An old adage states: “When your only tool is a hammer, everything you see is a nail.” This perfectly describes the filters that color our perspective. How we see profoundly influences our attitude and our attitude dictates the quality of our life. These thoughts prompted contemplation with regard to my personal turning points. I found repeatedly that as I reflected on my many turning points, I become more deeply grateful for them and the realization of how I had been blessed through them. Turning points caused me to look at my life through a different prism.
My thoughts were guided by a recent introduction to prisms in a way quite different from my previous view. My technically focused education introduced me to prisms and their unique effects many years ago in physics classes. But now I saw them more figuratively as prisms related to our viewpoints. I found the following descriptions useful as a basis.
From the dictionary:
PRISM: NOUN
• Geometry: a solid geometric figure whose two end faces are similar, equal, and parallel rectilinear figures, and whose sides are parallelograms.
• Optics: a glass or other transparent object in prism form, especially one that is triangular with refracting surfaces at an acute angle with each other and that separates white light into a spectrum of colors.
• used figuratively with reference to the clarification or distortion afforded by a particular viewpoint: “they were forced to imagine the disaster through the prism of television”
A prism then has the quality of breaking down invisible components of light and revealing the hidden colors that make up what is referred to as “white light”. Figuratively then it reveals the detailed truth about any viewpoint.
How then can this fact help understanding our viewpoints?
Consider the thought: Prism Viewing
Prism viewing affords the person the ability to see the elements of life in finest details of the heretofore unseen. Depending on the choice of prism we engage, we will see the beauty or the ugly, the good or the evil of a scene in our life.
I sought to look at some possibilities both “negative” and “positive”.
The prism of anger opened up many unseen minute details of what in general had prompted anger in the first place. The anger prism view gave countless more reasons to increase one’s anger and become more consumed by its effects. Unchecked, it would create a spiraling effect ultimately resulting in an unprovoked physical action. I perceived this as a “negative” prismatic viewer because if the potentially destructive effects of anger.
On the contrary, the prism of kindness produced a very different perspective of the same situation. The kindness prism opened visions of fine details of what may have caused an otherwise angered response. With kindness there was opportunity for one to see new ways to assuage whatever was awry. Prompted with this prism view we would be enabled to reach out and help resolve situations and potentially reconcile the issues at hand. This I perceived as a “positive” prismatic viewer because of the potentially corrective effects of kindness.
I expect some readers will take issue with this viewpoint, citing righteous anger in the face of some injustice. Of course that perspective has it merit. I propose one looks at this from the standpoint of the outcome of the revelation of the prismatic view. Does it produce good or does it produce evil?
It is important to realize and appreciate that we have full control as to what prism we choose to view our life circumstances. These thoughts prompted me to investigate positive prisms available. It was very obvious that the negative prisms are many fold. With little thought, here are some negative prisms that come to mind: prejudice, being offended, judgment, anger, resentment, hatred, covetousness, jealousy, envy, fear and the list continues.
To better understand the positive prism arrows that populate my personal quiver, I went to my reliable source, the Holy Bible. There I found the following:
Galatians 5:22-23 New King James Version (NKJV)
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. Against such there is no law.
This passage provides a concise but thorough list of positive prisms. As usual, I go to the Message Bible to see an additional word set to describe these qualities.
Galatians 5:22-24The Message (MSG)
22-23 But what happens when we live God’s way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely.
23-24 Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified.
With these perspectives, I found that the careful choosing of appropriate prisms produced results very beneficial for me. New opportunities to be a blessing for someone seemed to appear more often. I found more words that expanded the population of my prism quiver beyond the nine in the referenced scripture. Words like Graciousness, Meekness, Accessibility, Altruistic, Availability, Understanding, Compassion, and Humbleness described more quality positive prisms from which to choose.
What remained for me was mastering the act, or art, of choosing the appropriate prism for every circumstance. Communion with the Holy Spirit offered the opportunity for His influence on my choices, making each one progressively more beneficial. However, such mastery did not come easily; it took a determined, deliberate and constant effort. And it had to be viewed as a process of growth that would continue forever. Years of inappropriate prism viewing created strong inclinations, habits of choosing the wrong prism. Slowly, with steady concerted effort coupled with prayer and a sincere desire to change, I experienced progress in the quest to rid myself of the undesired prisms. Replacing them with the blessed ones was much slower than I had hoped. The road seemed endless. Along that road I discovered many turning points that provided encouragement on the journey.
