This is a reading from my book, Chopping Wood & Carrying Water: One day at a time
“Garbage
in, garbage out!” - Unknown
I love to ride my motorcycle. I pack up and get out of town
as often as I can. I love the wind in my face, the bugs in my teeth, and the
smells, sights, and sounds you can only experience on two wheels. Part of being
on the road is eating out excessively. A greasy sausage biscuit for breakfast,
untold numbers of energy drinks and protein bars, hamburgers and French fries
for lunch, and maybe a pizza for dinner. Granted, I could eat a much healthier
diet on the road if I chose to, but part of the fun of being on the road is
hitting all the little restaurants along the way.
After a few days of eating a fast-food diet, I tend to feel
bloated, lethargic, and generally unhealthy. I get heartburn, I am tired and I
feel weak. I am feeling bad physically because of the food I have been putting
into my body – eat like crap, feel like crap. That is about as simple as it
gets. Once I am home from a trip, I immediately get back to my normal diet. I
eat fairly healthy – lots of chicken, beef, vegetables, and good carbohydrates.
I like to lift weights, and as my good friend always reminds me, “muscle
is made in the kitchen, not the gym!” How true. After a few days of
eating right, my body begins to feel normal again. My energy levels come back,
I am able to concentrate more, and I even sleep better. I start to feel better mentally just because I’m eating better.
Eat well, feel well. Again, a
simple concept.
Take out your thought log from yesterday and place it in
front of you. Imagine that your thoughts are food. Take a careful look at your thought diet – what did you feed
yourself yesterday? Did you have resentment for breakfast, worry for lunch, and
self-condemnation for dinner? What did you snack on between meals? Guilt?
Shame? Remorse? Take a very careful look at what your thought diet consisted of
these last 24 hours. If you are wondering why you have been feeling defeated,
depressed, worried, and hopeless, just take a look at what you’ve been feeding
your brain! Garbage in, garbage out.
What we habitually think about eventually manifests in our lives.
Referring to your thought log, take a highlighter and mark
every self-defeating, negative, or worrisome thought from yesterday. Now create
an alternate thought to replace the negative thought. For example: if you have
highlighted “I am stuck in a dead end job” or “I never have enough money” or “I
am never going to find that special someone to spend my life with”, I want you
to completely change the theme of your
thinking, and this is how: for every negative thought, think of
something that is true and applies to your situation. If you
have highlighted “I am never going to find that special someone to spend my
life with”, it is no use to think “I am going to find that special someone today”
if you are not prepared to take certain steps. You might consider thinking
“Today is the day that I am going to talk to that certain someone at the
office, at the coffee shop, or in line at the grocery store…I am going to start
with saying hello, and take it from there…” If you highlighted “I am working a
dead end job”, you might replace that thought with “Today I will apply to a job
that will be more fulfilling, or research college courses to further my job
opportunities.” These types of thoughts take you from being a victim to taking control over the areas of your life
which you can.
The crux of these exercises is that you must be willing to take action on these thoughts.
On a 3x5 index card, write down the thoughts you want to think today (yes, you can choose what you think about - even
if you are still having doubts, do it anyway.) Keep the card somewhere you can
reference it throughout the day (I keep mine in my wallet.) Refer to this index
card a minimum of 10, 20, 30 or 40 times a day and remember – what you feed your brain you will begin to
experience in your reality. This may not happen overnight, but nothing
worth doing ever does. Keep this practice up for the rest of the day, and I can
guarantee you will begin to see life like you have never seen it before. After
a week of changing the thought-food you feed your mentality, you will feel even better, and after a few weeks,
this manner of thinking will become a habit. You will begin to know a new
freedom, your reality will change, and you will begin to know a way of life
that you once thought impossible. Keep chopping wood and carrying water. Do the
work of changing your thoughts. Just for today.
The idea of a mental diet is certainly not new. For the vast majority of my own life I often chased happiness with no real success. It was a slippery, elusive feeling that I just could not seem to wrap my head around. It was not until I read the following passage from Emmet Fox's book The Sermon on the Mount that happiness seemed within my reach. What I had been missing all my life was the realization that happiness is an INSIDE JOB and cannot be found from anything outside myself. IT IS ABSOLUTELY TRUE that what we think manifests itself in our reality. Remember: GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT. Never forget this. Enough rambling, and on to the message from Mr. Fox:
The outer world, far from being the prison of circumstances that it is commonly supposed to be, has actually no character whatsoever of its own, either good or bad. It has only the character that we give to it by our own thinking. It is naturally plastic to our thought, and this is so, whether we know it or not, and whether we wish it or not. All day long the thoughts that occupy your mind, your Secret Place, as Jesus calls it, are molding your destiny for good or evil; in fact, the truth is that the whole of our life's experience is but the outer expression of inner thought...
I have learned that I can be happy anywhere and at any time I choose. It is a choice - and one I must make daily. I encourage you to do the same. Life may not be perfect and it may not make sense...but you CAN be happy if you focus on WHAT IS GOOD, WHAT IS WORKING, and keep your mind focused ON THE PRESENT.
Happy trails to my brother as he begins a new chapter of his life. Remember: Things are going just as God has intended them to go. Hold on, say your prayers and just do your best.
Here is a link to the book:
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