grace

Natural Disasters: How to Find Hope in their Wake

July 27, 2018 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

We often feel powerless when a natural disaster strikes. Watching the news, seeing those affected, we quickly realize natural disasters do not discriminate.

The recent wildfires in the southwest and 2017’s destructive hurricane season caused untold damage to lives and property. All of us have either read about or experienced disasters, such as earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, and tsunamis.

Unfortunately, we will see them again in the future as well.

Here are some tips to be able to deal with these sorts of negative realities that exist at a high-magnitude level:

1. Do what life requires. It is easy to become somewhat obsessed and focused on the past or the next disaster. While we all need to prepare adequately for these occurrences, our minds are not equipped to stay “on call” thinking about these. Psychologists call this hypervigilance, a state of constant alertness. One aspect of hypervigilance is that the demands on your adrenal glands, constantly being engaged, causes them to become fatigued, which can be debilitating to your health and happiness. Instead of being “on call” for the next disaster, do what is required in your life: take care of your relationships with your family and friends; work in something meaningful and useful; keep your self care a priority; engage in your interests and passions; and help other in some form of service. This is not denial. It is simply letting your mind and behavior do what they do best.
2. Stay connected. Isolation and avoiding vulnerable relationships tend to have a magnifying effect on our stress reactions to disaster. Aloneness makes us worse, not better. Having a few supportive, understanding and warm people in your life, where you can mutually share your fears, your lessons learned and your hopes will do a great deal to help you function and feel normal.
3. Learn resilience. Resilience is a psychological term describing the ability to bounce back over time after a stress or loss. People who are resilient, for example, work through financial difficulties, health issues and family troubles, often to their previous level of functioning. Resilience is not instant, but it is an important skill. Learn resilience over the smaller matters in life, using patience, perseverance and a positive attitude. This will prepare you for the larger issues you will encounter.
4. Remove any demand for a just universe. The idea of “this is not fair” and “it’s not just” is a normal reaction to catastrophic events. It is just how our minds respond. But if “this isn’t fair” becomes an internal mantra, it will tend to sap your strength, your clarity of mind and your sense of well being. Just begin to accept that the world doesn’t run on “fair”, though it would be nice if it did. Instead, substitute “it is what it is, and I will deal with what it is.” That will be much more helpful and empowering for you.

4 Components of Good Character

July 23, 2018 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

“It builds character.”

You’ve surely heard the phrase at least once in your life. Generally, that statement is said to a person after something negative has happened in their lives that they must now overcome. So, by now, you’ve probably heard it at least once.

Look, life is tough. It just is. I understand the struggles surrounding getting older, becoming parents and grandparents, upsizing, downsizing, illness, career transitions, grief – this list goes on and on. How you handle the ups and downs of life makes all the difference and can indeed build character.

What Exactly Is “Character?”

Admittedly, the definition of “character” is somewhat abstract.

I define it as having a set of abilities required to meet the demands of reality. Most of the time, we are not really in control of what’s happening around us. That’s okay. It’s part of God’s plan for us.

As you know, life has many requirements to function. As you get older, it goes from making the bed and tying your shoelaces to finding your life’s passion, marrying the right person, having a family, and eventually retiring to enjoy your golden years. All of that “stuff” requires character because none of it is easy at the outset.

To make life work, you must focus on character growth first, and not just the results you want in the end.

Why Is Character Growth Important?

There are two main reasons character growth is so critical to all aspects of your life.

First, everything starts with who you are on the inside. Who you are shapes how you behave. How you behave then becomes how you relate and how you relate becomes how you succeed.

So, it starts with the inside and works outward. We all want great relationships. Character growth allows how we are on the inside to create the warmth that radiates around us.

Secondly, character is important because life has lots of demands. They can be simple or they can be as complicated. Either way, life is demanding and your character shapes how you approach and handle these situations.

The Four Components of Good Character

Now, I’m going to break down the four components of good character. These will make all the difference for having a successful life.

1. Attachment: Attachment is the ability to trust and be vulnerable, to be able to open up to people and create a support network. These could be people who end up on your life team. You also understand that not everyone is safe or meant to be a part of that. Attachment means finding the right people to provide the nutrients you need for growth. Read about how to create your life team here.
2. Separation: Separation means the ability to have your own voice, make your own choices, and to be a free person. Because some people are very attached, they have relationships, but they feel guilty about speaking up and about disagreeing and confronting. This means they don’t have good boundaries. Separation and attachment need to balance each other out as you work on your character.
3. Integration: Integration means there are two kinds of realities in our life: There’s the positive realities of my strengths, good people, good experiences, and great mission in life. But, there are also negative realities, like my own brokenness, my own failure, my own losses, my own pains, how other people let me down, and how I’ve let other people down. Integration means I can live with the positives very well and I can embrace the negatives at the same time.
4. Maturity: Maturity means I am confident in who I am and I know why I’m here. Maybe you’ve raised a great family and have a wonderful career. Maybe you’ve learned to walk away from negative relationships. Maturity also means being able to take everyone’s needs into consideration when making important decisions, including your own.

So, what now? In your own life, start identifying those four character growth components and see where you have room for growth.

Life will not work until we have the character to make it work.

6 Ways We Can Learn to Trust Again

July 16, 2018 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

We are born trusting. In the beginning, we put our trust in our parents and relatives to care for us, love us, and keep us alive. Yes, these are basic needs, but they are also important ones!

Unfortunately, over time, something happens.

We get let down. We get left out. We go through a break-up or betrayal. The hard truth is that a lot of things just happen in our lives that cause us to lose trust in others. Knowing this, is it even possible to learn to trust again?

Yes. You can trust again!

Defining Trust is a Must

How do we define trust?

Trust is allowing someone to know our vulnerabilities. It’s about revealing our soft spots, failures, pain, negatives, and weaknesses. When you allow someone to see the real you, it’s a way of saying, “I trust you with this information, and I believe that you’re not going to do something hurtful to me with it.”

In the Bible, one of the translations for the word “trust” in Hebrew is “to be careless.” This means that you have so much trust in someone that you’re just careless with them. You don’t worry about saying the right thing. There is no walking on eggshells. There is no fear. You are truly yourself when you show that vulnerability and trust.

This “carelessness” comes from knowing that, no matter what, you are safe with this person you trust. When someone violates that trust or exposes one of the “secret parts” of ourselves that we don’t share with everyone, it hurts. Sometimes deeply.

That betrayal is what I call a trust fracture. How do trust fractures happen? Unfortunately, trust can be broken in a number of ways, especially as we grow older.

Divorce, problems with an adult child, challenges at work, friendship drama, and disappointment are all common culprits of trust fractures. How we approach rebuilding trust after it fractures that makes all the difference.

The Two Big Don’ts in Trusting

Two different outcomes can happen when someone breaks our trust. Sadly, sometimes these trust fractures happen more than once and we experience a hurtful pattern from the same person. Small breaches in confidence add up! Once those breaches happen, it can be hard to trust anyone, whether they’re a longtime friend or someone new.

Big Don’t #1: We don’t trust anyone.

When we lose trust, we often default to not trusting ANYONE. That’s not good at all. You need safe people in your life and that means having trust in them. They’ll give you the right nutrients for a happier and more trusting life. (Information on how to identify the safe people in your life is in my blog post here.)

Big Don’t #2: We trust everyone (but shouldn’t)

Or, conversely, we trust TOO quickly. When people let us down or are inconsistent, we can sometimes forgive and forget without sitting back and thinking, “Let me discern if you’re gonna really change your ways here.”

Then, the cycle repeats.

Trusting everyone or trusting no one at all is not a healthy way to work through losing trust. You end up in a passive permanent state where you wait for people to come to you. That won’t give you the nutrients you need at all.

6 Ways to Learn to Trust Again

The good news is that you can learn to trust again, no matter how deep the fracture, if both people agree to change (and actually do).

Repairing a trust fracture won’t happen overnight. It is going to be hard work, too. It takes time to rebuild trust or to initially put your trust in someone after a pattern of broken promises. But, if you follow these steps, you will be in a prime position to start trusting again.

Count The Cost. By not trusting anyone, consider these questions: What am I missing out on? Am I lonely? Am I lacking energy? Healthy boundaries are one thing. They help us with trusting people. But, when you put up too many boundaries to the point of isolation, you lose out on the potential for the nutrients needed for a happier life.
Don’t Be Afraid. A big step toward rebuilding trust or putting your trust in someone new is overcoming the fear-need complex. It’s something in our head that says, “I’m afraid of needing people so I won’t need them. But, then I feel like I really need them and I get afraid.” It’s a hard, back and forth internal struggle. Let the need overcome that fear.

