Principle #5

Make failure

your teacher, not

your undertaker

Sometimes little irritations, mistakes, and failures come our way that are not earth-shattering or life-changing, but they cause a momentary stop in our progress. Sometimes we permit the little incidents to linger entirely too long and give us problems far beyond their significance. Let's say that you are caught in one of these situations, and at the moment you're not depressed, but you're not exactly on cloud nine either. As a result, you know that you are not as friendly or as productive as you would like to be, so you want to snap out of it.

What do you do?

Step no.1: acknowledge that you're in a funky mood; you got the "blahs".

Step no.2: recognize that your momentary switch from positive thinking to "stinkin' thinkin" is neither permanent nor even life threatening, so it won't be fatal. It's eventually going to end, so instead of waiting for a change in circumstances to bring an end to "blahs," make a conscious decision to end them yourself! Which means you have once again accepted responsibility, you circumstances will change and you will have turned a small tragedy into a big triumph.

Don't you know that this

good man, though you

trip him up seven times,

will each time rise again?

proverbs 24:16 TLB