I have had a lot of unexpected anger lately. I've decided that I'm a Bridge Troll.
What I mean by is that I'm very good at building a case rather than building a bridge, and if there is already a bridge in place I often guard it with debate and argument.
I can justify this behavior by saying it's because I'm an analytical thinker or because I work in the legal profession and conditioned to respond that way. However, when all is said and done, this rationale is merely more case-building by me. But worse, the debates and stated positions and all the explaining of why things are justified, reasonable or perceived as they are...well, it leaves me emotionally exhausted and often quietly angry when others disagree.
So, again - because I've done this many times in the past - I am seeking ways to be more open to better communication, better listening especially. I want to improve my character and person to become someone who can not only build a bridge but also leave it open for travel.
In the past, when I have had unresolved anger, it was for one of 2 reasons: 1) I had unmet expectations and saw no way to meet them. 2) I felt totally powerless in a given situation. I suppose they are actually related.
ReplyDeleteAll I have to offer is what was once offered to me. 1) Don't nurse it, curse it, or rehearse it. Your life is no longer your own. You have been bought with a price and it is no longer you who lives but Christ who lives in you, and the life you now live is by FAITH in the One who gave himself for you, and His strength is perfected in your weakness. Jesus love you, cares for you, and is able to sustain you with his vast resources that are beyond measure. Press in.
Ephesians 3:[14-21] For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God.
ReplyDeleteNow to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen.