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Encore: Will Poulter, Dave Beran, and The Bear 52:22

9 days ago52:22

52:22

Season 3 of the smash hit FX/Hulu show “The Bear” roared to life just days ago, but Will Poulter (the actor who plays fan-favorite Luca) and 2014 F&W Best New Chef Dave Beran had been prepping for weeks. Poulter — like his co-star Jeremy Allen White — staged with Beran at his Santa Monica restaurant Pasjoli to learn how to accurately portray a professional chef onscreen. The lessons went so well, Beran says he’d hire Poulter as a cook — even despite a messy mishap with a pastry bag. The two dished all about getting kitchen culture right on and offscreen, what it takes to be at the top of your craft, and the pure magic of a great restaurant service. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices…

Life Talk with Craig Lounsbrough

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Content provided by Craig Lounsbrough. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by Craig Lounsbrough or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://player.fm/legal.

Life Talk is a podcast intentionally designed to enrich your life, deepen your marriage, enhance your parenting, maximize your work life, and dramatically embolden this journey that we call life.

… continue reading

200 episodes

#Health and Well-Being #Self-Improvement #Craig Lounsbrough

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Life Talk with Craig Lounsbrough

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Content provided by Craig Lounsbrough. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by Craig Lounsbrough or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://player.fm/legal.

Life Talk is a podcast intentionally designed to enrich your life, deepen your marriage, enhance your parenting, maximize your work life, and dramatically embolden this journey that we call life.

… continue reading

200 episodes

#Health and Well-Being #Self-Improvement #Craig Lounsbrough

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1
To Think Outside the Box - "In the Footsteps of the Few" 7:53

2 days ago7:53

7:53

In the Footsteps of the Few I Was Thinking To Think Outside the Box “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.” Pablo Picasso I think that most of our thinking (despite how much there is to think about) is really pretty standardized and chafingly rote. We think in predetermined patterns and pre-existent templates that require no real thinking. And while there’s a whole lot to think about in this big, wide world of ours…we don’t. Not really. Why? Most of this appears to happen because we think within boxes that we randomly (and sometimes not so randomly) borrow. We think within predetermined boxes because they’re convenient and because they’re standardized. But what if our thinking were to open up fresh venues? And what if life could become a journey not lived within suffocating boxes, but rather an adventure crafted of breathless horizons where there are no boxes? What if? So, let’s consider some boxes that we tend to get stuck in. First, The Box of Societal Norms We think within the box of societal norms. We grant these norms legitimacy because most of the people around us adhere to them in one form or another. Because all these people adhere to them, we naturally grant these norms a morality, assuming that others would not dare embrace them if they weren’t sufficiently ethical or moral. To our relief, we quickly discover that if we think within these boxes we are far less likely to be met with rejection, or ridicule, or disdainful judgement, or some other rather distasteful response. Therefore, the rules of the box rule out the role of thinking. Second, The Box of the Mundane We think within the well-worn boxes of the mundane as that path is quite well charted, and therefore void of anything dangerous because other people have figured out where all the dangerous stuff is and either removed it, or they’ve created paths around it. We know that venturing off the path in life is ref with all sorts of calamity that’s just waiting to happen, and so in the box of the mundane there’s nothing to venture off on because there’s one and only one path. It might be mundane, it might go nowhere, but it’s safe (if you happen to define ‘safe’ as refusing to live in order to effectively avoid being hurt). Therefore, the rules of the box rule out the role of thinking. Third, The Box of Our Fears We think within the box of our fears, as anything on the outside of those walls is filled with horrific danger (often of the most fabricated sort). We’ve probably ventured out there a time or two, and when we did, we got hurt. And so, when we were hurt, we put our pain on emotional steroids which exponentially magnified our fear. We then took that fear and fashioned a monster that doesn’t exist, and we hunkered down in our box horrified by the fiction of it all. And while the space out there is a whole lot bigger than the infinitesimally tiny space in here, at least it’s safe. Therefore, the rules of the box rule out the role of thinking. Fourth, The Box of Our Families We think within the box created by our families as we engaged them growing up. In many unhealthy families, their boxes were shaped by their own demons and assorted hobgoblins that they handed the reins of power over to. Over time, they dutifully passed those onto us. Sometimes these families demand that family members stay within those boxes. Other times, family members may prompt us to move outside of the box because they have come to recognize the life-sucking quality of the box. Yet, while they prompt us to step out, they did not know how to do so themselves. Therefore, the rules of the box rule out the role of thinking. Fifth and Finally, The Box of Self-Esteem We think within the box crafted by our low self-esteems. These are often the smallest of all boxes because we dare not create any room whatsoever for anyone else to come in lest they see how pathetically awful we really are. We know full well that there’s great adventure and untapped possibilities outside of our boxes. We can imagine adventure because we’ve imagined it so many times. But we doubt our ability to function in it, or find a place in it, or seize it in the cultivation of our dreams, or much less survive any adventure of any size. Therefore, the rules of the box rule out the role of thinking. I Was Thinking I was thinking that there are a whole lot of boxes. Lots and lots of them. But I was also thinking that they are just boxes and nothing more. And as a box, it doesn’t hold us. Rather, we hold it. And when we realize that power and move beyond our boxes, the parameters of our lives will explode exponentially in a manner that we will be free to think about all the many things that this big, wide world of ours has to think about. And so, I think that I really, really want to think outside the boxes. You will find all of these outlined in my book, “In the Footsteps of the Few – The Power of a Principled Life.” You will find “In the Footsteps of the Few” on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

1
Asking the Right Questions Verses Responding for the Wrong Reasons 8:31

6 days ago8:31

8:31

Too often we don't take the time to really ask why we support what we're supporting. We get swept up in some energizing movement, or we're utterly captivated by some cause. Something feels inherently good and the premise that drives it appears sound. We find that an army of people have raced to the forefront of this cause, or it's embraced as long overdue, or it appears right for the times. But in all of that, do we ask the larger questions? Do we ask if there is some underlying issue that's bigger than the cause that prompted it? Is there more here than just the excitement of the moment or the rallying cry of the population? Do we proceed with a wisdom that will solve the larger issues, or will we just perpetuate all of those by running amuck in lesser things? Change is needed. But if it is not thoughtful change, nothing will change.…

1
Not Defined By Our Appearance 10:03

8 days ago10:03

10:03

Defined By Our Appearance “If the mirror doesn’t give me much back, it’s because it’s not designed to reflect the things within me that make the reflection truly magnificent.” Craig D. Lounsbrough The world has set an airbrushed standard of what we’re supposed to look like. This photoshopped menagerie of idealized versions of a perfected humanity demands something of us that none of us can achieve. Even those whose images are altered to this definition of perfection are themselves nothing of the sort. The culture defines beauty but it cannot demonstrate what they define as beauty unless they fabricate it. Physical perfection is the illusion that eludes anyone who claims it or pursues it. It’s the design of people who themselves cannot achieve the design that they both create and propagate. This perfection is declared as some pinnacle whose pursuit is the holy grail of our existence. It is decreed as the key that opens doors that will never open for the less desirable. It will elicit favors that the more homely among us can never elicit. In essence, it’s value is non-negotiable. Misappropriated Investments Therefore, we rigorously invest in a host of surgeries, a variety of cutting-edge procedures, and an assorted collection of creams and lotions. We sweat through an endless variety of trendy workouts that claim to put us one step closer to this pinnacle of our humanity. We dive into whatever diet that happens to have the blessing of some trending celebrity or health guru. We spend hours preening in front of the mirror. We take thousands of selfies in order to capture just the right angle that accentuates everything that we want to accentuate, and that hides everything that we don’t. Our interactions with the world around us becomes dictated by a shrewd and entirely exhausting game of flaunting that which we believe to be beautiful and disguising that which we don’t. We are driven to present a pristine self that is pressed, clean, orderly, well-groomed, tight in the right places, and loose in the places that enhance our appearance. The Priority of Our Appearance Imagine, if you will, the amount of energy that we invest in our appearance. Imagine the amount of time, money, and personal resources that we squander on what we look like. And with such a grossly disproportionate investment in the external, the internal goes wanting. The essential essence of who we are is left languishing as the red-haired step-child to the physical part of ourselves that can never and will never define the whole of ourselves. We are ambushed by the power of the airbrush The Vulnerability of the Veneer Your humanity is too vast to be held hostage to the veneer of your appearance. The essence that you bring to your world is housed in the powerhouse of your humanity, not the smoothness of your complexion. Your abilities will always outclass your body type. Flexing a muscle changes nothing. Flexing your mind can change everything. The veneers are a pathetic representation of what we think will garner the affection and attention of a world from which we seek acceptance at the sacrifice of self. Veneers are a mortifying trade-off where our desperate need for acceptance drives us to betray ourselves in a deathly exchange of identity for acceptance. Defining Ourselves By Our Appearance Despite its destructive nature, this photoshopped menagerie of idealized versions of a perfected humanity reigns over a deluded culture. It is the template by which all other templates are judged, modified or mortified. It is the reflection demanded of every mirror. Acquiescing to this weak standard, we begin to judge ourselves in relation to that standard. We lay out some sort of culturally-biased continuum in our heads and then we gauge our value based on where we place ourselves on that continuum. We live a life where the entirety of our resources are spent fighting our way up that continuum. The understanding of who we are and any value that we possess becomes based on where we’ve landed on that continuum and how aggressively we’re working our way up it (or have fallen down it). In the book, “The Self that I Long to Believe In,” I wrote the following: “Our existence alone is the greatest statement of our worth and the clearest evidence as to our value. What we do with that existence is up to us. But the sheer reality of that existence evidences value. The fact I am writing this and you are reading this attests to the fact that we both have immense value because we both exist to do both of those things.” That thought is build upon by a later quote in the book which reads: “Each of us needs to embrace the fact that our value is in who we are. And we need to widen that thought by understanding that this value that we carry within us exceeds our greatest estimation of it. It will readily eclipse anything that we do.” None of this has anything to do with our appearance. The essence of your greatness is not based on what you look like in any mirror. It’s based on what you want to do with the person that’s in the mirror. It’s ferreting out the rich storehouse of gifts, talents, and abilities that reside within the heart. These will handily eclipse any reflection. I would go so far as to say that cultivating who you are will lend such a power and vibrancy to your presentation that your physical appearance will be swallowed up in release of who you are. People won’t seek you out because of how you look. They will seek out because you radiate something that swallows up the superficiality of what they’ve spent their lives pursuing. The Reflection of Your Soul, Not Your Face “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am” outlines thirty-one “I am” statements that God has made regarding who you are. These are the reflections that have value. These are the reflections that grant our lives the power and sense of satisfaction that no other reflection will be able to deliver. Indeed, they are what’s truly beautiful. They are elegant. Their beauty deepens with age and their power multiplies with time. Your appearance is enhanced to the point that no mirror can contain it or reflect it. That is what the following “I am” statements will deliver into your life, today and every day. You will find “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am” on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Freedom is Precious 0:59

