A Racial Autobiography

Dave DeRose Racial Autobiography

                I was born in 1986 into a caring and loving house. I am very blessed to have the family I do. My mom was a teacher then, and when I started third grade, she became a principal. She instilled in me from a young age the tenets of equity. The first books I remember reading, besides Clifford and Curious George, were Teammates and Pink and Say, one a story of Jackie Robinson’s friendship with Pee Wee Reese and the other a story of a friendship that develops during the Civil War between black and white union soldiers (if you haven’t read them, I recommend them highly). Some of my first friends were black. Across the street were Tony and Brittani.  Their mom was white and father, black.  I never remember thinking anything about it. I knew they looked different than me, but it was the way it was. It was normal.

                When I started middle school, most of my favorite celebrities didn’t look like me. I watched Martin, Family Matters, Fresh Prince of Bellaire, The Cosby Show, and loved them all. I listened to DMX, Notorious BIG, Bone Thugs & Harmony, DMX, Usher, but my favorite was TuPac.  I knew every word to every song.  I watched his videos and interviews and read his poetry. He had me mesmerized. His energy, captivating. His flow, a magnetic force. His words, undeniable truth. Thug Life, which was TuPac’s philosophy, didn’t mean criminality. It meant being a survivor.  To me at the time, it was enticing and provocative. His stories became my stories. I felt in my core the emotion of the stories in his lyrics. I emulated the culture, I wore FuBu clothes. I didn’t even think that FuBu was “black people clothes” until a white student made fun of me. To me, it was simply part of the culture I identified with. It was the first time I heard the term wigger (which is a white person who wants to be black). My friend Tony Licon and I didn’t pay too much attention to it, though. We liked what we liked and didn’t feel threatened, so we carried on.

                I was baptized in racial divides freshmen year. I walked into Eaglecrest High School after a few weeks of football and weight lifting, excited to start a new adventure. I was green as a blade of grass. When I entered the school and passed the gym, I saw mostly Hispanic students, next the library and Asian students, lastly as I entered the cafeteria, mostly black students. The thing was, I loved hip-hop music, so I wanted to hang out in the cafeteria where hip-hop was blasting from stereos. As I approached with a sheepish grin hoping to find my place in this new world, I was thrown dirty looks by the upperclassmen. Feeling outnumbered, uncomfortable, and really small, I found a different place, a gap between the library and the cafeteria by the theater. Unfortunately, I lost connection with many of my friends on the football team as they joined groups of upperclassmen. We would still sing Ludacris songs during practice, but that was it. I was more or less left with my friend Parker. He is white.

                As the year passed, I joined the  wrestling team and made more friends, I joined the tech theater crew, made more friends, all white. I moved that spring to a new neighborhood to live in a house where my grandmother could live more comfortably with us. All my neighbors looked like me. I transferred to Grandview High School, which didn’t have nearly the diversity of Eaglecrest despite being only two miles away. I started listening to rock, country, and only some hip hop and R&B. I only had white friends, besides at football practice.

                After graduating, I couldn’t wait to get out of Aurora, so I ran to Nebraska. My college was seven hours into a corn field. Being a small private school in a small town, Doane College was a culture shock. I wasn’t used to being around so many white people. Out of a school of 1,200, there were only around 20-30 students of color. They all played sports. Again, I had more in common with the black and Hispanic students than I did with the white students. The white people all came from small towns. They talked differently, more slowly, and were huge trash talkers. Where I was from, if you talk trash, you wanted to fight. I almost got in a lot of fights.

              My best friend freshman year in college was Mexican. Adam and I jammed out to mariachi music. We enjoyed speaking Spanish in front of the Nebraska boys; there was even a time when I was close to fluent, so it was funny to us to see their faces. We ate menudo at the small family-owned Mexican restaurant in town. In the spring, Adam decided college wasn’t for him and returned home to Trinidad, CO, to work for a construction company. When he left, I fell into the same pattern as I had in high school. I joined a fraternity, which historically was the most diverse in Doane history, but that is not saying much. In my time we had two members of color out of thirty, one black and one Mexican. 

