Do you think for yourself? Of course you do right? Right????
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Well actually many people don’t do a lot of thinking for themselves, at least not all of the time.
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I was stunned when I read an educational book about 10 years back and in it there was a quiz about whether we think for ourself or do we go with the flow. Our parents have a large amount to do with our thinking.
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One question that got me was the one about politics. They didn’t ask who I voted for. Instead they asked if I voted for who my parents voted for (I didn’t). I started to think of all the people that I knew and who they and their parents voted for, and many people follow the political views of their parents. And sometimes it goes (proudly and loudly) down many generations. “My parents voted for blah blah and I proudly do the same.” – that is pride, family pride but it is not thinking for yourself, it is going with the trend, doing what everyone else is doing, and following blindly.
Then they said that if we simply followed our parents important choices then we really were not thinking for ourselves. Political views run strong in New Zealand and around the world. But how many of us sit down and study the views of each party and make an independent choice at each election? Or do we refuse to even consider the “other party” because we have had it proudly drummed into our heads since birth to follow the family “because”… for whatever reason.
Another example is “Do you go to the same church as your parents did and if so, did you ever really study the other choices, after all your eternal security demands such investigations?” If you decided to follow Christ did you make your own choices of church or did family and friends make the choice for you?
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When we are teenagers we start to make some serious independent choices in our lives. Testing our choices is one of the things that we do. Some parents make all the choices for their children and when they are given freedom they fail miserably because they have a weak background of little life experience behind them.
Their decision making tools were build on sand and had no solid foundation to draw experience and ideas from. The best parents are the ones that teach, guide and step back to see the results. The worst parents are those who tell their children what to think.
I have known cases like this to go well into a persons adult life and (mostly) mum is still interfering with their children’s lives instead of being a wise person, she is a dictator, she doesn’t want to give up control of her children’s lives.
One way to find out about your own ability to make choices is to go against the flow and loudly announce it. Do it for fun and see what the reaction is but also take close note of how you feel by the reactions of other people. Does their reaction make you want to immediately apologise and resume your position in the family obediently (yet you are an adult)? If so do you think that you are wanting to resume your place as a non-thinker?
Please do some serious thinking about this subject. Consider the choices that you have made in the past. Especially the ones that turned out to be wrong. Who guided you back then. Go back about 5 or 6 years ago and consider what you did and who you were then. Are you more independent now? If so how do you feel about that?
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If you are more independent now in your thinking then be sure that this is only the beginning. Part of our internal growth comes from testing our self and making our own choices and sometimes that means upsetting some people (even those we love) and standing alone.
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Please consider studying yourself over the next few days and think about “Do you make your own choices?”
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All the best from
James M Sandbrook.
29th of March 2013.