11 days ago0:59

0:59

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “If I don’t passionately desire freedom for all of my fellowmen, it’s likely that I haven’t been sufficiently freed from my selfishness so that I might see their captivity.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
Thinking About the Memorials That We're Creating 12:08

13 days ago12:08

12:08

Finding Ourselves Somewhere Else In the Footsteps of the Few Not Where We Were It seems that we have some vague and rather ethereal sense of where we’re going in this thing called life. For the more contemplative soul, that sense might be quite refined. For the casual traveler, it might be a bit more nebulous and scattered. For many, where they’re going is defined by the tasks of the day, rather than enlarged by a vision for tomorrow. In many cases where we’re going is far more rigorously defined by all the places where we don’t want to go, rather than the places where we do want to go. At other times its definition is shaped by the opinions of others, or it’s carved directly from the bedrock of the value systems that have been built into our lives throughout the whole of our lives. In whatever way we do it, we all have some sense of where we’re going. And too often, we find ourselves ending up someplace else. The Detours We Create Yet, life is not so predictable as to always wind its way to the places that we presumed it to be going. There are those times when where we were going was mistaken as some sort of final destination when in reality it was only a step to a final destination. At other times the place where we’re going is really a destination that we had fabricated because the place to which life had originally called us appeared too big, or too far, or too steep, or simply impossible in whatever way our limited vision happened to interpret it. Sometimes our destination is to set a course away from our destination so that we can dispense with whatever responsibility or obligation our original destination might have demanded of us. But then there are those other times when life takes a sharp turn that seems little of our actions, nothing of our destination, but everything of circumstances designed to kill our journey and crush our destination long before we get within arm’s length of it. And then in the magic of life, there are those times where we have actually pursued some authentic destination with such rigor that the trajectory has catapulted us past our destination to places that are everything of our fondest imagination. However, it might play out, we’re all headed somewhere. The Explanation of Detours Missed How It Happens Yet, more often than not it’s the not the obvious shifts in our journey that are the core problem. Sure, life shows up and we get shoved down. There’s no question that the natural ebb and flow of life, whether it be titanic or miniscule, will happen to us. Despite our frequently ego-centric inclinations to the contrary, we are not so shrewd or ingenious as to be able to traverse life in a manner that deftly side-steps everything that comes at us. We don’t dance as well as we think we do. Casual and Careless Yet, more often than not, the explanation doesn’t rest in life having shown up. The much more poignant issue is that too often we are passive, flabby and lax in rigorously living out our lives. We’re far too casual and careless. Somehow, somewhere the sanctity of life and the privilege of living it out was supplanted with some sense that it’s too much work or that it’s not going to work, so why try? Preoccupied with Pabulum Too often we’re too preoccupied with pabulum. We’re tediously engaged with tiny things and we’re caught in the tedium of minutia because we can gather these things around us and control them when the bigger things are out of our control. Too frequently we’re goaded by the fear of big dreams and massive possibilities, so we dumb down our lives to anesthetize those fears. Along for the Ride Frequently we presume that we’re some docile passenger along for a ride that’s going wherever it’s going, so we just let it go to wherever that place is. We freely surrender to passivity which is an invitation to meaninglessness. And meaninglessness is the death of the soul itself. Life is a river, we say. And the best course of action is to navigate it because entertaining the far-fetched notion of swimming against it is utterly preposterous. The Walls of Denial At other times, we live in the constructed confines erected from the raw material of denial, causing us to live out a life that is in denial of life itself. We become squatters living in a squatter’s camp constructed by the flimsy materials of justification, rationalization, blame-placing and projecting. We pull in the walls due to the reality that materials of this sort are always pulling inward because they will die if we dare to press them outward. Hemmed in by walls of this sort, the world around us is shut out and moves on without our awareness of it. Ending Up Where We Wish to Be We will end up somewhere. The fact that we have a destination is irrefutable as life is a journey that presents us with no option other than the journey. We may decide that the nature and course of the journey is irrelevant, and we may take a backseat to passivity. If we do, we have no right to complain when we end up in some place other than what we may have thought or preferred. Yet, we can recognize that we are not automatons subject to the flux of the world within which we have found ourselves. It would seem advisable to recognize that we have an obligation to the course that our life is taking, and that along with that obligation we have been granted a profound degree of power to bring to the course. If we succumb to carelessness, or become engrossed by pabulum, or if we just let the ride go wherever circumstances take it, or if we pull close the walls of denial this thing that we call life will wind itself to wherever it’s going with no one at the helm. And that kind of destination cannot be good. We would be wise to inventory our lives and determine if we are in some way large or small participating in any of these behaviors. If so, we need to root them out and expunge them from our lives. Reclaiming a sense of vision, and then seizing our lives with discipline and intentionality will set us on a path that will land us in places that we’ve dreamt to land. If we don’t, the place we land may not be on any land that we even remotely recognize.…

1
The Path to Losing Our Freedom 8:20

15 days ago8:20

8:20

Our freedoms are not a "right." They are, in fact, a "privilege." They are not ours to abuse. Rather, they are ours to cherish. But as we abuse these rights by demanding our right to them or exercising them in ways that will destroy these very freedoms, we forget that they are fragile. Very fragile. They are not permanent. They are not guaranteed. They will not stand under the weight of our misuse of them. And if handled inappropriately or abused in one of the many ways that we abuse them, we may someday find ourselves without them. We are a nation that is losing it's mooring. We are blatantly rewriting our history and thoughtlessly discarding truth in some mad dash of ultimate destruction. We are using our freedoms to destroy ourselves. And I would think that that is the saddest use of these cherished and long-held freedoms that I can think of.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - We Need to Stop 1:21

17 days ago1:21

1:21

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life. We need to stop. We need to put down our calendars, set our phones aside, strip ourselves of the voices incessantly clamoring for our attention and listen. Just listen. For life is not what we’re chasing. It’s what we’re leaving behind in the chasing. Consider this “Thought for Life:” “Rich is the person who stops long enough to listen to a bird sing in the celebration of spring, peer into the deep blue of a drowsy summer sky, draw in the pungent aroma of fall’s leaves, and watch the listless kiss of a winter’s snow. For in doing these you have witnessed that which money cannot purchase and man cannot create.” I hope that you ponder that thought today. Discover all of my daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Fear or Faith 1:00

21 days ago1:00

1:00

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life. We spend our lives acquiring what we think we need to fight the battles that we think we’re fighting. In a world fraught with fear and uncertainty, we assimilate whatever grants us this sense of invincibility and power for whatever battle we think we’re fighting. Consider this “Thought for Life:” “I do not weaponize my life for God by rigorously acquiring an expansive arsenal of sophisticated munitions. Rather, I empty out the arsenal of everything but God, for at that point the arsenal is filled to capacity.” I hope that you ponder that thought today. Discover all of my daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
Finding Ourselves Somewhere Else - "In the Footsteps of the Few" 8:52

