it.  Obviously you should drink some water too, but there is ABSOLUTELY NOTHING wrong with drinking it for something bubbly along with lunch and a snack, and hell, even dinner and breakfast if you're so inclined.  People forget, even if I counted my diet cokes as waters, I still need to drink four more glasses of it during the day if I have one with breakfast, lunch, dinnner, and a snack.  Which is more water than they are generally ingesting in the first place. 

That brings me to my last diet rant:  Drink your water!  One of the leading problems of people in nursing homes is acctually dehydration.  This accounts for things like constipation, and lack of energy, all the way up to eye issues, since your eyes are actually fairly water-intensive organs.  Just drink it, and no, there's nothing wrong with tap water.  And by the way, take some salt with your water.  Your pee should be clear, but you shouldn't be peeing every 15 minutes.  You actually need a saline solution to maintain hydration, because your blood keeps the water by a sort of osmotic pressure.  If you don't replenish your salt stores, the water passes through and just flushes more salt from your system, reducing your water holding capacity.  This is extremely notable on fires.  If it is 104, you are cutting fire line, and you pee... you need salt.  I have drinken over two gallons in a day and never peed once, because it was mostly being utilized for cooling.  Naturally, I also ate a crapload of chips, because in that weather, pee is wasted water.   Your blood is a saline solution.  Remember I said normal saline, pumped straight into your blood?  not distilled water.  Distilled water will actually kill you in short order.  It has 9 full grams of salt per liter of water. You can use this as a guide... for each liter of water you ingest, you should try to figure in about 9 grams (9000 mg) of salt from your diet.  This is way easier than you think and most of the time you won't have to work at it, but if you are peeing every time you take a drink and it's crystal clear... think about downing some pretzels, ok?

All in all, while I'm NOT a dietition, use some common sense and arm yourself with knowledge of what is healthy for a human being before you do any diet, even if it's got a Doctor's go ahead on it... because frankly, you can design a better diet for you than anyone else, if you take the time to stop and think.  

Finally, the big thing with dieting is to measure, measure measure!  weighing myself everynight has ultimately become a very rewarding activity that keeps me and my diet on track,  unless i'm sick. then all dieting rules go out the window, You just rest and drink, and get better before you go hog-wild depriving your body of calories.  

Emotional WMDs

I touched on this briefly in my Facebook note, and now I'm worked up so I want to unleash my full fury on what I call Emotional Weapons of Mass Destruction.  Partially because I have known so many good, well-meaning Christians get caught up in this.  Very intelligent people who have an emotional experience as they design, work through every Sunday and Wednesday set of music, teaming up with the "Worship leader"  to arrange the songs starting from lively to wean people off their coffee whose caffeine will make them more alert, and once the coffee has cooled and become undrinkable, the songs begin to become more somber, working their way from 80s rock to bluegrass, to blues toned, and finally winding up off the bottom of mellow on the musical charts, dropping off just before classical which has an enlivening quality.  The goal seems to be to totally anesthize the congregation and get them into a near-trance state.  The fonts lose their hard edges, they gain drop shadows, the anti-aliasing goes up about five pixels, and the words get really huge because by this point the songs are just repetitions of the same six words about a billion times.  At the same time, the colors drop off and become mellow, dark tones, they even lose duality of tone, ignoring design principles of lighting and the words blend in, forcing a person to really focus to read them.  

These last songs must be sung while standing, because the rise will drop blood to the brain and the increase in exposed skin will drop body temperatures.  This leads to a light, floating feeling also produced when one huffs paint.  The music drops, and sometimes vanishes all together, and everyone gets really mellowed out.  They are basically on a trip, psychologically, physically, emotionally, they have been all but hypnotized.  They are nearly braindead, we ensured a physical change and posture to cut circulation to their head.  We rhythmically moved them into a trancelike state.  And now comes the finale!  An apparently impromptu monologue by the worship leader.  To my knowledge they are impromptu.  And they had better be!  If they are not, worship leaders intentionally plan a mini-sermon behind the pastor's back.  And a minisermon filled with theological loopholes, assumptions, and even outright falsehoods and lies.  I've heard theological outrages spoken during a worship leader monologue with guitar background filler and a voice that sounds like the guy is having an orgasam on stage; and no one, not even the pastor said a word.  

