Robert Schuller

>Feb 08 ""A Prayer For Change" >March 07 "MORE SKILLS. FEWER PILLS." >Feb 06 "A Simple Formula" >June 08 "Dont Blame God"

Editor's Note: We are starting a series of excerpts from the book
Hours of Power, written by Dr. Robert H. Schuller.

What We Need Today: A Prayer For Change

O God, when a life has been so richly blessed as mine has been, it is not right for me not to be laughing! I confess that I am responsible for my moods. I have no right to selfishly indulge in negative feelings of self-pity.

It's time for me to change my mental dial, Lord. You are helping me. This will be the moment when the sun breaks through the parted clouds, and the springtime returns after winter.

Thank you, Lord! The dreary, depressing, disconsolate mood disappears like the morning mist in the glowing sunshine of your love.

And joy moves in!

And hope begins to build up within me!

And a beautiful feeling of love starts to surround me!

Thank you, God, for the great things you are doing within me now in this moment of prayer. Amen.

Practice Purity of Heart

If there is a negative emotion within you that is blocking you in your relationship with God, clean up! "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Here are some exercises to help you:
1. Think of some hidden hurt in your past and pray a forgiving prayer for the person who was the cause of your hurt. C. S. Lewis said it: "We all agree that forgiveness is a beautiful idea until we have to practice it!"
2. Think of someone of whom you are jealous, and pray for that person's continued prosperity.
3. Think of someone you've hurt, cheated, insulted, slighted, snubbed, or criticized. Call him or her. Invite this person to have dinner or lunch with you. Confess to him or her your un-Christian attitude, and ask for forgiveness.
4. Think of some neglected cause, project, or person. Surprise yourself with a streak of generosity! Really give a lot-of yourself and of your substance.
5. Pray a totally honest prayer to Christ. You doubt God? Tell Him so. He'll still love you, even if you don't believe in Him! (God specializes in loving sinners!)

Reprinted with permission from the Crystal Cathedral Ministries, located in Garden Grove, California. The church service from the Crystal Cathedral, called The Hour Of Power, is the longest running television ministry in history. and is seen all around the world.

The Hour of Power every Sunday at 8am Eastern/Pacific or on Saturday evenings on TBN at 9pm Eastern.

The advertisements are everywhere! There is tremendous effort being put into the desirability of recognizing that depression can be biologically based and helped with anti-depressant pills. And, indeed it can! But there is almost no attention being given to the face that most, (though not all). Depression is caused by not establishing a sense of safety, honest communication, and closeness with the child in the first years of life. Long before the child is verbal, most children are punished and/or shamed in some manner if they are not obedient.

When we teach obedience to a child we are teaching dishonesty. We are teaching children to keep their honest feelings to themselves, and to pretend that they are happy when they are obedient. Their true feelings have to be denied, so they come out indirectly, as rebellious behavior or in some delayed fashion. Their honest feelings may be expressed in an actively or passively aggressive manner toward a sibling or scapegoated onto some other totally, unrelated and innocent victim (Such as those who are injured or killed by rebellious teenager’s who are acting out pent up hostility at not being allowed to express themselves with honesty.

But children must learn to obey; you can’t have permissiveness. Can you? No, and there is a great deal of permissiveness these days because both parents are working and it is hard to supervise TV, e-mail; and the Internet under the best of conditions.

So what’s a parent to do? Attempt to somehow punish and control more effectively? Ignore the problem, or possibly lecture the children more often, and hope and pray for the best? Actually, the Harvard Medical School Mental Health Letter of April 2006 reported on 60 sophisticated research studies, which indicated such attempts won’t make much difference, using reasoning instead of spanking, for example, as the way to get children to “obey”(their word). These were studies done at Yale, Harvard, University of Michigan, etc. All the studies indicated only mild improvement was made through such training of parents.

May I be so bold as to suggest that the problem is that they are training for more “obedience,” rather than training the children to participate in win-win conflict resolution efforts. As soon as they are verbal, children can be asked to help find a solution, which makes both sides satisfied. Before they are verbal, you hear their feelings, rather than punish for their feelings. I had a couple referred to me for Parent Effectiveness Training, who had beaten their child badly enough that they took him to the hospital. They asked, how else could we teach him not to cry so much? Sadly they hadn’t realized that the very beating they were given the child was the reason he was crying. To a lesser degree we see this all the time - you don’t want to encourage a child to get his “own way” by crying. However, a contented, satisfied baby doesn’t need to continue to cry.

Anyhow, it isn’t “either-or.” Either the parents get his/her way or the child does. To give a simple, but real example from my practice, a mother who had attended one session of my Parent Effectiveness Training course, called me the morning after that first session, and asked if she could bring in her daughter since she was having “such a hard time with her.” I had some free time that afternoon, so the mother and daughter came in together. As they entered the room, the mother said, “I feel so upset, I feel I could commit suicide.” And I answered, “Something must really be hurting you!” She answered that her daughter had been screaming at her all morning that she hated her and she tried so hard “to be a good mother.”

