Earlier this week, something occurred that we didn’t, at the moment, have time to take note of. However it keeps causing me to have melodies floating through my mind.
On Wednesday, legendary composer Burt Bacharach passed away. Of all his many award winning compositions there is one, that for me holds so true. It is the one that proclaims, “It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of”.
Just as relevant and heartfelt today as it was nearly 60-years ago, for anyone, at any time, for any reason in any season has been becoming a timeless classic.
I’ll share my favorite version of the song coming up on this edition of “Becoming Today, however first it’s time to take a look at the week that was.
We began our week together with a discussion called, “Tenacity Comes From Within”.
What is the definition of tenacity?
The immediate response? “The quality or state of being tenacious”.
Well okay it makes sense if you understand the intention of our conversation today. However, we’re going to need to know more.
So let’s check another source. Ahh, this one is a little more explanatory.
Tenacity, noun:
- the quality of being tenacious, or of holding fast; persistence. Example- the amazing tenacity of rumors.
- the quality of retaining something. As in the tenacity of memory.
- the quality or property of holding together firmly. For instance, testing the tenacity of the old book’s binding.
Still their origins point to tenacious as its root, so let’s dig a little deeper and reveal tenacious as:
- not easily stopped or pulled apart : firm or strong. As in, the company has a tenacious hold on the market. Or a tenacious grip
- continuing for a long time. With examples including tenacious myths/traditions. And a tenacious effort/battle
- very determined to do something. Like us, She is quite tenacious.
So drawing from these, let’s consider tenacity to mean:
Not easily deterred. Persevering to continue despite any obstacles and steadfastly remaining forbearant in all efforts.
All very “Becoming” qualities. Plus they are ones that indeed need to perform “on purpose”.
Tuesday, we chose to become “Energized Through Tenacity”. When last we spoke, I shared that I had come to an understanding of what it truly means to be intentionally dedicated and persistent.
“To be purposefully tenacious is acting intentionally. With reason and uncommon determination in a consistent, dedicated manner.
Not being swayed, continuing forward in spite of any obstacles or perceived challenges.
Remaining steadfast, persistent, assured, affirmed and forbearant until we successfully fulfill our goal or objective”.
That goal for me is to share what I have learned. Testify to how life can be overcome and help as many of you as I can.
No two can do it in identical ways. While we walk this shared path together, our steps are independently ordered and routes vary.
Though the inspiration you desire is found in the same place. It is within. It resides inside you, in each and everyone of us.
To start “Becoming”, you need to bypass your mind. Detach from those lingering thoughts , worries, and distractions. Find that peaceful place and in solitude to make the decision to take action for yourself.
Make the decision to follow your heart and take action on what you know for yourself, what you want to achieve and the Truth. Just make a decision to listen to your heart and heed your intuition. Your heart is programmed by God. Your mind by other people. Choose love and the path revealed will lead you to your true purpose, your destiny, the life you were intended to live.
The power to do it. The power to achieve it all is within.
Listen to it.
Follow it
Expect it.
Grow with it, then you are “Becoming”.
For me, when I’m having some difficulty focusing, I’ll pick up a pen and just let a little free association take place. Just writing down whatever pops into my head, then discerning the direction that is being revealed to me.
As I pondered what to share with you, in this “Becoming Today”, here is what I started with:
Thinking.
Creating.
Designing.
Developing.
Growing.
Searching.
“Becoming”.
Being.
Seeing.
Wanting.
Finding.
“Becoming”.
Loving.
Carring.
Hoping.
Desiring.
“Becoming”.
The power is within.
The guidance is available.
The Peace.
The Strength.
The Heart.
The Love.
All is “Becoming”.
At first it looks just like scribbles on a page, but when I review it and lay it out here, I see structure to it. Questions, answers, a rhythm, balance and an outline.
So where do I go from there?
I make a decision. A decision to review what just came from within. Then another decision to contemplate what I just reviewed from within, and then yes another decision to expand upon and write about what inspiration I received from within.
Afterall, what happens when you make a decision? That is correct — it is either right or wrong. If it’s right, go with it, learn from it, and do it again. If it didn’t work out? Go with it, learn from it and don’t do it again. Instead head within again and seek revision in your inspiration.
At midweek I asked if you were ready also?
We say we are ready for things.