Things like, "Jesus never said he wanted us to be perfect"  Really?  He didn't?  I must be imagining that Matthew 5:48  in the Bible then, It must actually just skip straight from 5:47 to 5:49.  

"All God wants is our love, we don't need to do anything or say anything to make him happy, just love him"  OK... so James was being sarcastic when he went off about faith without works being dead?  You may say "Oh he's taking these out of context"  It's the first assumption.  I hate it when people do that, I don't want to do that.  I am not!  It's what was being said.  Maybe not what was meant, but what was meant is on the same ground as what was said in public speaker, because we must remember, even the dimmest in the audience must understand our meaning and how will they except by what is said?

I generally don't collect false teachings, so this is all the more I can give you of examples for now, but I've heard  a plethora of foolish ideas and straight out lies from these musical monologues. 

If you need proof, find a good guitar-only track of a very repetetive worship song.  Put it on repeat, and read these words in an airy voice, like you're in an early musical, talking romantially to the primary love interest. 

"Last night... I was lying in my bed... and I just couldn't sleep... And then it just... it just hit me... I really.... I really wanted a sandwich!... So I just got up and... and my feet hit the floor!.... and I went to the fridge and opened it up.... I got mayonaise... mayo and pickles!... Mustard and turkey... paper thin sliced turkey... I put them all together and as I took my first bite... I just began to realize... I realized, wow!... This bread is moldy!... have you ever been there? Have you ever just realized suddenly... my bread is moldy?... I know I did last night... and all you can say is wow... what a great and wonderful sandwich!.. and it was all wasted... But not to fear! .. Because I had a fresh, new bag... A bag of Standish farms bread!... My sandwich was remade!... and I ate it, and I never looked back!!!.  How encouraging!... to know that even a moldy sandwich can be remade!... Tonight... when you lie in bed... I want you to think about that.... about the power of the remade sandwich... and all the hope it brings us... Let's pray!"

First off this is more theologically sound than many mini-musical-monologues I've heard because it doesn't bring God into it at all except to pray to Him.  Second... If you lowered the lights and said this in that airy voice... you'll notice how it can cause goosebumps when presented well.  it can bring tears to your eyes when performed correctly, and worship leaders must practise this tonality very carefully.  It's like they think that by embellishing they get heard by God or something. 

This is an Emotional WMD.  It's purely designed to knock down your defenses and to cause you to have an emotional experience so that when you walk away you believe the time was significant.  You say, "I'm going back to church, because I feel good and energized, and good things happen there"  But this is a lie!  You should go back to church because the FELLOWSHIP is encouraging, because it is the BODY OF CHRIST!  not because you get all goosepimply, and it gives you shivers up your spine.  If that's your case for church, I vote you walk into your freezer instead sunday mornings.  You'll save about an hour of your time and get the same effect! 

I'm not saying there is anything wrong with using good design, or planning out your worship set.  What I am saying is that any and all impromptu outbursts in church need to be made with everyone unemotional, of sound mind, and thinking clearly, able to discern from truth and lies and right and wrong so we don't mislead people and send them to hell and ourselves to stern rebukes!  Furthermore, no one, not even the pastor having planned for weeks his message, should be allowed to speak with emotional music in the background.  Ever.  It is a trick, and we don't need tricks, manipulation, hypnotism, or sleight of hand to tell people about the Truth of Jesus.  It's the Holy Spirit, not their emotions that  move them to faith in Jesus.  If they are moved there by their emotions, it will be a shallow faith, and the second things get a little hot, they'll bug out.  They'll be worse off because they could not finish what they started, and every entry to the church will begin with the bitters of their last exit.  

Some people enjoy emotional time, and that's fine, but heaven forbid we teach lies with our emotional time.  It's great for worship, it's great to encourage openness and fellowship in a safe environment, but it is horrible to engender discerning discussion about the truth.  Furthermore, it's a tactic that outright says "I don't trust you Holy Spirit, I'm going to do your job for you.!"  

