You know the strangest thing? I'm having all this free time this weekend to blog, when I actually thought this would be my busiest weekend ever, cos my hubby is out of town. Yes he is on a guys' holiday, with two other guys from church, and I know he really needed it. So, I decided to be the selfless spouse (more because I can't stand his constant complaining that he really needs a break from work & kids, and since I don't share his sentiments, better that he go and get it out of his system).
So, I am supposed to talk about another habit, and it so happened that the next habit I read is the first one, called Being Proactive. The way I applied it to my life is kinda strange... After I read the second habit, something not-so-good happened. A particular person who has angered me tremendously in the past, has recently started to irritate me again. When this happens, I usually seethe and it would put me in a lousy mood for days on end. It is like a thorn in my flesh, and in the past, I will usually pray that this person will stop causing me grief, and after I pray, the problem would gradually go away, but then it will return again, and I would realise to my horror that God hasn't "handled" it! So it has been on-off, on-off over the years.
This time round, the same thing started happening, and it was starting to escalate. So one day, feeling a general sense of malaise, I went out on my own to grab dinner (both kids were asleep) and brought the Seven Habits book with me (yes I also read when I eat, when I don't have company - this is how I manage to read a lot despite being a working mom!). I ended up at MacDonald's (a rare event) and as I was tucking into my burger, I did something which I usually do when I run into intractable problems - I prayed and asked God to reveal the answer to my problem in what I am about to read. And the funny thing is, yet again, I actually got my answer. Two answers, in fact.
So, it happened like this. I actually wanted to move on to the third habit "First Things First", which sounds real important, but somehow, that habit didn't appeal to me and I decided to read the first habit again (though as I said, I felt I already knew it through and through), and see what new thing it can teach me.
It started by talking about how we often cannot choose the circumstances and things happening to us, but we can always choose how we respond (yes yes I knew that). And it went on and on in that vein for quite a while, and I started thinking that yes, I should probably focus on my response to the problem, and what I can do about it, rather than the person. And the book says when we do that, no matter how bleak the situation is (and the author described a pretty bleak one), focusing on what we can do, no matter how little, makes the mood inevitably more positive as we are dwelling on the opportunities the problem gave us. I must say the book is right - we are totally not used to thinking this way, as evidenced by how strange I felt to stop thinking about the other person (who is clearly the problem) and focus on me (who is the poor victim).
And as I tried to think of what I can do on my part, I suddenly recalled this wonderful trick a teacher taught me in this questionable-sounding "Asking Leading Questions" workshop (it was such a good use of my time, I learnt so much it's almost immoral), which is a way to use your right brain when solving problems. Ok, the trick is this - instead of thinking through the problem in detail, which causes us to fixate on the problem and after a while, all we can see is that problem and how big it is, we should imagine that we have woken up tomorrow morning, and the problem is miraculously solved. Then we ask ourselves the questions "How did it happen?", "What had to happen for it to happen?" and so on. And ridiculous though it seems, when our brains try to answer the questions, it somehow stops thinking logically, and starts coming up with creative, crazy solutions to the problem (haha, I know some of you are laughing), but it works! At least for me, and the problem-solving process sure is much more fun and less serious than if we were to dissect it like engineers and apply our left brain logic to it. It's sort of a free-flow of ideas, and to generate as many possible answers as possible.
So, I applied this to my situation and imagined, if I woke up tomorrow and the problem was solved, what would it look like? And I had a pretty nice picture, and then I thought - so how would it have come about? And pretty quickly, an answer came to me.
Now this is a Christian answer, and I heard it preached by someone years past (I can't remember who). But this person said that an Ethiopian pastor issued a challenge to his congregation - if we prayed continuously and fervently for 40 days for something we want, he guaranteed that we would get it. Ok, I actually don't remember the rest of that sermon (probably cos my mind was furiously working on that and closed my ears off to the rest), but it totally captured my imagination. Imagine that! Could it be real? I don't know, but I trusted it with child-like faith. So I went home and prayed for something I really wanted for 40 days straight, and for a good many days I really prayed, not those half-hearted prayers, and I may have lapsed a day or two, but generally I lasted till 40 days, and you know what? My prayer got answered. Not immediately, but within a year or two. I haven't applied this again to anything else, probably because if you try it, you will soon realise that it is pretty hard to do anything you are not in the habit of doing for 40 days straight, without lapse. I tried disciplining my son for not keeping his toys, hoping he would not turn out like me, but after a strong start, I lose steam around the 7-day mark. My mind just cannot hold on to that thought, that intensity of emotion and desire for that long. But anyway, I remembered that promise of that Ethiopian pastor and thought - well, that could be one way it came about. I pray for it for 40 days and that person somehow changes. I think I finished my burger at around that point so I carried on reading, satisfied I had at least one answer.
The last part of the chapter caught my eye - and it was a question posed by someone to Stephen Covey, that he no longer loved his wife, the emotions were gone, but they had kids, so what was he to do about it. Stephen said "love your wife". He said "But I don't love her anymore." He repeated "Love your wife" and went on to elaborate that in our culture and movies today, love is an emotion. But love is also a verb, and we often don't remember that. So he said, emphathise with her, listen to her, care for her, surprise her, do all the things he would do if he loved her, and the emotions would soon follow. I tell you, that sparked another lightbulb in me. So, I could focus on loving that person, and soon I wouldn't feel that anger any more - in fact I might start feeling love for that person! I know, it like, never occurred to me (and me being a cell leader at that), and the moment I put the word "love" and the name of that person next to each other, a positive feeling zapped through me, a big difference1from all that toxicity I was feeling a while ago. Ok, if you haven't guessed by now, this person is someone I care about (isn't it those people who can hurt us the most?) so it's not that strange to think that I should love this person. This person just turns out to be pretty unloveable some of the times.
So there you go. Two answers. Both pretty radical. And you know what? I went home and took action immediately. I got down on my knees and prayed hard about it. And the next day too, and so on. And I don't know how long I can last this time, but I really want to finish this 40-day prayer thing - so I'll update my blog on the results when the 40 days are up!
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