                It was in a college education class, Intro to Education, where I was prompted to reflect on race for the first time. My paper explained my experience at Eaglecrest and started a disagreement with the professor. I explained how I felt rejected by the black students at my high school because of my race. I purposed that racism went both ways and, in my experience, was stronger from black to white. One of the sentences still rings in my memory; “Black students could go anywhere in the school and feel comfortable, but white students in the cafeteria were uncomfortable.” She was a black woman who had grown up in Lincoln, NE. She grew up as one of very few black people in her large high school. She rejected my position and expressed how there was only white racism. I was infuriated. I wrote her a three page paper in response explaining how this was my truth and how she cannot connect her experience growing up to mine. She gave me an A. I felt empowered.

                I felt drawn to the topic of equity because so many of the students at my college had lived their whole lives and never seen someone of another race until they came to Doane.  To Doane where there is almost no diversity.

                In order to develop deeper knowledge in this area, I applied for an undergraduate research grant. I studied the five main world religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam). I wrote and presented on moral parallels that were inter-faith and expressed fundamental differences.

                Thanks to my college being small, I had unique opportunities. My proudest was when I ran the multicultural fair my senior year. This is an event where students from all over Nebraska come and rotate through different activities revolving around equity put on by all of the education majors. I worked closely with that same professor who I had disagreed with three years earlier, and we became very close. We still email to this day.

                December 2008 I moved back to Colorado hoping to get a job in Cherry Creek. I was hired at Horizon Community Middle School in October, 2009. Horizon has about 60 percent students of color and 51 percent free and reduced lunch. I had many students who didn’t just have racial identities but national identities--students from Ethiopia, Sudan, Gambia, Iraq, Vietnam, Russia, Egypt to name a few. There were language barriers, cultural barriers, and high expectations. I learned about how second generation Mexicans will ostracize new immigrants. It was an amazing place to start my career. It taught me a lot about how people from all walks, circumstances, and places view the world.

                At this point in my life, I would have argued against the idea of white privilege. Mostly because of my naivety. I truly believed that everyone has equal opportunities; success just depends on how hard one is willing to work. I would soon realize that what I believed does not translate to how the world works.

               Last spring I went to a training through Cherry Creek School District called Beyond Diversity that changed my life. Before, I was a race horse with blinders on. After, it was like someone removed the blinders and opened my peripheral vision. I was flooded with understanding and emotion. The homework was to interview a friend of a different race and give them a survey. I chose a long-time friend Rod, whom I have known for 14 years. The survey culminated in a point score that I was to compare my score to his. The higher the score, the less a role your race played in your day to day life. I scored somewhere around 70, and his was something like a 38. It is important to note that we both grew up in similar neighborhoods, had the same teachers, and both went to college. This opened up an amazing conversation between Rod and me that resonates with me to this day. The survey actually made Rod emotional, despite his 6'4" frame and full sleeve of tattoos. He started throwing out all things that struck him. Like Band-Aids. There are no Band-Aids that match his skin. He has to buy a special brand of magazine to see people of his race regularly shown. He is half black, and his wife is white; their kids look white. He is concerned how this could impact their racial identity and life experience. It was an amazing life changing event that happened in the office of the gym we both trained at.

                 So here I am in the journey of understanding, constantly learning, and then this summer I saw a documentary about TuPac on HBO (it’s called Resurrection if you want to check it out). It brought me back to the good old days. Watching it now, as a grown man, I came to see him in a completely different light. There is a point in the documentary where TuPac explains evolving rhetoric in black music and how gangster rap came to be.  He made the analogy between racial equality and people standing hungry outside a hotel that is full of food. At first they knock politely and even sing to be let in; then they bang on the door, and their song gets more intense. After a few weeks, when they are starving, they are knocking down the door guns blasting. This is an emotional, raw, and real issue. TuPac helped me realize that time is up. We need to confront these issues now.

                  At church one weekend, one of the pastors (Chad) spoke about Ferguson, MO. He phrased the realities of this issue perfectly. He explained how white people tend to say, “Hey, we passed the laws. Do you have to remind me about this?” We attempt to exempt ourselves from helping, or even facing race, because the laws are there. Unfortunately, this is not an issue that laws fix, or it would’ve been fixed in 1865, 1870, 1920, and 1964. We, as white people, need to sit in the uncomfortable chair and talk about race. To deny that race is an issue is to deny something that is a reality for so many. To say, “Well I’m not racist” comes across as insensitive and dismissive. People say, “Well I have friends who are black and Hispanic.” If that is true, I urge you to see the importance that race plays in their daily life. In order to make a difference, we need to confront issues instead of dismissing them as “fixed by laws” and therefore out of our hands. If we are willing to be exposed to uncomfortable realities, we will expand our understanding and perspective and in doing so grow. We need to admit there is a problem.