23 days ago8:52

8:52

Not Where We Were It seems that we have some vague and rather ethereal sense of where we’re going in this thing called life. For the more contemplative soul, that sense might be quite refined. For the casual traveler, it might be a bit more nebulous and scattered. For many, where they’re going is defined by the tasks of the day, rather than enlarged by a vision for tomorrow. In many cases where we’re going is far more rigorously defined by all the places where we don’t want to go, rather than the places where we do want to go. At other times its definition is shaped by the opinions of others, or it’s carved directly from the bedrock of the value systems that have been built into our lives throughout the whole of our lives. In whatever way we do it, we all have some sense of where we’re going. And too often, we find ourselves ending up someplace else. The Detours We Create Yet, life is not so predictable as to always wind its way to the places that we presumed it to be going. There are those times when where we were going was mistaken as some sort of final destination when in reality it was only a step to a final destination. At other times the place where we’re going is really a destination that we had fabricated because the place to which life had originally called us appeared too big, or too far, or too steep, or simply impossible in whatever way our limited vision happened to interpret it. Sometimes our destination is to set a course away from our destination so that we can dispense with whatever responsibility or obligation our original destination might have demanded of us. But then there are those other times when life takes a sharp turn that seems little of our actions, nothing of our destination, but everything of circumstances designed to kill our journey and crush our destination long before we get within arm’s length of it. And then in the magic of life, there are those times where we have actually pursued some authentic destination with such rigor that the trajectory has catapulted us past our destination to places that are everything of our fondest imagination. However, it might play out, we’re all headed somewhere. The Explanation of Detours Missed How It Happens Yet, more often than not it’s the not the obvious shifts in our journey that are the core problem. Sure, life shows up and we get shoved down. There’s no question that the natural ebb and flow of life, whether it be titanic or miniscule, will happen to us. Despite our frequently ego-centric inclinations to the contrary, we are not so shrewd or ingenious as to be able to traverse life in a manner that deftly side-steps everything that comes at us. We don’t dance as well as we think we do. Casual and Careless Yet, more often than not, the explanation doesn’t rest in life having shown up. The much more poignant issue is that too often we are passive, flabby and lax in rigorously living out our lives. We’re far too casual and careless. Somehow, somewhere the sanctity of life and the privilege of living it out was supplanted with some sense that it’s too much work or that it’s not going to work, so why try? Preoccupied with Pabulum Too often we’re too preoccupied with pabulum. We’re tediously engaged with tiny things and we’re caught in the tedium of minutia because we can gather these things around us and control them when the bigger things are out of our control. Too frequently we’re goaded by the fear of big dreams and massive possibilities, so we dumb down our lives to anesthetize those fears. Along for the Ride Frequently we presume that we’re some docile passenger along for a ride that’s going wherever it’s going, so we just let it go to wherever that place is. We freely surrender to passivity which is an invitation to meaninglessness. And meaninglessness is the death of the soul itself. Life is a river, we say. And the best course of action is to navigate it because entertaining the far-fetched notion of swimming against it is utterly preposterous. The Walls of Denial At other times, we live in the constructed confines erected from the raw material of denial, causing us to live out a life that is in denial of life itself. We become squatters living in a squatter’s camp constructed by the flimsy materials of justification, rationalization, blame-placing and projecting. We pull in the walls due to the reality that materials of this sort are always pulling inward because they will die if we dare to press them outward. Hemmed in by walls of this sort, the world around us is shut out and moves on without our awareness of it. Ending Up Where We Wish to Be We will end up somewhere. The fact that we have a destination is irrefutable as life is a journey that presents us with no option other than the journey. We may decide that the nature and course of the journey is irrelevant, and we may take a backseat to passivity. If we do, we have no right to complain when we end up in some place other than what we may have thought or preferred. Yet, we can recognize that we are not automatons subject to the flux of the world within which we have found ourselves. It would seem advisable to recognize that we have an obligation to the course that our life is taking, and that along with that obligation we have been granted a profound degree of power to bring to the course. If we succumb to carelessness, or become engrossed by pabulum, or if we just let the ride go wherever circumstances take it, or if we pull close the walls of denial this thing that we call life will wind itself to wherever it’s going with no one at the helm. And that kind of destination cannot be good. We would be wise to inventory our lives and determine if we are in some way large or small participating in any of these behaviors. If so, we need to root them out and expunge them from our lives. Reclaiming a sense of vision, and then seizing our lives with discipline and intentionality will set us on a path that will land us in places that we’ve dreamt to land. If we don’t, the place we land may not be on any land that we even remotely recognize. Thanks for joining us today. You will discover “In the Footsteps of the Few – The Power of a Principled Life,” as well as all of my books on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. It’s my hope that you find these books are meaningful and restorative in your life. Also, visit us daily on all of our Social Media sites to find inspirational quotes and videos.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Building Bridges or Barries 0:57

24 days ago0:57

0:57

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life. We build bridges or barriers. If you think about it, everything that we do builds one or the other. And the function of a bridge is quite different than the function of a barrier. Consider this “Thought for Life:” “Every decision will build a bridge or a barrier. Therefore, what stands in front of you at this moment illustrates the decisions that you made on your way to this moment.” I hope that you ponder that thought today. Discover all of my daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
A Mother's Day Letter 11:29

28 days ago11:29

11:29

Dear Mom: I realize that on days like Mother’s Day people tend to wax nostalgic, venerating those Mom’s among us who have passed. It is, I suppose, a way to express both our deep respect and enduring gratitude, while somehow holding you a bit closer in heart and mind since we can no longer hold you in our arms. Mom, you are missed more than the reach of words and the span of syntax can hope to explain. Yet if it were our choice, if your three boys had the power and authority to choose, even then we would not wish you here for you are truly home in a truly perfect and inexplicable way. Mom, your voice here is now muted, heard only in our hearts, our memories, and throughout the grand halls of heaven. Even so, we still hear it. And when it fades in the frequently stifling noise of life, we play it over in our minds so as not to forget it. Your wisdom now arises from the many footprints you left across the landscape of our lives, examples that speak life and truth and love and ceaseless hope into both the barren places, as well as those places wonderful and lush that we walk through daily. Your touch is lost to us, those simple hugs from a simple woman who not only knew how to love, but how to express it in a way that made each moment warm and safe. It is one thing to be loved. It is quite another to know that you are loved. We knew. And now standing so many years removed from your passing, we still know. But Mom, in the balance we have gained infinitely more. You left a legacy in our lives; a robust legacy that embodies integrity, honesty and tenacity. A brave legacy that boldly, even brashly believes that God always provides, always cares, always knows and is an ever-present source from which every need will always be met. You helped us understand that life ebbs and flows, sometimes magically and sometimes cruelly. You showed us that life at times invites us to a grand dance, and at other times it seems to slam us to the dance floor leaving us cringing and bleeding. Life pours into us, and then it draws out of us. The sun at times warms us and then the hail pelts us. In whatever form it takes, you taught us that God always prevails, that there is always good, that it will always, always work out. And it always did. You left us an unrelenting understanding that life is more than some daily routine, or the achievement of tasks either great or small. Life is about living well, living with respect, living in a manner that adds rather than detracts. It is not about pretending things are well or being Pollyannaish. You taught us that life is about understanding that things will not always be fair nor will life necessarily be just, but in the hands of God it will always present us with opportunities to learn about ourselves, to grow and to add something to those around us. Mom, all of these lessons came packaged in simple things like iced tea on sweltering summer days and hot chocolate on frigid winter nights. It was bedtime prayers that started “now I lay me down to sleep . . .” It was endless lunches packed for school, dimes tucked in lunch boxes for white milk during the week and chocolate milk on Friday’s. It was planting flowers in Spring’s sweet soils, and canning fruit when Fall generously yielded up the bounty born of those soils. It was wrapping us thick in mounds of coats and lengthy scarves when winter drew nature to sleep, and vacuuming the pool when the glory of summer ran and skipped through our days. It was summed up in a tiny plaque that still hangs in the kitchen which reads, “Bless this house oh Lord we pray, make it safe by night and day.” Such was your life. It was being home when the street lights came on, carrying the laundry up the stairs, and not hitting our brothers. It was your voice calmly and yet quite firmly saying, “quit teasing the dog.” “This didn’t get broken by itself.” “Did you call your grandmother?” “If your friends jumped off a cliff would you follow them?” “Would you please flush the toilet?” “Did you get your homework done?” “Please put your clothes in the dirty clothes hamper.” “Don’t listen to your brother.” “Who left the lights on?” “Please pick up your room.” “Were you born in a barn?” “I didn’t raise you kids to be like this!” “Who tipped over the Christmas tree?” And, “it didn’t walk away by itself.” Underlying it all, being spoken with undeniable clarity there were these messages. “I love you.” “You can achieve anything you want with your life.” “You kids are God’s gift to me.” “You’re the best kids in the world.” “I don’t deserve you boys.” “I’m praying for you.” “How can I help you?” “How are you doing?” “Do you need anything?” “I’m so proud of you boys.” It was all of those things, and so much more. Mom, you were about the stuff of building the lives of three boys and taking care of a husband who was, at those rather impetuous times, a boy himself. It was really never about you. We tried to make it about you so many times, but you always politely declined. Rather, it was a selfless investment, pouring your life, your energies and fiber of your being into three boys who really had no clue what you were doing until they themselves were adults. Even today we are unable to fully fathom the depth of your sacrifices. While I would wish to say otherwise, I doubt that we will ever understand them fully. We again commit to you on this Mother’s Day that we will strive to selflessly pour into the lives of others that which you so graciously poured into our lives. We know that any such efforts on our parts will pale indeed to the way in which you poured yourself into our lives. Know that we are committed to drawing from the innumerable footprints that you left, the lessons taught and lived, and the insights imparted. We will draw from the vast storehouse of memories packed tight with words, mental pictures, ceaseless emotions and warm thoughts. And we will live that out Mom, as we have for so many years since you passed. We will bring your life to the lives of our families, the people who populate our careers, and to those we meet in the briefest passing. You will live on Mom, here as well as in the marbled halls of heaven. You will touch innumerable lives through your three boys who you loved, equipped, nurtured, guided, guarded and then launched. One final thing Mom; we want you to know that we will live each day in anticipation of seeing you again. However, we commit that we will not let that anticipation somehow diminish the efforts and energies we invest in living life. We will not live in some sort of distracted state, focused solely on the idea of seeing you again and awaiting that moment in such a way that the present moment is squandered. Rather, we will invest our lives vigorously while holding fast to the promise of scripture that there awaits for us a grand reunion, a wild celebration of relationships restored in a creation likewise restored. In the meantime Mom, know that you are loved, that you are fondly remembered, that you live on in us and that when stories of you are told, they will be told with the greatest love and deepest admiration. Thanks Mom. We love more than simple words could hope to convey. God bless and see you soon. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

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Podcast Short: Am I Passionate for the Right Things? 6:15

29 days ago6:15

6:15

Am I Passionate for the Right Things? “In full uniform, the color guard marched by as part of the parade. And as they did, he forced his horribly slumped and deeply aged body out of his worn wheelchair and stood to ram-rod attention. He held a salute until the guard had passed, and then he feebly collapsed back into his wheelchair. As I stared in ever-warming admiration, emblazoned across his hat I saw the words “WWII Veteran.” And while I deeply admire his stirring passion for our country, I stood there wishing that my passion for the cause of Christ might someday be strong enough to lift me out of the many wheelchairs within which I sit.” Am I passionate for the right things? Not just passionate. But passionate in the right way. Sure, there’s a lot of voices out there. There’s a lot of causes out there. There’s a lot of yelling, and screaming, and arguing, and hostile behaviors, and noisy propaganda, and a bunch of edgy people on more than one rant advocating for these causes. On top of that, the causes themselves shift depending upon the temperature of the culture, or the agenda of the people pulling long strings behind closed doors. There are causes that represent the demands of a handful of people who find the foundations of their cause so ill-defined or fragile that constructive dialogue is replaced with destructive actions. Greed is rampant. Power-mongering runs wild. Principles have been discarded because they impede the progressive thinking that end up resulting in regressive outcomes. And in this mess and in the midst of all of this noise, am I passionate for the right things? Consider this. There are some things that are timeless. There are some things that are woven into this existence that you can’t remove. There are principles and ethics that are foundational. You can try and remove them, but there’s a huge cost to that. Civilizations throughout history have messed with them, or attempted to adjust them to suit a particular cause, or worked to rid their culture of them altogether. And the outcomes are never good. History will tell us that rather plainly, if we’re willing to be honest about history. And so, I want to be passionate about something that’s timeless, because I want it to live on beyond my life. Something that this culture can reliably build on both today and tomorrow and for every tomorrow after that. Something that’s certain to sustain my kids and grandkids and great-grandkids. And nothing that we can create on our own will do that. What we create is too weak, and too fragile, and too shallow, and too lackluster to do that. That kind of stuff is only something that God can create. And so, it’s this God and what He created and principles that He built it all around, it’s that stuff that I choose to be passionate about. Not man-made stuff because that doesn’t last. Rather, it’s God-created stuff. It’s the principles that shaped this existence at its core that I will surrender my passions to and be passionate about. Because if I’m not passionate about that stuff, passion won’t matter because very shortly nothing will.…

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”LifeTalks” Thought for Life - Not As Helpless As We Think 1:03

4 weeks ago1:03

1:03

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life. Sometimes we feel helpless. In the midst of tragedy, or painful losses, or devastating moments, we often feel that we are helpless to do anything other than standby and watch. Yet is that really all that we can do? Consider this “Thought for Life:” “Prayer inserts me into the middle of any battlefield regardless of how gruesome or bloodied. And in the carnage of whatever that battle might be, it allows me to deliver a force greater than any raging on that field.” I hope that you ponder that thought today. Discover all of my daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

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”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - An Existence Without God 0:59

5 weeks ago0:59

0:59

Welcome to LifeTalk’s Thought for Life. It’s my sense that God doesn’t need me to speak to you. He’s quite capable of doing that without me. But there are times when I sense that He wants me to speak something of Him to you. And this is one of those moments. Consider this “Thought for Life:” “I don’t always preach God, for His existence is obvious. Rather, I preach what will happen to our existence if we deny His.” I hope that you ponder that thought today. Discover all of my daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

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The Unrecognized Potency of Prayer 7:16

5 weeks ago7:16

7:16

Let’s start here. Think about this thought: “Too often we have stripped our single greatest asset of its power and hobbled it to the degree that it has come to be viewed only as a pathetic last resort. Yet despite our incessant meddling, this asset nonetheless remains a first resort so potent that it never needs a last one. And that asset is prayer.” Prayer. You know, through our own lack of understanding and discipline, we’ve granted prayer the characteristics associated with some antiquated religious monk living in some secluded monastery off in the woods. For us, prayer sits on the far fringes of life as some traditional nicety that we toy with when we’re not wrestling with bigger things. It might serve a purpose in life’s special moments, or in the midst of life’s most dire emergencies, but even then we’re not all that confident that it actually brings anything to either. To varying degrees we’ve rendered prayer as culturally outdated, logistically outmoded, a backburner endeavor, and far too simplistic to grapple with the monumental realities that are part of living in the 21st century. But I would challenge all of that by saying this: “I am convinced beyond words to convey that prayer is infinitely more than the mindless ranting of some poor, delusional soul talking to some imaginary friend in some imaginary place. Oh, to the contrary. Prayer is the manifest pleading of a soul worn raw that, by the simple act of prayer, unleashes untold forces that we can’t imagine that surge in a descent so massive and so inconceivably powerful that the ground of everything before them shakes. And in this descent lives are changed beyond recognition, nations are transformed beyond comprehension, and history is brought to its knees in the face of a God who says, “be healed.” That, my friend, is nothing of a delusional soul or imaginary friend or any other such nonsense.” That is what prayer is. But let’s build on that. Consider this: “How do I tell you what prayer is? It is everything that I need every time I kneel in the practice of it. It shakes the infinite alive and sets its armies afoot in defense of me. It will never run aground or find itself drowning in the waters of the adversity that I bring to it. Nothing it faces is insurmountable, for to think that such an adversary exists is to run a fool’s errand. It will shield me in its advance, it will beckon me to anticipate the miracles that it is about to wield, and in the midst of it all it calms me as it whispers, 'Be still and know that I am God.' And because of these reasons and a million more, I find prayer the single greatest place that I could ever imagine being.” That’s what prayer is. And if that’s not what prayer is in your life, or if that’s not what your experience of prayer is, then you’ve missed one of the powerful things that we have the privilege of engaging in. We’ve settled for this slumlord existence of spiritual impoverishment when we can be spiritually rich in ways that give light, and energy, and meaning, and purpose to life. Enjoy LifeTalk's wide array of inspirational and timely programs on most podcast platforms. You can also enjoy his daily quotations on Facebook, Pinterest, X, Instagram, and LinkedIn. __________________________________________________________________________________ You will discover all of Craig's books on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold.…

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Bigger on the Inside - The Self That I Long to Believe In 10:35

