Several years ago my elementary-aged son was having a difficult time with his perspective one weekday afternoon.  He felt frustrated, sad, irritated, and lethargic all at once.  It was February.  A new month in a still-very-new year.  I don’t generally make resolutions at New Years, but this time I did resolve within myself that I was going to try and be more of an optimist.  Years of challenges had honed a hard edge of cynicism on me, and I wasn’t pleased about it.

And so when my son was experiencing this wobbly-ness of mood, I passed along a truth I had only recently grasped, myself, which is this: How you feel depends largely on two things; what you choose to think, and what you choose to do.  If someone says or does something that bothers me, regardless of my immediate “gut” reaction (which is reflexive and not easily controlled) I can still make an immediate decision about how I’m going to feel about it thereafter.

If my feelings are hurt, I can choose to believe the offender is having a bad day, and not make it personal.  I can think “what is his problem?”; not receiving the insult into myself at all, or I can discern if there is actually some truth in what that  person has said, and if I have truly contributed to the bad attitude of the other person, I can apologize, or diffuse it altogether by just admitting they were right.  Like Dr. Laura Slessinger says, “do you want to be right or would you rather be happy?”

If I feel lethargic, I can choose to go out into the sunshine, or to take a walk, or do some stretching.  If I feel alone, I can go where people are, and strike up a conversation, or write a letter or e-mail.

I have to intentionally go after what I am missing.  If someone has disrespected me, I don’t get my deserved respect by disrespecting them back.  I can be the bigger person and overcome evil with goodness or kindness, or grace, or forgiveness, or at the very least with humor.

I am a word person and a visual person.  So I used an illustration to drive home the point to my son.  Taking a large bowl, a small medicine cup, and a  16 oz. cup of clean water, I set the little medicine cup inside of the large bowl and added 3 drops of blue food coloring to the medicine cup.  It was very dark and concentrated.  I asked my son “do you see the blue?” That is the “yuck” in life; sadness, pain, tragedy, sin, unfairness.  Now this clean water represents the good things; God, church, sunshine, a good laugh, fun, friends, doing something nice for someone, reading your Bible, praying, hugs.”

I poured a half-teaspoon of water into the medicine cup, diluting the dark dye and making it lighter.  I asked my son; “What has happened to the blue dye?”  He said; “It is lighter”.   “That’s right”, I said, and began to pour more water into the tiny cup until the blue “yuck” overflowed and pretty soon all of the “yuck” was on the outside and all that remained inside the little cup was clean water.  It was a clean cup of water,  now sitting inside an ocean of blue “yuck” in the bigger bowl.  I asked him “where is all the yuck now?”  And he said; “Outside!”

This world is full of yuck.  It is a sinful and fallen world.  But you get to choose what you “let in”.  The only way to keep the bad stuff from saturating your heart, mind and spirit, is to always be putting “clean water” in your cup.

Nature abhors a vacuum.  The yuck will get in if you don’t take pro-active steps to prevent it.

Do not mistake my illustration as a spiritual one.  All humans are sinners and only the blood of Jesus cleans you up from that.  What I am speaking of here is a mindset.  It’s about moods and attitudes and even aptitudes.  If you say “I can’t”, you are probably right!  And if you say “I can” you are also probably correct because whichever one you tell yourself will be the one you believe.  Everybody likes a sense of control.  Know what you can control.  Leave alone what you can’t change (what’s outside of you).  Work on what you do have power over.

That tiny cup represents your own heart, mind, and life!