                  As of now, we have a pseudo society of smiling faces, like the movie Pleasantville. Smiles and nods dot the faces of people in the meeting on equity. Yet, they are underscored with frustration, assumed guilt, and dismissal of the importance of the topic. When we (white people) feel backed into a corner we blame the victim. We expect people of color to tell us what to do to make it better. That is like telling someone who is living by a contaminated river to somehow sanitize it. The problem is not with them, but with those who perpetuate the pollution.
                Have you ever noticed that all the people running equity trainings tend to be people of color? That’s like saying, "Hey, you, person of color, this is your problem. You fix it." Only thing is, the problem that exists isn’t a problem for people of color. They live the problem. It’s a problem for white people. It’s the problem of apathy. We need to add color and contrast to our Pleasantville like existence. The only way to do that is through confronting the issue, having the bravery to expose personal bias (we all have them), and by having a growth mindset. Only then will we be able to accept others perspectives. Take our blinders, shaped by personal experience, and begin to look through a lens of empathy rather than apathy.

                 Lastly, TuPac said in an interview that he knew he wouldn’t be the one to change the world, but that he wanted to spark the mind that does. Let him inspire us to listen, to acknowledge the reality he expresses in his lyrics, and in our own way, make the world a better place.  

“I know if I keep on talking about how messy it is around here, someday someone will come clean it up.”

-          TuPac 1994 MTV Interview

Below are two TuPac interviews that I believe are worth watching.

               

                                       https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMXzLhbWtmk

                                         https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=128ao5Xl_VY

Living with Purpose

Living with Purpose

Written by: Dave DeRose

It is an inevitable reality. It happens to everyone. All that we can hope for is that it is beautiful, meaningful, and leaves an impression on those who knew us. We don’t get to choose how or when it happens therefore we must believe it can happen at any time and embrace it. Own it. In doing so, we embrace a more vibrant perspective of our lives.

If you haven't figured it out, the reality I speak of is death.

In order to appreciate life, we must first accept the transitory nature of our lives.  Our lives do end. This must be a constant thought in our minds if we are going to appreciate each moment.

We tend act in a way where we do not take full advantage of our special moments on this earth. We exhibit this through our actions: most importantly, however, through the lack of action. We observe rather than participate. We have dreams but don’t act. We choose things that numb us from life instead of confronting, engaging, and living life. Avoiding conflict in fear. Diverting from resistance for convenience. Not facing our issues because we don’t want to revisit painful emotions. These realities make for a life that resembles a flower growing in a glass jar. The roots, stem, and petals press against the glass wanting to grow beyond the limits of the confined space. After time, parts of the plant begin to die. The flower loses the ability to expand its roots, and those excess roots begin to strangle what remains.

“Watch therefore, you know neither the day nor the hour.” Matthew 25:13, ESV

Breaking through this glass barrier of self-doubt is a painful and scary leap of faith. There is no way to know for sure what will happen. Maintaining a healthy mindset that will help us through tough times, times of transition, and times of necessary personal growth. We need to think of ourselves as already dying - the terminal illness of life, mortality rate 100%. Embracing and reflecting on this as our reality, daily, will alter the way we live. We must view every day, every interaction with someone new or old (no matter how different from us), every book we read, and every opportunity as a gift from God.  He holds our lives in His hands. If we feel inspired to do something, let us be resolved to do it, not talk ourselves out of it. We must cherish our experiences, both the failures and successes, as lessons from God.

“For it [the kingdom of heaven] will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted them with his property. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away.” Matthew 25:14–15, ESV

He wants to make something outstanding out of everyone’s life. God manifests His will for our lives in our talents, abilities, and inspirations. When we sense out of nowhere a desire to do something, it is God speaking to us. Being faithful, knowing that life and death lie with Him, and pursuing what we have been inspired to do is how we can walk with God and truly experience life. Every moment is fleeting. Youth, strength, abilities all fade, but what we do with them never will. There will be a time when we will be asked what we did with what God gave us, and the result of this conversation was made clear in scripture.

“Now after a long time the master of those servant came and settled accounts with them. And he who had five talents came forward, bringing more saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here I have made five more.’ Hiss master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ . . . . He who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, so I was afraid, and wen and hid your talent in the ground. Here you go have what is yours.’ But this his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. So take the talent from him and give it to the man with ten talents. For everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.  And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ ” Matthew 25: 19-30 ESV

God blesses us with talents. It honors Him when we use them. When we do, He blesses us with more.  It takes faith to use our talents and follow our instincts. It can be frightening, risky, and against the grain of society. Strength for those emotions come with the realization that God controls our hours and minutes, our time is as unknown to us as it is priceless. This is not meant to be a scare tactic. In understanding our fragility, we gain an appreciation for what we do have. It makes our moments on earth precious. Because our strengths and talents fade, we are forced to use them to their full potential each time an opportunity presents itself. Only in performing them can we experience the life God wants for us.

The key to all of this is choice.  We have the choice either to do or not to do. To have faith or not. Taking risks and using the gifts God has given will lead a vibrant and enriching life that will glorify and honor Him. 

So why should we do that has been lurking in the back of our minds like a tailgating vehicle today? Because we know not the hour or the time God will come for us. We must live with urgency and intention. We need to make the most of the time we are blessed with. There will be no regrets to the life fully lived. And, when it comes to an end, and we have exhausted everything God has put into our tank of talents, we will be welcomed into the joy of our Lord. And those whom we have impacted will rejoice in all that our lives have given to theirs, and our lives will be examples for them to do the same.

Freedom to Fail: Pursuit of Happiness

Freedom to Fail: Pursuit of Happiness

Written by: Dave DeRose

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

-Declaration of Independence

                Without bravery to exercise freedom, we become lackluster drones moved by every slight breeze that passes. Always moving with the wind, never standing out. It takes a ferocious desire to dream and to act on that dream in order to experience the benefits of true freedom. It is incredibly more common, however, for fear to drown dreams. This can manifest itself in a variety of ways. It could be that we are trapped in our minds with thoughts of self-doubt, concerns about how others view us, dwelling on the past or fixating too much on the future. There could be a dream that's in need to be accomplished, but waiting for the perfect circumstances to take action beats out giving it a shot. In thinking such thoughts, we are mentally oppressing ourselves from realizing our true capacity for freedom. It is through freedom that we may attain happiness.

                In the United States Declaration of Independence, the three unalienable rights are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. This is a clear indication of how the Founding Fathers viewed Freedom. We are given life and liberty, but then we must pursue happiness. Happiness is a byproduct of courageous risk-taking actions. If we do not exercise this skill, we are not being nourished by the freedom or liberty we are endowed with by God. In not being bold and pursuing happiness, we become slaves to inaction. We sit on the sidelines of our lives, not truly free. We exist in limbo, unattached from the life God wants for use.

“Freedom is not worth having if it doesn’t include the freedom to make mistakes.”

-Mahatma Gandhi

                One reason why we are guilty of not pursuing happiness through our God-given right of liberty is because we are emotionally paralyzed. If we are filled with self-doubt, we will lack the confidence to venture out of our comfort zone. If we are concerned about how others view us, we will never truly be ourselves, and if we're never ourselves, how can we claim to be free? If we are stuck dwelling in the past, we close ourselves off to any new possible future. If we are too focused on the future, we may miss God’s calling on our life. Lastly, if we rationalize not acting because the circumstances aren’t ideal, we caution ourselves away from experiencing God’s potential for our life, like a kid standing on the edge of a pool afraid to jump in because, when he sticks his toe in, the water's cold. Don’t deny yourself the joy of swimming in life. 