5 weeks ago10:35

10:35

The Self That I Long to Believe In Bigger on the Inside Than the Outside Attempting to Define Success to Define Ourselves “It would make sense that our worth should be, and in reality is based on something that cannot be proven for any other reason than its value lies forever beyond the most magnificent achievements that would serve to even remotely evidence it.” Success has been accorded an endless array of definitions. Some of them are crafted to make failure seem more like success so that we can limp through life and fail without remorse or guilt. Other definitions are quite lofty, written to give us opportunity achieve in a manner that has little to do with the achievement and everything to do with restoring blunted self-esteems. At times success is defined by whatever will accord us the accolades of others or advance us socially or professionally. At yet other times, the definition of success is more about giving ourselves a sorely needed boost when our spirits have been lagging. Lost in the Array of Definitions Whatever and wherever their source, a dizzying array of definitions abound. Many seem to be a target created after the trigger was pulled, making every decision a bulls-eye even if the aim was horrid. Some are thrown out because they’re easy, or we’re not certain what success is so we just come up with something that might pass for success if people don’t pay too much attention. And in the squalor of definitions gone awry and rogue, we seem to have lost a genuine definition of success. Why Success? It's interesting that success, in whatever manner it is defined, has come to define our worth and value. That’s why a lack of perceived success will tank our self-esteem quicker than just about anything else. Success appears to have become the litmus test as to the credibility of our existence and the unforgiving gauge of our worth. Success has evolved into the exclusive commodity by which we ascribe value to ourselves and others. Fear of Questioning the Definition Success becomes so acutely defined and so irrevocably defining that we seldom entertain any other possible definition. We find ourselves entangled in the culturally mandated definition of success, or the definitions imposed by our families or friends or occupation. We become so absorbed in the sorting out and the achieving of those definitions that the endeavor to achieve them becomes inordinately consuming. But what does this mean in terms of how we’ve come to identify who we are and in that, how we’ve attempted to determine the value of who we are? The Flaw of Success Yet, the nature of such a mentality of success demands that we constantly achieve. It is an effort of insanely perpetual works that requires that we continually prove our worth as the previous success eventually fades sufficiently to demand a new one. Sure, we can define it. But success as used to determine our worth and value is always temporal. It’s always moving. Therefore, we become enslaved to successes that demand nothing more than other successes. We Are Too Big to Be Defined By Any Success Our value is not based on ‘what we do.’ Rather, it is based on ‘who we are.’ If we remain stuck with the feeling that our worth is based on ‘what we do,’ the definition of success is what lends credence to those efforts. Success is irrelevant in respect to our self-esteem as any definition of success regardless of how lofty does not possess the power to sustain our sense of worth or feed our sense of value. When it comes to our sense of worth and value, success is the thing that’s not the thing. It’s been marketed as the snake oil for our self-esteem by the carpetbaggers of our culture, but it’s snake oil only. Success cannot do what it promises to do. With such an apparently irreconcilable flaw in its makeup, it would be worthwhile to postulate that our worth must be based on something significantly more consistent and profoundly more fundamental than success. Value Based on Who We Are Maybe we should dare to consider that our worth does not need to be established either by effort or definition. Maybe we should consider the possibility that it has never ‘not’ been established. That success was achieved by the fact that God decided to designed us and then deliver us into a far larger design to make an impact in and upon that design. We’re here, and that itself is a success. Everything that we do from here forward is not about success, for success has already been achieved by the fact of our existence. It’s about calling. It’s about fulfillment of the purpose that we’ve been given the privilege to fulfill. It’s about honing in on our purpose and purposefully carrying it out. It’s about obedience to the call, not the adherence to some definition that measures our obedience to the call. It’s doing all of that knowing that our worth and value exists by virtue of the fact that we exist. From there on out, it’s about the doing and not about the proving. Thinking a Bit More Deeply It would therefore be wise to consider the possibility that our worth is based on something so profound and unerringly rich that its worth singularly speaks for itself. Something that does not need to be proven simply because it is established in a manner that the need of proof is the weakness of our vision and not the fact of reality. It would make sense that our worth should be, and in reality is based on something that cannot be proven for any other reason than its value lies forever beyond the most magnificent achievements that would serve to even remotely evidence it. Achieving for Sheer Pleasure, Not Proof of Value We would be wise to embrace the liberating reality that we can achieve in life for the sheer pleasure of achievement, rather than as a despairing effort to establish our worth. We can walk through life with vigor and tenacity out of a sense of worth, not out of some desperate effort to prove our worth. We change things and we change the course of things because we have been privileged to possess both the ability and the permission to do so. Life is engaged, energized and inspired by our worth, rather than depleted in the pursuit of it. Our days are lived embracing the reality that our value is based on who we are, and to embrace that liberating reality is to embrace a life liberated. The Viciousness of Low Self-Esteem Explained If we cannot embrace this indispensable reality, we will be irreversibly stunted by the limitations of the achievements we pursue. We will chain our potential to the baseness of achievements. When we do, the infinite worth that defines us will be forever overshadowed by the shallowness of achievements, for the greatest achievements will never come close to reflecting our true value. Your value is based on who you are, despite what you do. And that is a critical but glorious shift that we each must make.…

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”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - What is Truth? 0:54

6 weeks ago0:54

0:54

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “Decisions based on timeless truths will never leave our tomorrow regretting the decisions of our yesterday, for such truths will always supersede any ‘then’ or ‘now.’” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

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Taking It to Our Knees - Defined By Our Self-Esteem 8:36

6 weeks ago8:36

8:36

Defined By Our Self-Esteem “I can only imagine how much low self-esteem has robbed us as individuals and ransacked our culture. It is a rogue beast bent on diminishing us to some point of forlorn incapacity. Plagued by this beast, we live out marginalized lives that surrender the accomplishments and forsake the achievements that could have been ours. We grope through this existence meagerly living out each day by surviving each day, rather than realizing that we can live with an intensity that will have caused the day to finish having survived us.” Craig D. Lounsbrough From “The Self That I Long to Believe In” Hi, I’m Craig Lounsbrough Welcome to LifeTalk We are not defined by the worst-case assessment of ourselves, although we tend to render just such an assessment. We hand-pick the worst of ourselves to define the whole of ourselves. We do that because the worst of ourselves always seems to render the best of ourselves less than whatever best it might actually be. Our attitudes trend toward the downside of whoever it is that we are. The deficits. The failures. The reversals. The relationships that never happened or shouldn’t have happened. The goals that fell to the things that got in the way. Dreams that were crushed under the heel of reality. Choices that turned sour. Careers that died at the hands of corporate wrangling. Opportunities squandered. Surrender to fear when we should have feared the idea of surrender. We trend toward our interpretation of what these things say about us. The Application of Our Interpretations Once we’ve developed these interpretations of ourselves we apply them liberally. Their repeated application creates a negative skew where everything is painted in undesirable and self-defeating tones. The best of us never escapes the interpretation of the worst of us. Some small and commonplace error becomes catastrophic. An inconsequential misstep evidences our unworthiness. The normal hit-and-miss of life is turned into a relentless barrage of not so friendly-fire where we cut ourselves to ribbons. Defined by a Fraudulent Identity In time and over time we come to believe ourselves to be who and what we’ve told ourselves we are. We become convinced of our own self-deprecating narrative. The fictional account becomes the non-fiction of our existence. We find ourselves unable to entertain any other possible interpretation of who we are and who we can yet become. We cannot comprehend another story. An Authentic Script We become locked in a story not our own. We play a role fabricated of a false self. We continually force ourselves into alignment with this story because we have come to believe that the ‘force-fitting’ is actually some sort of self-actualizing struggle. We Are More No narrative can capture the whole of who you are. And no narrative can destroy that either. The vastness of your humanity will always escape the scope of any words that we might use to either define it, or hold it hostage. In the same vein, the narratives crafted by our deficits, our failures, the reversals, the relationships that failed, the goals that fell, the dreams that were crushed, the choices that turned sour, the careers that died, the opportunities that were squandered, our surrender to fear…none of these can craft a narrative even remotely capable of embodying the entirety of who we are. You are vaster than everything that would seek to define you, even if the person that’s doing the defining is you. In speaking to God, the Psalmist said, “I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made…” That’s your narrative. That’s your story. That’s who and what you are. You aren’t just one of many. You’re not just another person walking around on a planet populated by eight billion other people who are just walking around as well. You are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” Your design is the product of an infinite genius crafting a one-of-a-kind human being whose skill-sets and attributes were specifically fashioned to impact the point in history into which you were placed. That’s your story. That will always be your story. I would have you think about this. Read this carefully and slowly: “Whatever you see within yourself, let it be the whole of yourself. For too often we have been brutalized by our own sense of inadequacy and we’ve been held hostage to the lesser choices born of such a debilitating sense of self. Know this, that latent within you there lies more than ample resources begging to be called forth to smash the chains forged of such an incapacitating sense of self. And it is my prayer that you would press against everything within you that would hold you back, and that you would raise whatever voice you have and extend that call.” Craig D. Lounsbrough From “The Self That I Long to Believe In” Thirty-One I Am Statements The thirty-one statements made by God Himself declare that you are bound to nothing other than the magnificence of your design. Any low self-esteem only serves to mask the greatness within you. You will find all thirty-one of these “I Am” statements outlined in my book, “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am.” This book is a fresh, entirely thought-provoking, and richly insightful thirty-one day devotional that will assist you in both discovering and living out your real self. You will find “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am” on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

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New Beginnings - Seeds in Pain 3:01

7 weeks ago3:01

3:01

New beginnings. The way our lives frequently go, we doubt the existence of new beginnings...at least for us. We've had too much loss, far too much pain, and circumstances that seemed anything but kind to us. And as we look down the road of our lives, we can only envision more of the same. We really don't believe in new beginnings because all we've come to believe in is survival, and we frequently feel that we're doing that all that well either. But our new beginnings lay in our painful endings. No one likes to hear that, and few of us actually believe it. But the seeds of our new day, our new month, our new life lay scattered about in the midst of our losses. There are new beginnings awaiting you in the brokenness of your pain. And it's worth looking beyond your pain for a moment to gather the seeds that lay there waiting for you.…

