Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain ‘be taken up and thrown ingot the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him.-Mark 11:23

 “Lord if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.” “Come,” He said. Then Petr got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!” Immediately Jesus reached out His hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” He said, “why did you doubt?”-Matthew 14:28-31

 

Expectations

If it’s true that we get just what we expect,
And to expect is to create what we want,
Then it stands that we design our own fear as well
The terror of the ghosts that haunt.
If we choose to meet life timidly,
Peering out through a veil of distrust,
Then by pure definition, we are choosing as well
The disappointments we decry as unjust.
Be careful about expectations
Be mindful of what you create.
For, thoughts are inventive, intangible things
Bringing forth their tangible mates.
If it’s true we are part of the Creator,
Then it follows we’re creative as well.
And the mind that can believe there’s a heaven
Must certainly fear there’s a hell.
So, if it’s true that we get just what we expect,
And to expect is to create what we want,
Then it stands we design our whole lives as well,
Including joys and fears that haunt.
Be careful about expectations,
Be mindful of what you create.
For, thoughts are inventive, intangible things
Bringing forth their tangible mates.
So, if we know our thoughts are creative,
Then we know we create what is real,
So why can’t we join together
Use our thoughts to change and to heal?
If expectation can change the whole world,
Depending on what we think of,
Then we could transform the whole planet
By using our thoughts to sow love.
Let’s carefully use expectations,
And together, mindfully create,
Using our intangible thoughts of love
To bring forth their tangible mates.
©Linda Troxell 01/2002

 

Why is it that you and I can face the same obstacles and one of us just breezes through the challenge and the other struggles to even get started? Why is it that some people are so concerned about what their peers think as to be almost obsessed, making most of their decisions based on the opinions of their peers, and others don’t give a second thought to what their peers think? You would think that being humans, created by the same God, and put into bodies that are essentially the same, and having brains which operate in the same way, we would be more alike in our behavior and our way of seeing our world. But do our brains operate the same way or are they actually very different?

I think that maybe our brains start out very similar but by the time we are adults they have become very different from how they started. Between hearing certain things again and again from family and friends and being exposed to different learning environments, styles of teaching and opportunities for quality education, not to mention opportunities for enrichment, I think by the time we reach adulthood our brains differ a tremendous amount from one another.  I’m no neuroscientist so I cannot really speak to the technical aspects of the brain but I do know some basic information. I know that we build or lay down neural pathways from things that we do, read, hear or think repeatedly.

For example, in the past it was explained that boys were better in math than girls by elementary school because boys played with trucks and cars, plotting routes and estimating distances and such, and they played sports, estimating throwing angles, the speed of the ball, etc,. And so, they set down neural pathways for these things that are all mathematically based. While girl’s, on the other hand, engaged in play which tended to be more relational, perhaps creative, but nothing that created these mathematical pathways. Therefore, boys were at an advantage by the time they entered elementary school and began to learn math. Now, it seems, that the difference in boys and girls math scores are no longer so different. I wonder, could that be because girls are now playing sports at roughly the same rate as boys? I don’t know, I’m just wondering.

In the world of psychology it has long been held that by the time we reach adulthood our reality is created by our thoughts; that our personal world will be pretty much as we expect it to be. Of course they have a rational explanation for how this works. They say, we have created neural pathways for what we believe or expect from the repetitive thoughts that we have had for our whole life. With those beliefs and expectations that our world is a certain way we then pay attention to that which reinforces what we expected and ignore that which refutes it. Therefore, we see our world just as we expected to. Thank you psychology for that explanation. The only problem is that this is not an idea that psychology discovered or invented so how can they explain how it works? The Bible told us long before psychology was even a word in our language that we will get what we expect, and that which we believe. And the Bible’s explanation for that is faith, something which gives substance to things before they become visible. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain ‘be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will come to pass, it will be done for him.-Mark 11:23. Mark tells us here that Jesus taught that if we believe, or expect something will happen, it will. Peter was able to walk on water because he expected to; he believed when Jesus called him onto the lake that he would be able to walk to Him. And he could, right up until he quit expecting to because of his unbelief, his lack of expectation, his loss of faith. “Lord if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.” “Come,” He said. Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!” Immediately Jesus reached out His hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” He said, “why did you doubt?”-Matthew 14:28-31

 Well, personally, I’m more inclined to believe the Bible’s explanation of how this phenomenon works. I believe the Bible because psychology’s explanation is nothing more than a theory and a theory is really no more than an educated musing and wondering. I believe the Bible because the Bible’s explanation came before psychology ever existed. But most importantly, I believe the bible because I’ve learned to trust God before trusting man. Now, this is not a hit on the discipline of psychology, I, myself, am trained in psychology and am a Marriage and Family Therapist. I’m just saying that I trust the Bible concerning how the phenomenon works, not necessarily that it works. I know from personal experience that it works. The point I’m hoping to get across here is that we create our own reality and by extension influence the reality of the whole world. If we were all attentive to this truth, a truth well documented, both in psychology and in the Bible, we could change things. If we all worked together to discipline our thoughts we could change this world from a cold, unloving, sin-infested, dying planet to a place in which we all could live in harmony until we are called home to Paradise. I don’t know about you, but I think it’s worth a try.

I wonder if you have the heart for change or enough courage to make a commitment to work to change your thoughts about the world and the people in it. The commitment to try to change the reality of the world and the people in it? You might be asking, “Huh? What would that look like?” Well, it would be no different than working to try to change any other thought or belief. You would commit to meditating on the world as a safe, beautiful and loving place. You would commit to meditating on everyone on the planet being acceptable, loving, caring and having good intentions. You would picture, imagine and meditate on both things at least once a day for a set period of time; 5 or 10 or 30 minutes; whatever you are comfortable with. Every time you caught yourself thinking or saying something contrary to the above, you would stop yourself and change that thought to be in line with your new belief. And you would read in your Bible all the verses that tell you that as you believe so it is. It is not a difficult process but it isn’t an easy one either. Because most of the problems we have in this world begin with our thinking. And to change a thought we have held on to for an extended period of time takes patience and discipline, two things we humans are short on. But are you willing to try? I hope you are.

 

Points for Prayer and Pondering

1. Many Christians have a grave distrust of psychology or at least for therapy or counseling. How do you feel about them?

1a. What brought you to that conclusion?

1b. Have you ever had personal experience that informed your belief?

2. Have you ever had an experience where you changed your belief and it changed your experience of the world, or at least your part of the world?

3. What do you think of the concept that we create our own reality by our expectations or the way we think?

3a. Were you aware that it is both a psychological and a Biblical concept?

3b. If you were aware it was only a concept of one, the Bible or psychology, how did you feel when you discovered it was also a concept of the other?

3c. Did it affect your opinion of the concept or those that believe it when you found out?