Stick Your Toe in the Water. Take a small risk with someone NEW and see what happens. Allow someone to see a small mistake you made and be vulnerable. This is what happens right after you work through the fear I mentioned in #2.

Pick the Right People to Trust. Trusting someone is hard, so don’t make it harder than it has to be. Make sure people deserve your trust. You’ve got to make sure the people you’re surrounding yourself with are not going to intentionally betray your trust I always stress the need to identify safe people and trust is a big part of that concept.

Treat Others as You Want to Be Treated. Trust is truly a two-way street. The foundation of trust is built when you treat someone well, regardless of what they can or can’t do for us. Start to look out for them, start to put their needs in front of your own. It’s a lot easier to build trust with someone who shows consistent, good behavior toward us. It’s also a way to show the other person how they can build trust with you!

Balance Strength & Vulnerability. A strong person is one who can be vulnerable with others. Meaning, strength comes from being able to trust someone. For example, if you tell someone you want to trust that you’re feeling anxious about a situation at work and they give you warmth in response, that’s a show of strength. It is not weak to show vulnerability. Quite the opposite in fact. Keep in mind, this is not the kind of strength that dominates people or controls them, but the kind of strength that is balanced with being vulnerable.

It takes a lot of work to build trust, and even more, work to build it back up after a trust fracture. Trust is not something that should be given freely (meaning just to anyone). It should be earned.

6 Healthy Ways to Handle Critical People

June 18, 2018 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

You’ve probably heard the old saying, “everyone is a critic.” This is our way of saying we all have opinions on one subject or another. In general, most people can have disagreements without escalation. When this happens, everyone comes into the disagreement with a healthy approach, and most leave the conversation better for having a good, healthy interaction.

But, sometimes we have to disagree with difficult people. You have probably had to deal with a difficult person in your life. Whether in-person on their computer or mobile device, difficult people are out there. (They are everywhere, actually!)

Whether we like it or not, we’ll have to deal with them with the same grace and truth we apply to all realms of our lives.

Change Your Perspective

Now, I’m going to give you some insight into how to work with critical people for a healthier outcome.

The core issue of a critical person is that when they face a problem, they negate the good. That’s no good. That’s not the healthy way to deal with problems!

Everybody has some level of critical analysis when it comes to problem-solving. That’s perfectly fine. You have to say, “Well, I screwed up there, or we have a cultural problem here, or we have an organization problem here, or whatever.”

It’s not that they see bad things per se. Instead, they negate the good. Even though life’s tough, it should be more positive than negative. Pretty simple right? So, critical people tend to be way out of balance.

We must ask ourselves where this comes from. You have to understand where critical people come from just to see they’re not making this up.

So how does one become a critical person? Let’s look at that next. Where does the problem start?

Family of origin: Sometimes, they have a family of origin issues where they were raised around a lot of criticism and that became the norm.
Environment: Some people are just around negative people all their lives and assume that’s just a normal way to communicate.
The Receiving End: Sometimes a person is the recipient of a lot of criticism.
Disappointment: A lot of times, at a deep level, critical people have been disappointed so much that it’s a way to avoid taking a risk and saying this is what I want.

Get Control Over It

You’ve probably got a critical person in your life; we all have that one person (or possibly more) who can’t seem to see the good in any situation. Here are a few simple truths that hopefully help you gain some control over the situation.

Forget about pleasing them: I’m sorry to say it, but you can’t please them! They’re unpleasable because they’re critical! They move the goalpost so that the goal is unattainable. Don’t try to please them, you will just be spinning your wheels.
Don’t get involved in power struggles: Do not escalate the disagreement to show them that you’re “more alpha.” Male alpha or female alpha, don’t show them that you’re an alpha because they can escalate till the cows come home. No good. Waste of time.

I’ve covered what not to do above. Now, let’s get into a few healthy ways to handle critical people.

6 Healthy Ways to Handle Critical People

Hear them: Just say, “Help me understand.” The road to solving problems comes when people feel heard.
Understand they didn’t come in a vacuum: This disagreement did not occur in a vacuum, they got to this critical point from somewhere, so it gives you a sense of patience and empathy for them.

Let them know how you feel: That awareness will help the lights come on. They will often go, “Well, tell me when I do that again.”