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Backwards - The Grand Reversal of Easter 11:14

7 weeks ago11:14

11:14

Backwards - The Grand Reversal of Easter By Craig D. Lounsbrough I am backwards. I don’t think I’m backwards, I wouldn’t necessarily see myself as backwards, nor would I tell you that I’m backwards; but I’m backwards. And the oddity of it all is that I actually see backwards as forwards. From where I’m sitting it doesn’t look backwards at all. However, in terms of how I conceptualize the realities of life as held against the limitations that I perceive myself as having, I’m backwards. I’m backwards because I have tediously assessed the realities of the existence within which I am forced to operate, and I have concurrently determined the permanently fixed limitations that define my humanity as I live within that existence. And based on the conclusions I have drawn in these two areas, I have done a rather splendid job of setting the parameters for my existence by configuring (to the best of my ability) what’s possible and what’s not. In the end, this determination that I have made regarding that which is ‘possible’ verses that which is ’impossible’ is markedly canted toward the ‘impossible’, leaving me facing a life bereft of everything except a handful of the most limited ‘possibilities’. Worse yet, this determination has come to comprehensively define all of life as I know it, leaving me nothing bigger than myself. I have categorized the whole of life as falling within the limits that limit me, assuming these are limits for everything that exists, or ever will exist, or ever could exist. And in that sense, I have dramatically drawn down life into some minute rubric that is but the slightest fraction of what life really is. Indeed, I am backwards. God’s Reversal We reject God because He is not backwards. He comes to us asking us to move forward, which we, by virtue of our shallow determinations about how life works, see as backwards. And we stand there wondering why we would be asked to do something so utterly preposterous as moving backwards. In fact, what God calls forward we call impossible, or improbable, or ridiculous, or naïve, or fanciful, or ignorant, or any number of other explanations that really do more to explain how backwards we really are. Reversals History is littered with God’s reversals. Leprosy was healed when the person should have been consumed by it and died. Bodies of water were split in two when they should have been completely impassible. Food to feed literal thousands was secured from nothing more than a few small fish and a handful of leftover loaves of bread. Massive armies were evaporated without so much as a shot being fired. Dead teenagers were raised to life instead of being dropped in a hole. Paralytic limbs were straightened and people walked away when they should have crawled away. That stuff is all backwards. The Grand Reversal of Easter Then there is the grand reversal of Easter. It began with an execution reversed, whereby He who was innocent was brutally executed by those who were guilty. It was an inhumane execution turned into ingenious sacrifice, whereby an end for one man turned into a beginning for all men. It was a devout religious leader who should have cast his vote against this man, who instead carried this man’s body into his own tomb. Three days later it was an empty tomb when it should have not have been, leaving a dead man walking which is a reversal of the most astounding sort. It was a group of terrified disciples keeping their heads down while crawling back to their old lives, now standing directly in front of the man they watched lose His. It was all backwards. These were all uncategorically opposite of what should have been. If we apply the realities of the existence within which each of us are forced to live, these things and so many more were and are completely backwards. They were completely opposite of how it all should work. They simply did not and do not fit into how we have conceptualized the realities of the existence within which we are forced to operate, and how we have concurrently determined the permanently fixed limitations that define our humanity. They are backwards. Going Forward To fix this conundrum, might we say that to go forward we must indeed be willing to go backwards. And I suppose the best way to do that is to switch the two of these in our minds by reversing our perception of how this existence actually operates. And we cannot do that unless we include God, for God is the single and sole thing that reverses the limits of our humanity by quite literally obliterating those limits with His limitlessness. Therefore, we must comprehensively trade who we are for what He is, and in the trading trade off everything of us in the exchange. We must understand that it is not our limits that define our existence at all, although we have foolishly surrendered to that terribly myopic idea. Rather, it is God’s power and nature that define it. We must understand or at least accept the immense, radical and in many cases incomprehensible difference between who we are and who God is. And out of that understanding we must willingly trade our limitations for God’s limitlessness. Indeed, that alone will abruptly turn things around. When we do that, backward becomes forward. And when that happens we will have cut the chains that we’ve slapped on life, we will have blown out the boundaries that we thought defined us, the ‘possible’ verses that which is ’impossible’ now becomes wholly canted toward the ‘possible’, and the horizons that we had tightly fixed on our lives suddenly blow out to horizons that are horizon-less. Standing in the gaping space now created, we suddenly start to understand that dreams are more than hopeful fantasies that our minds toy with, rather they become realities that life is changed with. That a vision for something better can move from ‘nice idea’ to ‘transforming ideal’. That hope is not some thin thing that is subject to the winds of fate, but it is crafted hard by the hands of God. That the end of ourselves is where God begins. That the fear of failure is slain cold by success already hot on the way. That a looming mountain is nothing more than a road in disguise, and that the impossible is not an obstacle but an invitation. Message Delivered All of this and more happens when we refuse to continue to go backwards. All of this and more is the true forward. This is the incessant and unrelenting message of God throughout history. And it is a message hand delivered by God’s Son Jesus with potent impact at Easter. It is a message for anyone who will hear it. It is the single and sole message that can turn us from backward to forward. Therefore, be assured that the direction of our lives and the outcome of our existence will hinge on what we do with this single message. Oh yes, I am backwards, but no longer. How about you? Find additional Easter resources on our website at www.craiglpc.com . Enjoy all of our daily posts on Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn, X, and Instagram.…

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”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Ignoring Our Conscience 0:52

8 weeks ago0:52

0:52

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “Disabling your conscience is like disabling your smoke detector. It doesn’t stop a fire. It just leaves you ignorant of the fact that there is one.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

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Defined By the Culture - "Taking It to Our Knees" 9:53

8 weeks ago9:53

9:53

Defined By the Culture "Taking It to Our Knees - Declaring Who I Am “When they ridicule me and tell me that my need to do the ‘right thing’ is embedded in an overweening insecurity about doing the ‘wrong thing,’ I quickly inform them of three things. First, I inform them that it is nothing of a need born of fear, but everything of a choice born of conviction. Second, that it is nothing of insecurity, but it is everything of a strength that is sturdy and amply sufficient to field the most caustic of criticisms cast against it. And third, that this strength is far more potent than the pathetic weakness out of which their criticisms arise.” Craig D. Lounsbrough Rubrics and More Rubrics The culture is full of rubrics. Really cheaply crafted rubrics. These rubrics are defined by what’s loosely determined to be vogue, trendy, politically correct, in lock-step with progressive thought, and anointed by whoever’s doing the anointing at any particular time. These rubrics are always shifting, ill-defined, and possess a shelf-life that’s about as short as the attention span of those who dreamt them up. These rubrics are typically granted a sense of rightness and correctness without any evaluation as to either. They’re viewed as defining the current state of societal evolution as it supposedly trends toward a more enlightened society. These rubrics become the template by which groups and individuals are evaluated as to whether they are cooperating with this progressive evolution or whether they are not. If it’s determined that they are not, they are assigned any number of derogatory labels. These are typically categorized into a variety of negative stereotypes that are held as defining the persons that they’re labeling. The Cost of Not Fitting In Therefore, the cost of not ‘fitting in’ becomes incrementally greater the more that we deviate from the vogue, trendy, politically correct, progressive thought that’s forced upon us. The greater our divergence the greater the cost. This creates a dilemma of identity. Do we borrow the ever-shifting identity of the culture, or do we press the culture aside sufficiently enough to determine who we are as a unique individual existing within the larger culture? Do we allow any of the elements within our culture tell us who we are, such as our families, our communities, our jobs, the accepted cultural mantras, or the organizations to which we belong? The demand for adherence is incessant, pressing, and coercive. The culture struggles knowing what to do with people who refuse to embrace the cultural narrative. It doesn’t mesh well, or it’s considered blatantly adversarial. It’s messy and irritating to those who are incessantly beating the drums of lesser cultural agendas. Therefore, the pressure to conform is intense. The more that we reject what our culture demands that we be, the more alienation we experience. We are subjected to punitive measures and pressed further and further outside the mainstream culture. Who Will We Choose to Be? The culture can’t define you. It doesn’t have that kind of power and it certainly doesn’t possess any such privilege. People and organizations and the larger culture can say any number of things about you. They can criticize you, make declarations about you, label you in any number of ways, or stereotype you in order to force-fit you into their agendas or force-fit you right out of the culture. Yet, you are none of these things. Criticisms, declarations, labels, and stereotypes are far too small to express the fullness of your humanity. These are weak definitions of something far too big to define. Yet if we bend to them, they leave us living out a pasty-thin identity that is a horrific exploitation of who we actually are. Who We Are No element of our culture can define you. No culture possesses the capacity to do that. No part of the culture has the depth to define the depth within us. The culture doesn’t define us because it can’t. The fact is, it can’t even define itself. We are defined by something far greater than the culture. Something that outlasts and outlives any culture. We are defined by the God Who created us. Nothing can define us except that which determined what our definition was to be. Nothing else understands the whole of us except that which created the whole of us. Nothing else understands the intricacies, the nuances, and the ingenuity of a design that lays leagues beyond the intellect of any man or collection of men. Breaking Away The culture has made many demands of us. Many messages have been sent to us. Many characterizations have been made. Labels have been assigned. Definitions have been plastered all over us. Traits ascribed and values determined. And all of this will continue. Yet, none of these define you. None of them can. None of them ever had. Therefore, don’t grant them power to do what they cannot. Yet, over time we have carried these definitions. And as we have carried them we begin to act on them. When we act on some belief we are likely to get results that mirror the belief upon which we acted. Therefore, if we act on the things that the culture has defined us as being, the results are likely to confirm that we are those things. Thirty-One Things God Says You Are Yet, you are none of these. You can’t be. You won’t be. And you can’t be because you are far too vast to be fully defined by any one of them or any assorted collection of them. Only God can define who you are. He’s got the blueprint. The only thing that the culture’s got is a few errant scribbles on an illegible scrap of paper that they can’t find half the time. Only God knows you from the best of yourself to the worst of yourself. And this God is calling you to your authentic self. Taking It to Our Knees You will find thirty-one of God’s “I Am” statements outlined in my book, “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am.” This book is a fresh, entirely thought-provoking, and richly insightful thirty-one day devotional that will assist you in both discovering and living out your real self. You will find “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am” on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - The Inadequacy of Men 1:13