I turned to the daughter and said, “If you’re hating your Mother so much, there must have been some thing she did that made you mad at her,” The daughter answered, “Yes, she wouldn’t let me drink a cup of tea while I was studying.” I asked the mother if there was some reason she felt the daughter shouldn’t have a cup of tea? The mother answered that the caffeine in it wasn’t good for her and she should obey her, and do as she was told. She couldn’t “just get her own way.” I suggested that we look at the problem from a win-win perspective? Was there some way she could have a cup of tea without having caffeine? They both began to giggle. The Mother said I could get her some decaffeinated tea and the daughter agreed. They both had their own way, and nobody felt suicidal or that she hated the other because of the requirement to be obedient!

That was a simple problem, and problems can be very complex - but more often than not when we approach the problems in a win-win spirit and respect the child’s feelings as well as the adults. Problems are more easily solved than we expect. When a child feels heard and respected, they hear and respect you in return and learn to problem-solve and consider the other and think for themselves that helps them for their rest of their lives. They don’t fear coming to you for advice because they know you will not shame or punish them for disagreeing with you.

You will be able to communicate with each child’s needs because you talk with that particular child - and each child is different. So they don’t grow up with depression or social anxiety. Some people do have a biological component to their problems, but good communication skills will help with these problems, also.

Parent Effectiveness Training (now called Family Effectiveness Training) was developed in l972, and it is now taught all over the world. I have made it a focus of my work for 40 years - it essentially teaches communication and conflict resolution skills, which apply to all situations.

Editor's Note: We are starting a series of excerpts from the book
Hours of Power, written by Dr. Robert H. Schuller.
A Simple Formula

The mathematics of high achievement can be stated by a simple formula. Begin with a dream. Divide the problems and conquer them one by one. Multiply the exciting possibilities in your mind. Subtract all negative thoughts to get started. Add enthusiasm. Your answer will be the attainment of your goal.

Select A Goal

If you aim at nothing, you'll hit nothing. If your goals are vague, your achievements will be vague. But if your decisions are specific, you will harvest specific results. . . .
Then select the right goal. Have you heard of the company that developed a new dog food? All the necessary nutrients-protein, minerals, fats, and carbohydrates-were included in the product. The company came out with a brand-new package and a national advertising program which included full-page ads and ingenious commercials. Everything was planned and designed to be a success.
After six months' sales, which had started slowly, dwindled to nothing. The chairman of the board called all the district sales managers together in a major meeting in Chicago.
"What's wrong?" he asked. "Look at the beautiful full-page ads we have in national magazines. Look at the expensive commercials on television."
He held up a box of the dog food and pointed to the back of the box. He read the contents and admired the beautiful packaging. "The cost is even lower than our competitors," he added. "Now tell me why you people aren't selling this dog food?"
You could hear a pin drop. Then someone at the back of the room slowly came to his feet and said, "Sir, the dogs don't like it."
The secret of success cannot be found by sitting in an expensive leather chair in a plush office and dreaming your The secret of success is to select a goal by finding a need and filling it. Find a hurt and heal it. Find a problem and help solve it.

Stay Focused

What is your goal? Is it God's goal for you? Does it draw you like a magnet? Does it have meaning? Will it help others who are hurting?
If the answer to all of the above questions is yes, then be prepared to say no to propositions that will distract you from your goal. Saying yes always involves saying no. If you want to get in better physical shape, you may have to say no to overeating. If you want to save your marriage, you may have to say no to many distractions. Remember your goal and focus on it at all times.
Keeping your focus on your goal is easier when you have someone to help you. You may get tired. You will want to quit. Set aside quiet time, reflective time, refreshment time-not just for your body but for your soul. Get linked up with a positive church. That's the best place to find supportive people as well as a time and place to get in touch with your biggest support system-the God who made you and loves you.
God must be a part of your goal, the bedrock on which to build your dream and to follow your goal to fruition.

Remember this: in setting your goals, bloom where you are planted. Your mental attitude toward the spot you're in at any moment is all-important. If you think it's impossible, then your biggest problem is you! If you "think possibilities," you'll realize that every difficulty is a call to some personal triumph.
When you have invented a solution to a difficult problem or adjusted to a trying situation, you will know the happy feeling that comes when you experience personal triumph.
Once, while I was driving through the desert, the tire on my car went flat. I jacked up the rear end of the car and just managed to get the tire off when the jack broke and the car fell on its axle. I was stranded. No way now to raise the car.
"Wait a minute! Let's dig a hole," my wife suggested. So we did. Fortunately, I was off the pavement and on the shoulder. Indeed it was about as hard as cement. But with the tire wrench I chipped away! Stone by stone, pebble by pebble, I labored on until I had dug a hole deep enough to take the flat tire off and drop the spare tire into-and onto the waiting bolts!
Written with permission from the Crystal Cathedral Ministries, located in Garden Grove, California. The church service from the Crystal Cathedral, called The Hour Of Power, is the longest running television ministry in history, and is seen all around the world and on the Armed Services Network. Dr. Robert Schuller can be seen on The Lifetime Cable Network for they are now showing The Hour of Power every Sunday at 8am Eastern/Pacific or on Saturday evenings on TBN at 9pm Eastern.