Ready for things to get better. Desiring for more. Even claiming to be ready for change.
But are we really?
On this edition of “Becoming Today”, we’ll look at the question of whether or not you are ready to receive; plus we’ll explore three areas of focus to determine if you truly are.
So, “people get ready….”
So pulling it all together for our common understanding to be ready is to put yourself in a suitable state to take action without reservation to achieve a goal, outcome or result.
Are you prepared for that?
Then get ready to deal with some steps to ensuring you are remaining on the path to your desired “Becoming”.
“You don’t need no baggage,…”
In ensuring you are fully prepared for the effort that lies ahead in readying yourself for whatever your specific “it” is, you need to ask yourself another question.
Are You Ready To Accept Change?
Whoa… wait a minute let me turn the volume down, I was just blown away as I heard nearly 20-thousand of you scream YES!!!!… in unison.
However, while I appreciate your zeal, you need to pause for a minute.
Are you truly ready for this step?
It takes more than a willingness or a desire, it requires genuine work to ensure that you are open to accepting.
Realize first you don’t always get what you think you want, but if you try sometimes, you might just get what you need.
In learning how to accept we are “Becoming” able to live a life with gratitude.
“All you need is faith,…”
Understanding that, now you need to reflect upon this inquiry:
Are You Ready To Do The Work?
Anything truly worth receiving requires effort. Are you determined to make the commitments to dedicate yourself to the cause?
Examine your beliefs about receiving
Undertake some self questioning to determine what could be causing you to be hesitant or putting up a barrier of resistance. What’s stopping you from accepting help? Do you feel undeserving? Why?
Allow yourself to be vulnerable
Being vulnerable is not a sign of weakness. In order to accept help, you need to let go of control. That may be the most difficult obstacle to overcome. Nevertheless it is required in order for others to step in and help.
You can not create a state of “Becoming”, if you aren’t willing to let the former or current realities go. Are you ready to do some releasing?
To let go of past hurts, you need to make the conscious decision to release control of the situation.
However, this can take time and practice. Be kind to yourself as you practice refocusing how you see the situation, and celebrate the small victories you have already received.
So now that you’re willing to accept change, understand the change you get back may be not be what you had calculated and and you’ve embraced the idea that you need to be committed, diligent and steadfast toward the need for effort and action, then one more question remains:
Are You Ready To Ask?
You can not receive something if you don’t ask for it. Conversely we are assured that if you ask your needs will be met.
The Bible is full of examples on this step, and receiving assistance, guidance, support, recompense and even zeal are all among the more than seven thousand promises God makes to us that are recorded there.
As it is written in Matthew 7 verse 7, ““Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you”.
“Don’t need no ticket,… You just thank the Lord!”
So are you ready to receive?
I can not answer the question for you, because while we walk along this shared path, we all have different callings, missions and purposes. Only you can fully understand what it is you need to receive.
Work the steps, make sure you are liberal with you utterances of gratitude and praise and people you are ready to receive,… whatever “it” may be for you.
Thursday we spoke about, “Are You Truly Trusting?”.
Trust is one of those things we’re constantly told we should be doing and sometimes we believe we are. However that’s not always the case even if we believe what we are saying.
To give us a working definition of the basic elements of what it means to trust in someone or something, let’s agree to discern the term as:
“Exhibiting and practicing full faith and confidence in an idea or individual, with reasonable expectation and reliance on their abilities to operate with the sureness of truth”
That seems like a lot to ask. It is. This is where we need to accept the idea that there are varying levels of trust that are perfectly acceptable.
For example it’s okay to trust the garbage collection service will haul your trash away, but you should not expect them to be trusted to deliver the mail, much less to transport you to eternal salvation.
There is trusting within limits and trusting implicitly. Therefore when using the term we need to understand that we should treat trust with differing levels of accountability, expectation and protection.
I don’t use the word childhood when discussing my past. I was always expected to be a short adult and circumstances dictated that I grow up a lot sooner than most. So let me say early in life I was taught to trust no one. Keep everything secret, do not tell anyone anything because they’ll use it against you.
This is not the proper lesson on developing trust. It is one I had to spend many years unlearning.
I had to learn early that there is a significant amount of discernment necessary, even coming to understand that for my own protection I had to trust others outside of the ones we are commonly expected to believe in. In addition I had to trust that inner knowing to not let the ones I was supposed to trust find out I was trusting others.
