Your Perspective Determines Your Ability – Biblical Natural Health Coaching

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Your soul, the part of you that thinks, feels, and processes, needs care just as much as your body does. I recently shared a long article on the subject of prayer, because who we pray to, why we pray, and even how we pray, is integral to our spiritual health. Earlier, I shared a mental health article on dealing with depression and it’s effects on the body versus effects from man-made medicine. I shared a number of Scriptures in that article showing how our mental and emotional reactions to life can impact our physical health. Today we’re talking about how you think about obstacles in the path of life. The bumps and potholes we encounter as we try to accomplish things.

For some out there, you’ve run into so many and been told they’re hopeless to overcome so many times, that now it’s a struggle to get past them to move forward. The mental tape that plays each time you encounter obstacles has become a barrier in itself and limited your ability to function. There’s a very big weakness however, in the logic your mental tape has been presenting, a weakness you can exploit to your advantage!

It’s all in your perspective, how you look at the task you want/need to do versus the obstacle you want/need to get around. Different personality types will see this differently depending on the perspective they tend to have, or the outlook they generally cultivate for themselves.

A utopian, daisy-path, or pie-in-the-sky outlook will eventually get disillusioned as “the right path” continually runs up against bumps and potholes that weren’t supposed to be there.

A pessimistic outlook will run into those bumps and potholes in “the right path” and decide it’s not for them, too many obstacles to deal with.

A realistic outlook can trend toward either of the above, recognizing that there will be obstacles and that “the right path” may take work to accomplish. The realist might need reminding every now and then that they’ve got this, they just need to remember their goals and get creative to deal with the obstacles in their path.

Many times, obstacles and rough patches in life, are an opportunity to discover just how creative you can be! Just how far outside the box can you go to discover a new way to do something?

Sometimes that means improvising, such as repurposing one tool for a completely unrelated purpose (ie: a butter knife when you don’t have a flathead screwdriver nearby). Sometimes it means looking at life detours as opportunities to learn new things, concepts, methods, gain new experiences, etc. Getting lost enroute to an appt becomes an opportunity to discover a new area of town you’d never been in before, and perhaps discover a new park, service, business, or resource you might never have considered. Imagine going to a flea market and connecting with a farmer??!! That happened to me in the past month! (the flea market wasn’t an obstacle, just an example of how you can discover things where you least expect them)

If you start looking at obstacles as opportunities rather than setbacks, you open up a whole new realm of learning and discovery! This is possible no matter what kind of personality you have. Life does throw setbacks in our way, but we can use them to our benefit.

Sometimes it takes some introspection and stock-taking to figure out how to make a given setback work for us, ranging from:

Just waiting it out to
Leveraging learning opportunities to
Being launched headlong into a variant of our goal we hadn’t anticipated being a thing before, or even
Discovering that what we’d thought was a setback, turned out to be the very thing that got us where we thought we were going in the first place, just using a route we didn’t foresee.

So the next time you find yourself saying to others or yourself: “I can’t because. . . “, take a closer look at the other end of that sentence, and does it really hinder you, or does it cause you to rethink your approach to it so that the goal on the other side of the statement can be realized?

If your issue is a case of self-perception, my daughter is fond of this quote from Oscar the Grouch of Sesame Street:
NOTE: I do not support the current Sesame Street efforts at pushing propaganda on our children!

If you remember that often enough, eventually you’ll stop seeing yourself as less-than and no longer think of yourself from a damaging self-perception.

If you really struggle with this, take a moment to look back over your life, and list off all the times you overcame things others said you couldn’t or wouldn’t. Then go out and buy a stainless steel garbage can and fill it with dirt and plant your all-time favourite flower in it as a visual reminder that you have done and can do more than you’ve talked yourself into believing you can!

As various people have said over the years, if you believe you can, or you believe you can’t, you are correct. Your chosen belief will dictate what you can and can’t do, and what you will or won’t do. Choosing “can do” over “can’t do” may take time to achieve, but it is achievable. Start changing the mental tape that plays every time you encounter an obstacle.

In my web app that you can install on your device, and under my coaching link in the menu bar of my main website, there is now a Wholistic Check-in form you can start using as a type of journal for yourself. Only you and I will see what you send through that form! Use it to record how you’re doing in this area of whole-person health. There is no cost to use this form, but if at any time you’d like to work with me, you are free to fill out my client intake form and request a free session to discuss your health goals and how I can help you achieve them.

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