Look Beyond

The Common Thread

I think I have a form of A.D.D.  For me, all of my writing flows out of a mind that is constantly working.  I tend to live more in the realm of my thoughts than in the realm of the world going on around me.  Yes, I'm aware that this is probably not a positive thing.  It makes interaction with the world around me - particularly relationships - somewhat challenging.  I often find it difficult to concentrate on the task or project or relationship at hand if it is not somehow connected to what is going on in my mind.    That's been the case with blogging.  Let me explain.

There are three arenas of thought that I find occupying my mind most of the time.  The first arena has to do with the liberty of the human heart and mind.  That's why I began this blog.  I believe that optimum life is found in breaking free from the bondage of a painful past, perceived limitations and shortcomings, and learning to look beyond what we see in ourselves and our circumstances to become all that we are meant to become.  And what we are meant to become is a force of unimaginable good in the world around us.  This is life.

The second arena of thought that I find myself consumed with from time to time is the liberty of the human spirit from the control of religion.  I am a follower of Jesus Christ.  And I believe that he alone atoned for humanity's evil and made a way for us to experience the optimum life I mentioned above.   I have been a pastor.  And I have come to believe that the greatest bondage of the human spirit can be found in the religions that we create for ourselves.  There is a story in the Bible about the nation of Israel in the earliest days of her existence.  God desired for them to exist as a people free from human control.  But they began to look at the nations around them, noticing that all of them had a human government with a king, and they said to God, "We want to be like the nations around us.  Give us a king."  God granted their desire.  And they came under the rule of a long succession of human disasters (with a few good ones here and there) that eventually led to their destruction.

I believe that followers of Jesus Christ have done the same thing.  We are meant to live as a community of redeemed people with Jesus as our head.  Yet we have, and continue to, create religious governments to manage, control, and feed us.

Well, there's a third arena of thought.  That is the liberty of the American people.  I am one who believes that at one time the United States of America was the greatest nation on the face of the earth.  We were great not because of our wealth, not because of our military might, but because of our freedom.  I believe that our founding fathers and our constitution were divinely inspired for the purpose of creating a people on earth who would demonstrate the beauty of God-given freedom to the rest of the world.  However, I am also one who believes that our country is in a death spiral.  Our constitution is no longer revered.  Our founding fathers have been forgotten.  Our government is no longer a government "of the people, by the people, and for the people."  And our "Republic" is being supplanted by an accelerating movement toward socialism.

These are the mega-themes of my mind.  I am seldom fully engaged in more than one at the same time.  So when I have a blog that focuses on just one of those themes, it falls silent as I enter into seasons of thought in one of the other arenas.  I do see that there is one common thread running through my main areas of interest, and that is the thread of liberty.  So, instead of managing one blog with one focus, I am creating a "network" if you will of three separate, yet interconnected, blogs with each one devoted to one of these three mega-themes.  There will be a "feed box" on each blog scrolling the latest posts on the other two.  This way, if one of the blogs falls quiet for several days, you will be able to see what I am writing on the others.

The blog focusing on the liberty of the American people and the necessity of our activism for the preservation of liberty will be called www.keepusfree.net.  Don't go there yet, it's not live at the time of this writing.  And the blog focusing on the liberty of the human spirit will be called www.churchdetox.net.  Likewise, this link is not yet active, but will be soon.

To those of you who have become part of this blog community here at "A Look Beyond," I hope you'll stick with me and become a regular at the other blogs as well.  I'll let you know as soon as they go live.

Yes, I Survived

I know you're probably thinking that I must not have survived my 40th birthday as I haven't posted since.  Well, it was touch and go for a while, but yes, I did survive.  I had to go into hiding for a while to come to terms with my masculinity after our (so called) friends got me a gift inside a bag that looked like a purse with a little Paris Hilton dog sticking it's head out.  What was inside the purse made up for it though...two packages of Starbucks coffee.  I've spent a great deal of time sitting alone, rocking back and forth, and holding the bags of coffee to my chest.  Eventually I recovered.

Maryann, thanks for your heartfelt concern!  :-)

Actually, it's just been really busy.  I'm wrapping up the final couple of weeks of school.  Lot's of stuff going on at work.  And now we're getting ready to head out of town for the weekend.

Hope you all have a great holiday weekend.  I'll get back into a regular blogging rythmn next week.

Be well and do good!