“I have prayed for you that your feet may not fail . . . . I tell you, Peter, the rooster will not crow until you deny three times that you know me.” (Luke 22: 32-34 NIV)

Jesus’ point is, even in spite of Peter's forthcoming failure, that He still hopes and prays he will continue to act. It is important to know that Jesus does the same for us. He wants our feet to not fail us in the face of failure. Why do we struggle so much with failure? The root cause is simply that we don’t want to fail.  We especially don’t want others to see us fail. What we need to realize and remember is that failing and freedom go hand in hand.  We have the freedom to act, which often results in failure. Failure’s gift is experience. Experience allows us to learn about ourselves,  our strengths, weaknesses, and delivers the knowledge we need to succeed the next time. If we don’t exercise our freedom through action, we will be missing out on the path God desires for us. We need to change our perception of what failure is; failure is a gift. It's important to our growth both in life and in our walk with God.

“Peter said, ‘Man, I do not know what you are talking about.’ And immediately, while he was still speaking, the rooster crowed. And the Lord turned and looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the saying of the Lord, how he had said to him, ‘Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times. And he went out and wept bitterly.”  (Luke 22: 60-62 NIV)

Often times, what we perceive to be a failure can often be a blessing. Nobody understands this better than Peter. When Peter denied Jesus, I bet he thought he had failed in epic proportions.  How could he ever recover from such an egregious failure? Yet he became one of the most influential individuals in the Christian faith. God has a plan for our failures. If Peter hadn’t understood failure, he may not have achieved what he did. His failure gave him strength for what came next.

“But Peter, standing with the eleven, lifted up his voice and addressed them.” Acts 1: 14 NIV

The passage above is the first time the gospel of Jesus was preached.  And who was to deliver this monumental sermon? Peter.  The same Peter that failed Jesus by denying him three times. In this action, of preaching about Jesus, Peter shows his unwavering faith. It is in this moment he becomes free. He has started on the path that God has set out for him, and what a glorious path it was. On the day of that first sermon, around 3,000 people where baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. It was through Peter acting, choosing to speak, that he experienced true freedom. The courage it took for him to "[lift] up his voice" was immeasurable. He was, in the eyes of all his peers, blaspheming. An act punishable by death. Yet, in the face of it all, he chose to act, to show faith, and, in doing so expressed his God given freedom.

                God gives us freedom, which includes the freedom to make mistakes. He did this so that, through choice, we may experience happiness.  In order to be blessed by lessons from such mistakes and failures, we must first act, and not let our feet fail. Put our faith and trust in God. We must step out of the boat into the troubled waters and experience freedom through faith and action. So why should we do that thing we feel compelled to do today? Because we are free to. Let us act today, and see what God has in store for us.

Thursday

Thursday

Written by: Dave DeRose

Blast and jar of the alarm
Pull myself out of bed arm by arm
With a churning in my gut
I wish my eyes could return to shut

Prepare for the day by
Shower, teeth, deodorant, tie
Ironed khakis fall into my crunched car
Drive to where I feel sub par

Chalk, dust, computer beam
With desire to help kids dream
Students faces filled with hope
Still can't help but feel like a dope

Unwanted I feel
Society doth peel
My dignity, educational and professional ability
Society's lack of respect stripped me to humility

Dreams I had
Of differences made iron clad
I only found
My efforts unbound

Only by God's grace
Will I keep pace
With sound focus
To give students a solid locus

My vocation isn’t popular
To see impact I need more than binocular
Yet, my need to understand remains
Unnecessary, God explains

His capacity to love
His gifts of Grace drove
The meaning of my calling,
to keep students from falling

To Him I give Thanks
For filling my blanks
For giving me purpose and vision
My work decreases humanities division

Allow me an inference
Thanks to God, I make a difference
I have a newfound meaning
To make future lives gleaming

Self-Worth vs. Money

Self-Worth vs. Money

Written by: Dave DeRose

                Self-worth and money has been a battle of mine for years.  This includes having passion for my vocation versus making the most possible amount of money.  You see, I am a teacher. Everyone knows how teachers get paid.  What people don’t know is the turnover rate in education is atrocious. In the first five years around 48 percent of new teachers leave.  I have seen this first hand.  I have to say that the pressure to leave is intense.  In order to make ends meet, I have held a variety of odd jobs. I have done everything from landscaping, working the front desk at a gym, sold supplements, and worked my way up to personal training. I found that a lot of the same skills that made me successful as a teacher also made me successful in other facets of life.