8 weeks ago1:13

1:13

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “I am left with no alternative than to look beyond the efforts of men, for efforts of those sort leave cities flattened, nations teetering, and lives crushed. Instead, I must shift the whole of my gaze to the God who tenderly kneels in the midst of this unimaginable carnage and effortlessly makes the healing imaginable.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
I Heard a Robin - Hope in the Dark 10:46

8 weeks ago10:46

10:46

I Heard a Robin - Hope in the Dark We all create expectations. But how often are our expectations a wholesale surrendering of ‘what could be’ to ‘what is?’ How often are they borne of a discouraged soul and a frightened heart that cannot see beyond the realities of the moment so as to envision a brighter reality standing at-the-ready in the next moment? How many times have we taken the darkness of today and handily projected it onto the landscape of a tomorrow that is in fact full of light? How many times have we expected that failure will be our lot, disappointment our bedfellow, and that this curse is somehow our due? We create expectations because that’s what we do, so we’d better be very careful as to how we create them. What Shapes Our Expectations There are an innumerable array of elements that mold and craft our expectations. However, there are several that seem to directly impact most, if not all of the rest. In and of themselves, these three are certain to kill our vision and utterly convince us that tomorrow will surely embody the darkness of today. Left unchecked to bleed into the other areas of our lives, they can leave us destitute. First, we have a tendency to focus on the negative experiences that we have had for fear that the positive ones weren’t authentic, or if perchance they were, they’re unlikely to come our way again. Second, we build a faith that’s safe, which means that it’s ‘faith’ in name only and therefore it holds no power. Third, our vision is limited by the walls that we’ve meticulously constructed all around ourselves in order to protect us against imaginary enemies, or at least enemies that are not nearly as gigantic as we’ve given them permission to become. And while it’s obvious that far more goes into the creation of our expectations than these three ingredients alone, these would appear to be inordinately impacting. Making ‘What Is,’ ‘What Will Be’ Because these appear to be an inherent part of us, we gather up the sum total of our negative experiences, we fall victim to them because the lackluster nature of our purported faith can do no other, and we hold them hostage to these incessantly compressing walls of ours. And in this ever-weary concoction of negativity, faithless faith and massive walls, everything coalesces to shape a distorted observation of ‘what is,’ which then goes on to shape these rather dark expectations of ‘what will be.’ Therefore, our expectations are constricted to what will ‘not’ happen verses being exuberantly expanded to embrace what actually might. We project the misery of the present onto the landscape of the future and render it such before we even get there to better ascertain what it might actually be. We live with this morbid expectation that nothing will get better, that the future is eternally doomed to be nothing more than the past in redress, and that any hope of something better would be yet another expectation disappointed when we feel far too fragile to bear yet another disappointment of any sort at all. Hope Deferred The morning was yet dark as if the darkness was purposefully lingering in spite of a morning that should have long been well on its way. The cold of a winter in retreat somehow remained fiercely undiminished, casting a biting edge across what was supposed to be a warming spring. The snow had secretly begun falling under the cover of a night now lifting, leaving a world elated by spring’s flowers laying helplessly encased in winter’s white. It was as if the coming of spring was a promise disappointed; a hope fallen prey to a winter that spring was supposed to be advancing against. That days tenderly warmed at the edges with hints of green breathing new life into winter’s impossible cold were a hope ripped away. Sometimes we let circumstances of the moment create our expectations of the future. We altogether lose the vision of being able to see beyond what besets us at the moment. What we see is the ‘what is’ that our minds have interpreted as ‘what will be.’ And we throw the ‘what could be’ of a future yet unwritten into the straitjacket of a ‘what is’ that has all but consumed us. The ‘now’ is projected forward and the future is subsequently cast in its unforgiving mold. We create the shackles that bind us to the present and we fashion the blindfold that keeps us from seeing the future as anything but the present. Our expectations of ‘what will be’ are crafted entirely by ‘what is,’ and yet it is highly likely that neither are correct. I Heard a Robin Suddenly and without warning, out of snow and darkness I heard a robin. I heard the harbinger of spring call out into the dead of winter. I heard a single song that raised itself up against the dark and the cold and the anger of a winter being forced into retreat. It sat entirely at odds with everything that made that morning that morning, this bold song of this single bird off in the distant distance. As held against the power of the frigid morning, it seemed to be voice mocked by the morning itself. It seemed a lone prophet of spring that was ridiculed for bringing a such a song into such a morning. But it sang anyway. It sang until the sun rose. It sang the promise of something better that I could not see because I had errantly projected the ‘what is’ of a dark moment onto the ‘what could be’ of a spring already surging in my direction. This single robin was not deterred by the darkness and foreboding cold of my expectations. It sang. And that evening, it bid the cold day farewell by singing into the night of spring well on the way. Expectations It took a robin, this single harbinger of spring to remind me that the moment is just that…the moment. On the heels of any day or any event there is a robin singing in the distance. There is the hope of something coming, of the end of the darkness and the cold, of all things always moving on to new things. I cannot allow my expectations of ‘what is’ to create some sort of construed view of a future that in and of itself will not bow to my ‘what is’. It might be dark. It might be cold. I might not see the horizon. But out on the horizon’s edge there stands a robin. There is something that is raising its song into the darkness and the cold, heralding the truth that something new has long been running in our direction. Such is the story of spring, and better yet, such is the promise of God’s redemptive plan. Something new is coming and the darkness of our expectations cannot stop it. It’s existence is undeniable and its arrival is inevitable. So you might take a moment, step into a darkness that is cowering before the light of a new day, pull your coat tight against a cold that is bowing in sure retreat, raise an ear and listen for a robin.…