Library Purge - Part 1

I've spent much of the day beginning an extensive purge of my library and placing the books for sale through my Amazon.com sellers storefront.  Dealing with all of these books every time we move is a heinous ordeal, so we're lightening the load.

Today's purge is the first round of books about church planting, pastoring, and church growth.  Most are in "like new" condition (I take good care of my books).  If you have any interest in some of the top titles in this genre from the past ten years or so, stop by my storefront and check out the inventory.  I'll be adding much more in the days and weeks to come from both my pastoral library and personal library.

Enjoy!

One Cookie, Three Fortunes

Before anything else, let me make it perfectly clear that I place no stock whatsoever in the ability of fortune cookies to predict my future.  But today I did get one fortune cookie at lunch and inside that cookie were three separate fortunes, each of which would be a very welcome reality in my life.

"Your choices at the moment will be good ones.  Trust yourself."

"You will receive unexpected support over the next week.  Accept it graciously."

"Others take notice of your radiance.  Share your happiness."

So there ya go.  I'll let you know if any of them happens this week.  And then I'll let you know which Chinese restaurant I go to.

Have a good weekend everyone.  Be well and do good.

The Journey Begins

I shared with you in a previous post that I was going to launch into my dream of writing a book and invite you into the process with a special section here called, "Book Progress."  Be watching for that navigation button to appear in the coming days.

While Lynn and I were enjoying a long weekend together in Orlando last month, an outline for a non-fiction book came together in my mind in a remarkably clear way.  This was the book that I was going to invite you into through the blog.  However, late last week I experienced something new, and kind of amazing.  A fiction story dropped into my mind and the outline, chapters, storyline, characters, and dialog have been flooding into me so quickly that I can hardly keep up.  I sense a real urgency to get this written.  The urgency is so strong that I've decided to take the summer off from school and the summer off from leading a small group so that I can devote as much of my time as possible to writing this novel.

So, watch for the "Book Progress" button and follow along with me as this story gets from my mind onto paper.  I'll present you with the chapter titles and the progress status of each chapter.  As I work on each chapter I'll share excerpts from that chapter with you.

I'm looking forward to sharing this journey with you.

Two Weeks Old - Next Steps

Beyond What You See is two weeks old today.  I've been blogging for about three years now and so far, this blog seems to be gaining traction with visitors, subscribers, and commentors better than any of my previous projects.  Thanks to all of you who have taken an interest in this new work.

I want to tell you about some enhancements that will be coming soon, perhaps this weekend if I can get all of my homework and yard work done.

Topics!  So far none of my posts have been categorized.  One of the first enhancements I'll be making is categorizing all existing posts into two main topics:  "Being Well" and "Doing Good."  "Being Well" will contain posts that deal with all of the different facets of human wellness.  "Doing Good" will contain posts focused on what I believe to be the sole meaning of life, serving humanity.  There will be two other topics, though these will receive fewer posts.  One will be "Spirituality," because I believe that our capacity to do well emerges out of wellness with all of the different facets of human wellness emerging out of a core of spiritual wellness.  The fourth topic will be "Personal Updates."  I know that I enjoy getting to know the people behind the blogs that I read, so I will share some of my life with you through posts in this category.  You can look for all of these topic buttons to appear in the left sidebar immediately under the "Connections" buttons.

Navigation Buttons!  I will be adding buttons for two new items under the "Navigation" heading in the left sidebar.  One will be called, "Transformation Projects."  Transformation Projects will be fun exercises for us to all experiment with together as a way of killing bad habits, forming new good habits, enjoying new life experiences and improving our relational capacity.  My hope is that when a new "Transformation Project" is announced, many of you will join me in it and share your experiences with the project through comments.  The second button will be to a page called, "Book Progress."  Yes, I'm going to finally begin working on my first book.  And I want you to hold me accountable.  On that page I'll report to you my progress from developing the outline, writing the introduction, writing the chapters, etc.  Each time I finish a chapter I'll post an excerpt from that chapter.

Entrecard Contest!  This will be for those of you who participate in the Entrecard program.  I've just launched a weekly contest that will award 100 ec's each Saturday to the blog that generates the most referral traffic to Beyond What You See.  If you are an Entrecard user and are interested, you can check out the details here.

That's it for now.  Thanks again to all of you who have taken the time to stop by, read posts, subscribe, and leave behind comments.  Have a great weekend.  Be well and do good!