 

Value

Lately I've heard a lot of people talking about "the economy" and "markes" and "The industry"  putting them on graphs, and all that.  They act like these forces are like the forces of nature, they ebb and flow and you can't do anything but ride it out, or seek shelter by putting your money in a coffee can buried in the back yard.  

It really makes me stop and look at the basis for the whole thing.  It's value.  Value is something that many people don't really under stand.  Many marketers will probably give you some speal about value being benefits divided by cost or some nonsense.  I like to look at value as: What's it worth to you?  For example.  If you're in the middle of a desert, dying of exposure, no supplies, and you come across a shimmering pile of gold, Solid gold.  Well, if you're not disappointed that it's not water, you're an idiot.  In this situation, a wise man would gladly trade a mountain of solid gold for a drink of water.  When I give this example, lots of people say "I wouldn't!"  They are full of it.  

Either they truly value posessing gold more than their own life, or they have never really been thirsty.  And when you think about it for half a second valuing a posession requires you to value your life, because on this earth... "you can't take it with you"  so if you were going to effectively value all your posessions you are not capable of valuing them more than your life.  This puts a cap on the value of any posession.  A sane person cannot value any posession more than their own life.  If they do, they cease to be sane.  

lets say you're there, with your big pile of gold, more than you could possibly carry out, heck, in this situation it's looking like you're not getting out at all gold or no!  Then along comes this trader on camel back, and you offer him ten percent for a drink of water and a ride out with your gold.  Most people I've actually presented this question to say, as the trader, sure they'd do it!  These people are either extremely generous or not shrewd at all, or again, they've never been thirsty.  A shrewd trader would point out that you're screwed without him. "market forces" are in his favor, your posession of the gold depends on his water and transportation.  Indeed your LIFE depends on his water and transport.  A smart trader would assess if he has the camel power to pack all the gold out, and offer you a trade of as much gold as he can carry out for a bag of water (assuming he has spare water).  This is not a cruel trade.  You walked in, you have no water, so, with water, you can walk your butt out, and he gets the gold.  If you say NO to this situation, what happens?  

Lots of people think they could convince my shrewd trader to come down on his price.  They are very wrong.  They haven't calculated the values at stake.  If you say no, YOU DIE!  At which point you won't be posessing anything.  The trader, being shrewd as he is, would say "he chose death.  I offered him water, and he wasn't willing to trade his gold for his life"  And you are lucky my trader is shrewd and a good man.  A bad man would just walk on by, and make a note of the location, come back later, and take the gold that is no longer yours, because you're dead and dead people own nothing.  

This is the underlying principle of all transactions.  As a farmer I've asked people if they would pay $1000 for a loaf of bread, everyone I've asked has said no.  If I have the only loaf of bread you've seen in a year, and you have the cash, you'd pony it up in a heartbeat.  

The point I'm making here is value is completely arbitrary.  It is not "the price of this is going up" or, "the price of that is going down"  prices don't rise or fall, the primary purchasers value it differently from moment to moment.  

A brewer needs barley to brew.  It's his livlihood.  Since no one values their things more than their life, he will pay as much as he has to for barley, but not a cent more, because he is shrewd, and not generous... at least, not to barley growers.  He helps orphans, so he is generous.  Just... none of those orphans grow barley.

So when everyone has barley, he can basically find the guy who values his barley LEAST, or rather needs money more than barley to survive, and will trade with that guy, giving him the scant amount of money he is so desparate for.  

But when only one man has barley, the tables are turned.  The barley grower will look at all the brewers to find the one who values his barley much more than his money.  The desparate one. 

With desparation comes a value increase.  It's human nature.  You actually could choose to not value something when you are desparate... But you are desparate for a reason.  you either need to change your value system, (that is if the barley grower decided he didn't need money that bad right now, so he's not going to sell his barley that cheap)  or pony up the extra expense.  

This is the basic reason that in 2002, I drove a winding road through idaho, and we wisely filled up before we left Montana.  Half way down that 100 mile winding road through nowhere, there was a gas station.  In 2002, gasoline here was nearly 5 dollars per gallon.  Why?  Because if your tank says "E" you are desparate... Or you're a sheister in a U-haul who wasn't going to fill it with gas anyway.  

