Perspective, that's the key word, isn't it? If we're going to deal with stress the right way, so we're responding use restfully, not this stressfully, then we need to have the right perspective, we need to think rightly about six different areas in life. Now, we've highlighted those in the past and each time I present to you a short video, I'm gonna unpack a little bit more information on this whole topic of stress and responding, you stressfully so we can actually be overcoming and conquering stress in our life and minimizing distress. And it's going to be like peeling away an onion. So I'll give you a little bit of information, just a little bits and pieces. And we'll keep going deeper and deeper and deeper, particularly as we get into our course, on dealing with stress.

So let's talk about this whole area of stress and dealing with it the right way. Particularly, it begins with having the right perspective towards self. And by myself, I mean the way I see myself as my self image, my self perception, my self esteem, there's a number of terms we use to define the way we see ourselves. But self and seeing self the right way is absolutely critical. And you might recall, the key to that is thinking of our life in a balanced way, constantly realizing like two rails of a train track. On the one hand, we're very special, we're unique.

You are the only person you'll ever be. And on the other hand, we're loaded with soft spots and weaknesses, Bible column sins, but we have areas of weaknesses and in capabilities that we're aware of sometimes and sometimes we're not aware of so the key to having the right perspective for yourself is learning to constantly balance those two. So like a train needs to stay on the train tracks to be able to get traction and move forward the way it needs to. You need to stay on the train tracks have a right perspective of self image by constantly seeing yourself especially. In fact, I like the concept of our lives being a masterpiece. The apostle Paul said that in the Bible, he said you are a masterpiece created by God for good works that you would walk in them.

In other words, we are created to be a masterpiece to our life to be a work of art Think about that. Your life ought to be an incredible Symphony your life ought to be a beautiful painting, your your your life ought to be a gorgeous piece of artwork, every part of it. And that means in your your fitness in your family and your friends and your finances and your faith in in all of your certainly your work. your profession, your firm, all vital areas of life. We're going to, we're going to talk to you about how to do that as we go a little bit deeper here. But bottom line is, you need to constantly see yourself as special and unique.

You're the only you they'll ever be. On the other hand, you need to realize you have soft spots, you have weaknesses. And there are two implications to that. One is that you live with humility. That means when someone criticizes you, you don't react to them. Now, think of the last time you are criticized.

How did you react? Did you get upset? Did you get angry? Did you deny it? Did you throw it back in the other person's face? Did you go into a cave and insult?

How did you handle it? Well, a number of years ago, I remember I was I was a president of a Graduate School of Theology. This was back in the 80s. I was very young. I was 29. When I started, my average age student was older than I was, so I had a lot to learn.

And one day one of our young first year students wanted to go out for Lunch over lunch, he said, Dr. Jensen Yura, you're a great leader and a great communicator. And so I thought, well, this is great. I'm going to pick up the check, which I did. And then he said, there are two more things are kind of personal. And I thought, well, I'd love to hear those because I knew what he was going to say. And that is of all the great leaders who've ever lived.

You know, you're one of them. I thought it was gonna say that he didn't say that. He said, Dr. Jensen, there's two things your life I don't think you're aware of that I believe impede your leadership. I was so offended. I mean, my first thought was, Who Do You Think You Are you punk? I'm the president of this institution.

You're a first year student. But I, you know, I kind of held back and I said, Well, that's interesting. Tell me what those are. And he told me one had to do with the way we were raising our children he had been in our home is all the new students were for an hour and a half. And we had young children and he thought my wife and I were a little too permissive with our children. So is attacking me and my wife, I didn't like that.

And then there's some element of leadership. If we didn't like about what I was doing, I was just enraged, and I was leaning as I was leaning forward, just ready to give him the benefit of my insight. It was though the hand of God grabbed me up by the scruff of the neck pulled me back and said, Hey, Ron, why are you so surprised that someone should see something in your life with which you need to deal? Imagine if he saw everything I see. And I went, Whoa, good point. You see, the reality is, you and I, and everybody is a lot worse than we articulate and communicate.

We don't get up in the morning and try to present our worst self. Frankly, we're a lot worse than we even know. Because the areas of our life we're even unaware of or live in denial about that are horrible. The fact that matter is we're we're all messed up. And the key to living the right kind of life with the right perspective towards yourself is realizing you have soft spots. So you're constantly living With an openness to criticism and humility, and honestly a fear of God that says, look at, I realized that my inner life doesn't always match up with my words and my outer life.

And I have a lot of areas to grow in. And that's fine. By the way, we're all a little goofy. But you also need to realize that you're a person of great worth. Now, the problem is, we tend to bounce back and forth, or we simply go to one extreme or the other. Some of us think we're just wonderful, we're great.

We're incredible, and we become arrogant. That's a terrible quality. Not not a healthy sense of pride. But arrogance is, on the other hand, some of the sacred Oh, good, we're worthless. I had a note from a dear friend this yesterday who said, My life is no good. I'm wondering if this is as good as this can get.

This is one of the most talented, gifted young women that I know I'm so impressed with her and I had to write back and say, my dear friend, I said, your life is a masterpiece. You have no idea how good you are. Because she had this view that you know, she just was kind of an adult Kendall had some setbacks and how to view that her life wasn't worth that much. You need to realize that your life is absolutely invaluable. You are special, but you have soft spots. Don't run away from the soft spots, keep learning keep growing, become self aware.

Let others tell you how you can grow, listen to criticism, adjust from it, it's not always right but learn and grow and move forward live in humility. Having a healthy sense of realization that you have feet of clay and then live with a sense of of significance that your life is important and special, and that you're the only you they'll ever be on this earth. Your Life has to be a masterpiece, keep on those train tracks. And you will start the process of having the right perspective toward yourself. So work on that. Well you.

I want you to think now, for the next week about where you see yourself as special write down your specialist, what your gifts are your abilities, your passions, how you're unique, ask others around you to tell you that and then like that Where your soft spots are, where your weaknesses are, hey, ask your friends what those are as your parents are or colleagues or if your children ask them what they what those are, they'll tell you I asked my family and they tell me and and learn we both write those down and then let's start getting a real look at our strengths and our weaknesses and start moving forward. You got it. Hey, and if you like this, pass this on to some of your friends, your family. Lord knows we could all use some help and dealing with stress and I hope this was helpful to you, Ron, signing off from again, my beautiful backyard.

In San Diego, California.