The Crash

Sometimes I think God just like to mess with me, I think he get great pleasure out of seeing me get upset or thrown off task. Take this morning for example, I posted my first blog with no problem, I stat in on this blog with a solid idea of what I want to write, and BAM! My laptop decides its a great time to reboot with an issue.. So now as I write this I am running every security check, registry cleaner and spy program I have, to make sure it don’t happen anytime too soon, and to make sure all my data is safe.

Now I know God didn’t do this, but sometimes I wonder, maybe He didn’t like the topic I was going to blog about or maybe He just likes to see me get frustrated…. No matter, I can’t remember what the topic was, so it must not have been that great of an idea and I was able to get to some real work (my 9 to 5 job stuff).

But now I sit here with no real idea of what I want to blog about, no words of wisdom to give…

Funny how things work out, I had a “great” idea, or so I thought, all pick out for today, one little distraction and BAM, it’s gone… Life can be that way, we are moving along, and BAM, everything changes, we get distracted by the death of a loved one the loss of a job or a child is ill, and life seems to change, be it good or bad it changes.

What matters is how we deal with the BAM’s in our life, take my computer crashing this morning, I had a few options I could have taken, 1) Get mad 2) Fix it 3) Do nothing, or any combination of the 3, I chose to fix it, I didn’t get mad, I didn’t do nothing, I stopped what I was doing and resolved the issue, well in truth I had to my laptop went down.

When death or illness hits we have the same basic options, get mad, deal with it (fix it) or do nothing. Once again we can combine them anyway we like.  But what we choose to do will change the rest of our life… So choose wisely…

Paul

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Reading list…

I just finished “Gross National Happiness” a book by Arthur C Brooks who also wrote “Who Really Cares” (also a great book to read). But back to the new book, Gross Domestic Happiness, this book looks at the national happiness of our country, what makes us happy and what doesn’t. It is a fascinating look at America and Americans, how we think and see event that help shape us.

Mr. Brooks uses research data, not his opinion to form his conclusions on who and what makes America happy. He delves in to politics and religion takes a look at race and economic situations and delivers the facts as they fall, not as he wishes them to be.

His argument is that the happier America is the better off we all are. A simple argument, but one that is all to often left  out of the policy making or the discussion of America and her future. Arthur lays down the facts, backs them up with the research and draws logical conclusions from them, often they are conclusions that he was not striving for, but the facts lead him to them. He is an author who is willing to place his own needs aside and allow the fact to lead him, and not his own predetermined outcome.

Arthur followed the same pattern in his first book, “Who Really Cares” allowing the facts to lead him, in truth we all can learn from him, we all should allow the facts to lead us, and not try to skew them to fit in to our own predetermined outlook.

All of us do it, in our faith life, our work life and dour political views. We vote Democrat or Republican not because we agree with the candidate, but because of the party they are with, we change faiths to find one that better fits us rather than us changing to fit the faith we live in a society that allows us to justify the means to achieves the ends.

In his books Arthur refused to allow his own political and religious views interfere with the facts, using raw data to formulate the outcomes he allowed the data to speak for itself.

The Happiness of America and each of us individually is extremely important to our economy, communities and national security. It plays a roll in diplomacy and helps elevate national tensions. This book, well in truth both books, should be required reading by all Americans, they both are books that will help focus our national and personal affairs on what is truly important.

For more information visit his website at http://www.arthurbrooks.net/index.html

 

Paul

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