1
I Am Only One - "The Self That I Long to Believe In" 10:11

9 weeks ago10:11

10:11

LifeTalk Script I Am Only ‘One’ Understanding Our Impact “I am only one but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something.” Edward Everett I am only one. That’s all I am. I am only one and I will always be only one. I was born as one, I will live as one, and on the day of my death I will die as one. Living as Being Only One And so, because I am only one, I relegate myself to being only one. I surrender to this weak singularity. I am obscure, so much so that I can hardly define myself or my purpose as held against the billions of others within which my existence becomes swallowed up and lost. As held against history, time and creation, I will enter with barely a sound and I will exit in the same manner. And in relegating myself to being one and only one, I unwittingly embrace the limitations that I perceive are part and parcel of being one and only one. I become convinced of what I think being one means and subsequently what it does not mean. The Fears of Being “One” The Fear of Not Being Enough I think that we fear that being one is not being enough. Being one is too often seen as being inadequate. The world out there is not some massive mass of people. It is a collection of individuals. It’s a bunch of ‘ones.’ By and large, those individuals experience life pretty much the same way that we do. It’s all just a collection of ‘ones.’ It’s a collection of people that are each one individual just like we are one person. While being one makes us perfectly suited to impact all the other ones around us, we still fear that being one is not enough. The Fear that We Can’t be Loud Enough I also think that we fear that our single voice is not loud enough. We don’t have the volume to be heard over the raucous, roar and interminable noise in our world. We can’t possibly scream loud enough or long enough to be heard in the ruckus and racket that defines the world around us. So our voices are drowned out. Yet, we need to remember that we’re not speaking to the world around us. We’re speaking to the ones around us. And because that’s the case, there’s plenty of them and we’re plenty loud enough. The Fear of Being Rejected I think that maybe our greatest fear is that we will be heard, and that in being heard we’ll be rejected or discounted or blown-off. It seems that our single biggest fear is rejection. What if we’re heard and in the hearing we’re labeled as stupid, naïve or ignorant? What if we’re heard and then we’re slapped with accusations of being politically incorrect, culturally ill-informed, biased, mistaken at some fundamental level, or being something of a faith-based moron? What if we take a stand? What if we refuse to compromise? What if what we’re saying isn’t popular or trendy or it’s absent in the talking points of a screaming media? What if? I think that we need to understand that there are ‘ones’ out there who share our convictions and who understand the oppressive burdens that birthed those convictions. Indeed, we are ‘one’ but we are not alone in being ‘one.’ The Fear of Failure What if I step out as one in the midst of the chaos and the darkness and the malaise, and what if I fail? What if nothing is different? What if I am shamed into submission as my failures bring me face-to-face with the limitations of being only ‘one’ that I hoped were not true? What if I try and nothing changes? What if I step up and get knocked down? Then through some misplaced hope and fanciful zeal I have done nothing other than convince myself that being only ‘one’ is truly limited to being only ‘one.’ And I hardly think that I could live with that. The Fear of Responsibility But what if this one that I am is not a one in isolation? What if I can change things? What if I can impact the world? What if? Maybe we don’t want to be responsible for that much power. Maybe we don’t want to shoulder some sort of bold mantel, draw our resources around us, and press out against so much of what is destroying so many. Maybe under the right circumstances we’d be willing to following someone who would be willing to do that, but we don’t want to be the one doing that. We prefer to leave such exploits to others and follow them at a comfortable distance, or track them from an even greater distance. But, what if we actually pull it off and are left with the responsibility of having done that? The responsibility might be a bit too much for us. The Opportunity of Being “One” I am only one in a mammoth sea of humanity within which my main and often single goal is simply to survive. But I am one, and my oneness is sufficient to forgo surviving and embrace living. I am only one and despite the rather lackluster view of myself, being one is enough. I am only one, and because I am, the reality of my existence can change the reality of everyone around me. In the span of this minute, or this hour, or this day, or in the span of history itself my existence ‘can’ be noted, and because I am one it can register enough to acknowledge that I was here. The briefest notations that I have made or will make on the pages of history can add moving lines of inspiration in the seemingly infinite volumes of tightly written copy that stretch from mankind’s earliest moments to his eventual demise because I am one. I am in union with the Infinite ‘One’ Who renders me capable of being everything that I am not. I have yet to understand that my oneness is never held solely to itself. That my oneness is the seed of a greater greatness that when joined with God, with those others He brings alongside of me, with the dreams He has implanted within me, with the purpose He has bestowed upon me; this ‘one’ will remain one, but it will be a one that has moved leagues beyond its own oneness. Yes, I am only one, but I am one in league with a God Who makes my oneness infinite. You have one chance at being ‘one.’ You have been granted one life to touch the other ‘ones’ around you. Being one is being enough. Life’s about being intentional about being the best ‘one’ that you can be, and intentionally touching all the other ones around you in a manner that transforms them ‘one’ at a time. Be the one that you were designed to be and change the world by being that one, for despite your poor assessment of yourself you will always remain this beautiful one. Closing Today’s podcast is drawn from the book, “The Self That I Long to Believe In – The Challenge of Building Self-Esteem.” Get your copy today at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Forgetting What Love Is 0:52

9 weeks ago0:52

0:52

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “Love is the essence of our humanity expressing itself in actions of sacrifice so profound that we risk not surviving those expressions.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Running Away 0:51

9 weeks ago0:51

0:51

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “Running from what we fear is like throwing a bunch of stuff in the bed of a truck and somehow thinking that driving the truck will distance us from what’s laying in the bed.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
LifeTalk’s ”Thought for Life” - Leaving a Legacy 0:51

10 weeks ago0:51

0:51

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “Who are you sending into the future and how are you sending them? For this is the stuff of legacy that we tend to forget until long after we’ve sent them.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

1
Defined By Our History - Taking It to Our Knees: Declaring Who I Am 9:38

10 weeks ago9:38

9:38

Defined By Our History “The nature of our histories are always secondary to what we choose to do with them.” Craig D. Lounsbrough Our histories impact us. However, what impacts us doesn’t define us. Our histories can scar us, cripple us, leave us plagued with deficits, and reeling from loss. Our histories can leave us with overwhelming insecurities, fears that sabotage our dreams, and a deeply running pessimism that runs rogue over anything that might appear to possess some bit of desperately needed hope. They can leave us with deep-seated trauma, an addiction that won’t relent, an inability to develop meaningful relationships, and a haunting sense that the effects of our past will engulf the whole of our future. Our histories might define our journey to this point, but they do not possess the power to dictate that journey from this point forward. They might tell the tale of where we’ve been, but they have no power to pave the road to where we’re going. A New Thing In Isaiah 43:19 God says, “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” The radical boldness in this verse is both rich and raw. The past ends here. Decisively. Right here. In the ‘now’ of our existence. God draws a hard line that halts ‘what was’ and unleashes ‘what will be’. He Who is timeless cuts time in two. The story of yesterday is stripped of the power to pen the script of tomorrow. All is new! God states that He is “doing a new thing.” Not some slick revision. Not an overhaul. Not something old dressed up to look like something new. Not some clever nip-and-tuck. He is doing a “new thing.” Something revolutionary. Something that sheds the past. Something that peels away the insecurities, crushes the fear, rips away the pessimism, shakes us free of the trauma, and breaks the back of the addiction. God is the great insurrectionist, rising up against the past and crushing it in the rising. Revolutionary The tone of ‘something new’ in this verse suggests something unexpected. Something whose newness is so ‘new’ that it breaks the back of our logic and leaves our reasoning entirely out of breath. It’s ‘new’ to the point that it catches us entirely off guard. It’s not something ‘new’ that we might devise or cook up in our heads because there’s typically not a whole lot of anything new in that kind of stuff. Rather, it’s something so wildly revolutionary and so far out-of-the-box that it will defy all of the shortsighted paradigms that we use to make sense of it. Not Our History And God does this ‘something new’ because there is no need to be held hostage to our histories. That’s not God’s intent. That’s not His design. The scars, the insecurities, the fears, the pessimism, the trauma, the addictions, the inability to develop meaningful relationships, and the haunting sense that our past will engulf the whole of our future are not who we are. Rather, they are the results of what happened to us. These things might be how people have come to define us. A spouse, or a friend, or an employer, or a family member, or some random person functioning out of some thoughtless mindset might have slapped these definitions upon us once-upon-a-time. Someone might have looked for some handy way to conveniently define us in a manner that was comfortable for them, and so they cherry-picked some assorted bits of our history and declared us to be those things. But God is “doing a new thing.” Not a continuation of what was. Not some cheap addendum. Not some hat-trick. But something new. This newness declares that we are not held hostage to the way in which the past has attempted to defined us. We are not sentenced to walk with some impermeable definition that has already determined the nature of our future as well as our role in that future. The ability to be different will always crush that which declares that we will never be different. Building Blocks Rather, your past holds the building blocks of your greatness. Your past holds the essential raw materials for the very things that God is determined to build you into. Your past is the resource for your future, not the story of your future. It is a massive storehouse of incalculable assets capable of constructing a fresh tomorrow. Our history is not what defines us. It’s what enlarges us, enlivens us, empowers us, and thrusts us up and out of whatever yesterday was into everything that tomorrow can be. Your past is the accumulation of untapped resources standing ready to be unleashed into your today and delivered into your every tomorrow. More Than Your History You are more than your history. No history, despite how massive can define a single human being. You are far more than the accumulation of years, experiences, disappointments, betrayals, losses, frustrations, and failures. The nature of your humanity is vast beyond a hundred lifetimes and a million experiences. You cannot be defined by your past. It’s simply impossible. No one’s past could ever hope to contain enough content to define the limitlessness of their humanity. Yet despite the frequently painful nature of your past, you can be enriched by it. That is what God seeks to do in your life. Behold, He is doing a new thing in you. Thirty-One I Am Statements The thirty-one statements made by God Himself declare that you are bound to nothing other than the magnificence of your design. History is the recounting of what has passed, not the declaration of your design. Conclusion You will find all thirty-one of these “I Am” statements outlined in my book, “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am.” This book is a fresh, entirely thought-provoking, and richly insightful thirty-one day devotional that will assist you in both discovering and living out your real self. You will find “Taking It to Our Knees – Declaring Who I Am” on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or wherever books are sold. Thanks for joining us on LifeTalk today. You will find LifeTalk on most podcast platforms as well as YouTube. I would also encourage you to check out our daily posts on all of our Social Media sites.…

1
”LifeTalk’s” Thought for Life - Fear or Faith 0:51

10 weeks ago0:51

0:51

LifeTalk's "Thought for Life" is a weekly one-minute thought that touches on one of today's pressing issues. Each of these brief presentations is centered on one of Craig's personal quotes. All of his quotes are specifically written to challenge, inform, and inspire. Today's thought is: “It comes down to 'fear' and 'faith'. 'Fear' of what stands in front of me. 'Faith' in believing that the resources I possess can handle what stands in front of me. If I stop at the former, I will change nothing. If I embrace the latter, I can change everything.” Follow all of Craig's daily quotes on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Linkedin and Instagram.…

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