                I was ready to quit teaching.  I was frustrated. I could give you a list of frustrations I had with education at the time but it would serve no purpose.  All that is important is that I was unhappy. I loved my students and my job but there was something missing; meaning. I had an incredible out, something I have proven to myself that I could be successful at, personal training. Then I began to rationalize even more why I should quit.  I was still helping people. I was helping them to lose weight, gain fitness, or achieve something they couldn’t without my knowledge.  My clients were engaged. They were motivated. I am an extremely good arguer. I could argue why one penny is better than another.  I was building my case to leave education.

                There was something missing from my life. The potential increase in income made me salivate.  I wanted to stop having multiple jobs… work less, make more.  I thought it would bring me happiness. Then something unexpected happened to me.  Something that would change my life forever.  It would give me purpose, direction, and above everything, a sense of contentment in my current state. I found God.  When I stopped putting my interests and desires first and started putting my troubles on God, He changed my heart and then my mind.  I went to school with a completely different attitude.  My students noticed a difference, noting how happy I seemed (and these are seventh graders so that was especially amazing).

                I stopped thinking about what I wanted for myself and started praying for what God wanted for me.  I know I make less money.  I know that not everyone looks at what I do as a successful career. I don’t care.  I am happy.  I know I am making a difference.

                Since this new found purpose that was God given, I have had a completely different mindset when thinking about my future.  I enrolled in grad school. I am working on a degree in educational leadership.  My goal now is to, hopefully, be a school leader and to make as deep of an impact as I can in the lives of students and other teachers.

                Money has its place in life. Obviously, you need a certain amount to survive.  It is when we mix pride with income that trouble arises. I wanted to be able to do things I saw my friends doing. I felt that my skills and talent deserved more money.  I felt like I was owed. I wanted, I wanted, I wanted.  My thoughts had very little to do with my purpose, my impact, my legacy as a person and as a Christian. When I put God first, my life was incredibly enriched. I went from wanting to build my own kingdom, to building His.  Mine will fade away, but His will live forever. When approaching any vocation, pray for God to give you a purpose. If you have His guidance, money becomes a bonus in whatever you end up doing… no matter the amount. 

Determination Over Expectation

Determination Over Expectation

 Written by: Dave DeRose

                I am currently in a state of concern about how people today look at goals in life.  These goals could be anything from weight loss, improving on a skill, developing closer relationships with people, or any other area of your life that needs improvement.  What I have found is that, in general, if it (whatever it is) doesn’t come easy to them they give up, find excuses, and sweep the issue under the preverbal carpet.  This pattern is not only ignored by society, but is encouraged.  People only want to see people succeed at things they are naturally good at.  When someone attempts to step outside their “box” of skills and abilities others, often friends and sometimes even family, caution, discourage, and lessen the importance by saying, “I just think you’re over thinking that. It’s no big deal.”

                This attitude along with the support from society, has developed a culture of one trick ponies.  Long gone are the days where people strived to be talented at various sports, music, and learning.  People are, for the most part, emotionally driven.  When they already feel anxious about stepping outside their comfort zone, and they receive discouraging feedback, they are more than likely going to cave to comfort.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard, “I would work out but I’m too lazy. At least I am really good at my job. Good to know I have that going for me.”

                It is your right to have everything going for you.  You don’t have to be smart and out of shape, athletic and not musical, and be hardworking while lacking friendships. Of course life needs balance, but people operate under this false dogma.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

                How do we fix the common culture?  We stop setting goals that are results driven and move to ones that are based on determination.  For example, in weight loss, don’t make the goal to lose ten pounds, make the goal to be committed to working out five times a week and eating right every day  The latter will guarantee success and a more positive experience.

I am living this right now. I am 28 years old and have been an athlete my whole life, I have never picked up an instrument in my life, besides the recorder in sixth grade (which I failed, sorry Mrs. Craft).  A few weeks ago, I decided to teach myself how to play the guitar.  It was by stepping outside my box that I realized this truth about successful goal setting.  You must know, I am horrible. No one wants to hear me play. But if I want to figure out how to play, I am going to have to stay determined. There is no way I could set a goal like: I want to play a full song in three months.  That would be absurd, and if I did set that goal, I would be setting myself up for extreme disappointment.  When I don’t reach my results based goal, I will become even further disappointed.  I already sound bad and I couldn’t reach my goal.  Why would I continue?