Ask them what they want: Ask them to say what they desire. Make them be specific! Because remember, they’re probably dealing with defending against disappointment and so they are more identified by what they do not want than what they do want.
Affirm the baby steps: It’s hard for a critical person to be balanced and look at the good because the good never meant anything good for them. So when they finally say, “Well, I just want to tell the team good job. That’s all I got to say.” That’s when, you know, pop the cork, have a big party, thank you. We need to know that and don’t let them say, “But you need to do these other things.” No, that’s not okay. Affirm the baby steps, it’s hard work for them. Write down a couple of vulnerabilities, it’ll really give you power and control over that.
Request more positives: Let them know that they can keep the negatives and that they need to add to the positives. You are trying to redo the way their brain works. Then, you can really repair the relationship and make them happier and a better place to work with and be a friend to them.

It will be difficult, especially at first, but I promise you that this kind of stuff works. Just like you, critical people have goals, desires, and wants. You can be an advocate for the person and share warmth for a healthy outcome.

When working with a critical person, you might need help with the conversation. TownsendNOW can give you the Christian-based guidance you’re seeking.

Are You Using Social Media in a Healthy Way?

May 14, 2018 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

I love using social media. It’s not going away, and I’m glad. Social media makes our lives better, but that also means that we must be able to use it wisely.

Before we get any further, let me just define the terms here.

Social media is any kind of a website or application that involves the delivery of content that leads to interaction with other people.

Benefits of Healthy Social Media Use

Social media can provide many benefits, including:

Stronger Relationships
More Success
Entertainment

Unfortunately, we tend to see people get stuck in addictive cycles on social media. This could mean they are constantly on their phone, which can also lead to physical problems like eye strain headaches. Or, they seek out people who may’ve been problematic in the past, which can lead to all kinds of emotional challenges. Social media is supposed to be primarily for entertainment. It simply cannot take over your life.

The main thing to consider when using social media is, “Is it helping me be a better person? Am I in charge of it or is it in charge of me?”

Watch Out For the Negatives of Social Media

Let me give you some of the negative ways people handle being constantly connected.

The first is access issues. You have your home life, work or school life, friends, church, etc. All too often, work or school can be accessed through text or email. You are technically available anytime. Do you respond or simply let it go for the time being?

Another thing is quality vs. quantity. When surfing social media make sure you’re not allowing stuff in that’s going to adversely impact your emotional or spiritual well-being. Then, there’s quantity. There’s so much research out there about how people are spending way too much time on Facebook, Twitter, etc., and it gets in the way of real life and real experiences.

Healthy Social Media Boundaries

Now, let me give you some healthy ways to deal with this:

Make sure you’re living a healthy life. You’re working out and dealing with people who are good for you and you’re doing something meaningful with your time. Nature abhors a vacuum. When we don’t have a healthy life and we’re lonely or isolated, we have a tendency to go into the digital world. This is the addictive process. Look, just like some people turn to drugs or alcohol, they can also go into the social media world because their real life’s not working. So, have the healthiest life possible.
Set realistic ground rules. To start, establish times when you cannot be accessed. Use this as a time where you can be disconnected and have real-world experiences, whether it a be a workout or going to church.

Leading a Team

April 23, 2018 by Dr. John Townsend Leave a Comment

The basic idea of leading a team is to influence a small group of individuals to perform at levels that they could not without you. In other words, they can do something without you, but your influence and guidance has them perform at a higher and better level. If they could do it without you, you don’t need a leader, but as you’ll see, they do need one.

Why is Leading a Team Important?

The research is clear – teams do better when there’s a good leader. They perform better, are more motivated, and more engaged because they’ve got someone that they know they can trust. It’s not even a question if you’ve got a team that has no leader and a team that has a leader, all things being equal, the team with the leader does better. But secondly, as the team goes, so goes the organization.

So if you get the team going right, you’ve got a much better probability of success in the entire organization.

Another reason this is important is that a team puts together intimacy. Teams have to learn to connect and be together.

Tips For Leading a Team

First, the leader’s supposed to advocate for the mission.

Secondly, developing trust. Every team leader must develop trust not just toward yourself, but also within the members. They have to learn how to trust each other enough to have hard conversations, to make mistakes with each other, to know they’re safe with each other.

Third, remember to get their views before you give your view. A mistake team leaders make is putting their opinion first. You’re supposed to set the tone, but then your other job is to tease out what they’re thinking.

Fourth, create a path. Sometimes, we call that a strategic path, sometimes we call it a path to growth, but that’s your job. You don’t have to do that by yourself, but you’re the one that’s got to make sure it happens.