I could go on for several chapters on that, so for the purposes of our discussion today let me just say, I have known people with ties to organized crime that had more honor and were more trustworthy than some of those who publicly portrayed themselves as saints or claimed to be called to help.
In my early life trust was intertwined with secrets, lies and hiding. The good news is I have come to know that truth and faith are what truly go hand in hand.
Faith empowers our ability to trust.
This applies on several levels, as we further explore our Ro-notation definition through the filter of the ultimate trust, trusting fully in God, let’s review and see that our agreed statement begins with the expression of the idea that trust involves, ‘exhibiting and practicing full faith and confidence …’.
Practicing faith. Doing it presently and actively. As we learn in Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see”.
Faith is built upon a foundation of confidence affording us ‘with reasonable expectation’, to be able to rely on those or that we are trusting ‘to operate with the sureness of truth’.
“Becoming “confident in this and living expectantly with an open heart towards the concept, as the Scriptures remind us in Hebrews 11:6 it is lovingly satisfying to the one we should be seeking trust in and with. As it is written, “… without faith it is impossible to please God,…”
When we endeavor to be “Becoming” one who pleases God, then our trust in Him is rewarded.
Some of those edifying, enriching, illuminating benefits include allowing us to live a life free from many burdens, without anxiety, depression, fear, stress, or worry.
Yesterday, our discussion involved, “Living Without Worry”.
A key element of being “Becoming” is living a righteous life.
To do so requires we cast all of our cares upon God.
Ensuring that we are the same page let’s explore some shared definitions.
Righteous living on our path to “Becoming” can literally be defined as being “right especially in a moral way”. Being righteous means doing the right thing at all times not only for yourself, but also for others.
Other key elements of being a righteous individual are:
“You, however, must teach what is appropriate to sound doctrine.
Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, and sound in faith, in love and in endurance.
Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good.
Then they can urge the younger women to love their husbands and children,
to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.
Similarly, encourage the young men to be self-controlled.
In everything, set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching show integrity, seriousness
and soundness of speech that cannot be condemned, so that those who oppose you may be ashamed because they have nothing bad to say about us.”
TITUS 2:1-8 (NIV)
Moving forward then let’s establish that to “cast” literally means to “throw.” When you throw something to someone, you are releasing it, trusting they’ll catch it and handle it appropriately. So whether it’s tossing the car keys or passing a basketball, it’s the same analogy as releasing your cares to God. You are putting the responsibilities for them in His court.
So what exactly are your cares? They are different for each and every one of us, but can generally be understood as our personal fears, worries, doubts, anxieties, or troubles.
By handing them off to the Lord we are demonstrating trust in God that He is able and willing to deal with our concerns.
Inasmuch as Scripture Instructs us to cast our cares, and Jesus himself told people not to worry. Not to show obedience in this matter, would be the opposite of righteous living. It shows not only a lack of obedience but can be described as being dishonorable to God.
Why? Because if we do not release the anxieties for Him to handle and try to battle them alone, we are trying to do His job. Attempting to take His burdens upon our shoulders will crush us. However if we follow the advice of the Apostle Peter that weight can be immediately lifted.
Peter’s advice is to cast all our cares upon God.
None of us need to weigh ourselves down with emotional baggage. We don’t have to carry the burden of our worries. Nor must we submit to the bondage of fear, self doubt or loathing.
God is willing to release us from all of it. By taking all of our anxiety and concerns upon Himself.
By now you’re saying something similar to ( if not exactly as) ‘easier said, than done’. True but “Becoming” as we have well established by now involves work. Sometimes arduous labor. Making deep commitments and then elevating that dedication to the level of covenants.
Understanding that as well as coming together with common expressions of the involved concepts , now go ahead and ask me, “what’s next?”.
Oh good question. Glad you asked. For there are some steps to adopting this practice and making it a positive habitual routine of our daily living.
That’s the week that was here at “Becoming Today”. As we began today’s conversation I promised a musical interlude. So here it is.
Jackie DeShannon singing Burt Bacharach’s, “What the World Needs Now Is Love”. A song fitting for any season for whatever reason:
Thanks for joining us and we hope come Monday you’ll choose to join us again, for our next edition of “Becoming Today”.
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Becoming Today with Rochelle Jeanette 