If instead I set my goal to be determined and practice for at least an hour a day, then my emotions are attached to my practicing instead of reaching a result.  I will now feel bad if I miss a day. I guarantee that if I practice for an hour a day I will get better, no matter how horrible I am now.  If you are trying to get in shape, if you set your goal on eating every meal every day and working out five times a week, you will succeed!  Your emotions will be tied not in the scale but to your grit.  No matter what area of your life that needs improvement, set your goal on being determined, not on a potential outcome.  Certainly, you should not set them on results others have had.  People learn how to play the guitar faster than I can, people burn fat at different rates, and so on.  Your body, your mind, your results will vary.  Ignore the successes and failures of others, focus on you.

When it comes to facing society, if a friend discourages you from achieving something that is clearly in your best interest, you need to seriously question if that person is a good friend.  This can seem incredibly hard but, trust me, if you continue to stay dedicated to your objective, new people will come into your life that will help support and guide you through it.  I personally have had to distance myself from people I was close to for many years when I realized that they didn’t have my best interest in mind.  Don’t settle for company, strive for people with purpose. Don’t be afraid to grow and become bigger and better than yesterday, instead, take an exited approach to life.  Think about everything you can, want, and dream to be. Then go get it.  

Frustration: A Paradigm Shift

By: Dave DeRose

Boy, do I have the ability to frustrate myself!  You see, God gifted me with a high-def memory but with an extremely slow processor.  I react in situations and remember everything from people’s voice inflections, slight eye rolls, and body language after the fact.  When I am by myself, I begin to analyze the interaction or interactions (they could be over multiple weeks) in vivid detail.  The major caveat is I am not an analytical thinker, I am an emotional one.  So as I break apart each detail, I feel a plethora of emotions; anger, sadness, embarrassed, but what consumes me is regret.

These emotions guide my actions, which can make things even worse!  When I act based on these negative feelings it compounds the issue. The cycle of over analyzing reoccurs and only deepens my despair.  

I tend to do my best thinking while I’m driving home from church, by myself, listening to relaxing worship music.  I probably shouldn't say “best thinking” after the type of rational aforementioned, but you get my point.  Tonight it was bad.  I was analyzing a series of interactions I had with a friend of mine.  After I had concluded that I had not acted correctly I began to panic.  Negative thoughts crashed through my mind like a tsunami.  I convinced myself that I had impacted our friendship in a negative way.  I concluded that I aided in “creating space” between the two of us.  Emotional pain stung my heart.  I began to pray, “God, why do I mess up all the time? Why can’t I just figure it out? Why didn't I react correctly? I should have seen it sooner. If I had, none of this would be happening.” I kept repeating those thoughts for about fifteen minutes as I drove on the dark empty highway.  Each mile added more pain and more anxiety.  I was sinking fast.

Then I felt it. I feel the best way to describe it is with a science term, paradigm shift. Merriam-Webster defines a paradigm as, “A model or pattern for something that may be copied, a theory or a group of ideas about how something should be done, made, or thought about. I was stuck in this destructive pattern of thinking.” In an instant it changed.  God put it on my heart and it changed my questions.  They went from, “Why me?” to “Why am I feeling like this? Why am I doing this to myself?” Just as quickly as the questions came, I had the answer.  I can’t control the past.  I can control how miserable I make myself. I feel like God told me to make peace.  Make peace with my thoughts.

A weight lifted off my shoulders.  My epiphany: my self-induced panic stemmed from my selfish desire to control my life.  I wanted to manipulate my interactions with people to get what I want. This is not my right nor is it righteous.  Understanding this gives me freedom to let go. This was God being candid with me.

It challenged the strength of my faith.  I need to have faith in God’s plan for me and make peace. Make peace with who I am, actions I have taken, things I’ve said, intentions, and personality quarks I have. I have faith that God won’t steer me wrong. Before I thought I could control outcomes with people, now I know God has control.  He will keep me afloat as I step out of my boat of control and into the stormy sea of faith. I didn't have a thinking problem, I had a faith problem.  This was my paradigm shift of thought this evening.