This also explains tourist traps.  The people in the community will put up with higher prices because collectively the community is making money on the people who don't live there and are DESPARATE for stuff so they'll pay triple the price a sane person would for sandwich making.  

Or they think they are having a unique or rare experience fishing here, or boating here, or having a camp fire in this man-made fire ring in the middle of this hand-planted forest here.  At any rate they will pay the price for the essentials to their unique or rare experience.  A 10 dollar fishing hook and 20 dollar worms.  50 bucks an hour boat rental, 10 dollar a bundle fire wood that is drier than kiln-dried lumber and will spontaneously combust and be consumed in less than 5 minutes. 

Why is our "economy" going down?  It could be nothing more than people, en masse, heard the economy was going down and they might lose their job.  They also have a 10,000 dollar credit card debt that's accumulating at 20 percent interest.  If they lose their job, Visa owns them.  They become desparate.  What will they do?  They suddenly see all their current posessions as under threat, or a possibility of them being under threat in the future.  And since the economy is bad, we can't put our money in a bank or stock market,  a few of those just went under, you know!  So he saves it in his sock drawer, under his mattress, in a coffee can buried in his back yard, and he pays visa for money he already spent so if he loses his job, no one can take what he already has.  His covetousness for the things he doesn't have goes out the window because he knows he can't even keep what he does have at this point.   As he buries and squirrels away his money and pays for the things he already has, this money falls off the economists grid.  They see the money spent, maybe even the money saved in a bank.  But not the money in your sock drawer.  So they panic, money is disappearing!  consumer confidence is down!  EEEEEEK!

What no one ever asks are things like "should his confidence be down?"  He's been over extended for five years!  He's always been in danger of losing everything!  His confidence should have dropped a long time ago, but loan extensions and new lines of credit kept him cocky!  There's times when a consumer shouldn't be confident.  Theres a time to be wise. 

If you're wise, at least in my mind, you'd take a moment to notice that all this stuff you're getting suposedly to "enrich your life"  is vanity and what you're really doing is trading hours of your life for stuff to enrich the life you just gave away!  

I don't pay for television service.  Because I value all the time it would take me to earn the extra money more than I value the entertainment.  And eventually you enter a paradox like many people I know, who own so much hunting gear that they haven't paid for, they spend all season working to pay for it.   Who have so many awesome cars that they spend into the midnight hours working to pay for them, and what are they doing while they are working?  NOT hunting, NOT driving, they are not enjoying the things they purchased for enjoyment!  Why would I want to buy a harley?  I could buy a honda for WAY cheaper, and my butt can't tell the difference when it's perched on there.  Rather, why wouldn't I buy an x-box?  I can drink beer while I do that, and it's cheaper than both!  Ultimately it is more ENRICHING because I gain more benefit because it costs less.  

What is value?  It's the price you'll pay.  Why you pay it is totally arbitrary and up to you, but it is the price you will pay, even for an item you will spend the rest of your life paying for so you can never use it.  

It kind of puts a new perspective on those cliches that we all like to lie about but our lives say different:  "I value my family most"  "I value Jesus most"  

Do you trade your life for your family?   Even if you are trading your life to pay for your families needs and desires,  what does your family want and need most?  probably you!  Because you are their family, so while family is your excuse for working all the time you are paradoxically neglecting your family to work.  I'd say you value your pride, the pride of your family having "nice things"  or your pride of being a "selfless hard worker"  more than you value your family.  You selfish jerk.   

If you value Jesus most, why does nothing you earn go to him.  Are you going to pull the "Jesus wants me most"  card?  If so I challenge you that you aren't even giving him yourself.  Heck, you won't even give him your spare time!  you people sicken me.  What's worse is that I'm one of you people. 

In close the only things you can value more than your own life are the things you can maintain posession of once it's lost.  Jesus fits this category... But if you value it more than your life, why do you not trade your life for it, but do trade your life for things that you can't sanely value more than your life? 

People are crazy.  That's the only answer I've found.