One such turning point was found in an old lesson from the book “The One Minute Manager” wherein it suggested one work at “catching” someone doing something right and praising them for it. This approach was in opposition to the tendency to employ the prism that inclined one to catch someone doing something wrong and seize the moment to correct them. This offered an interesting set of contrasting prisms.
I recently revisited a story that touched me and inspired further contemplation. It was entitled the “Second Mile” by Robert Wells. It is an excellent example of how changing one’s viewing prism made all the difference.
THE SECOND MILE
The great road stretched for miles in both directions and was very crowded. Groups of people on foot traveled steadily onward. Donkeys, heavy-burdened, passed along. A long train of camels, with great bulky loads high on their backs, plodded by.
The boy, David, standing by the side of the road, watched everything with eager eyes. “Someday, I’ll follow this road for a long, long way” he thought. “I’ll follow it all the way down to the Great Sea, and I’ll not stop even there.”
His eye fell upon a single figure, walking alone, along the crowded road. “He’s a Roman soldier,” thought David. “I can tell by the way he’s dressed. How I hate the Romans! If it weren’t for them we Jews would be free again. Then we wouldn’t have to pay their taxes or obey their laws. I hate them all!”
He stared at the Roman soldier who was almost opposite him now in the road. Suddenly, the soldier stopped. He shifted the heavy pack he carried, and eased it down to the ground. Then he straightened up again and stood resting a moment. David still stared at him, thinking angry thoughts. Then, just as the soldier turned to pick up his pack once more, he noticed David standing not far off. “Hey, boy!” he called. “Come here!”
David wanted to turn and run, but he stood frozen in his tracks. No one dared to disobey one of the soldiers of Rome. David went nearer, slowly. The soldier motioned to his pack. “You will carry it for me,” he said.
David knew that there was no help for him now. He knew the hated Roman law. Any Roman soldier could make any Jewish boy or man carry his load for him in any direction he was traveling for one mile. “But only for one mile!” thought David, angrily, as he unwillingly lifted the pack.
The soldier had already turned away and had started on along the road. He did not even bother to look back to see that David was following him. He knew that he would not dare do anything else.
David followed. The pack was heavy, but David was strong. He swung along easily, but his thoughts were angry. He wanted to throw the soldier’s pack down in the dirt and stomp on it. He wanted to shout and rage at that hated Roman soldier striding easily ahead of him. But he could do nothing except follow along, keeping his bitter thoughts to himself. “Just one mile. He can’t make me go a step further. Only one mile.” The words made a sort of song in his mind in time to his steps. “One mile, one mile…”
Then, as he was plodding along, David suddenly remembered another day when he had walked along this very same road. One day he had gone out a little ways from the city with some of his friends, to find a young teacher of whom they had heard about. They had found him out on a hill side among a large crowd of people. David had stopped with the others to listen to what he said.
“What made me think of him now?” wondered David with one part of his mind. Another part was still repeating over and over, “One-mile-one-mile-one-mile-“
“Of course,” he remembered suddenly. “The Master used those very same words. What was it He said about one mile?”
He walked on frowning for a moment before he could remember. Then he said the words to himself: “Whosoever shall compel thee to go one mile, go with him two.” That was what He said! David had not paid very much attention to it at the time. He remembered now other things the Master had said. “Love your enemies.” “Do good to them that hate you.”
Then once more David found himself repeating the strangest of them all, “Whosoever shall compel thee to go one mile, go with him two.” “Does he mean–could he mean–like, now?” David puzzled. “But why? Why should I go more than one mile?”
David was so busy thinking that he did not notice that the soldier had stopped, and so he almost ran into him. “You have come one mile,” said the soldier. “Give the pack to me.”
“I will go on,” said David. He did not know why he said it. “It has not been far, and I am not tired.”
The Roman soldier stared at him in surprise, and for the first time David really looked into his face. He saw that the soldier was very young. He saw, too, that he was very, very tired, in spite of the straight soldierly way in which he stood.
“You have come a long way,” said David.
“Yes,” said the other, “a weary way of many miles.”
“Have you far to go?”
“I go to Rome.”
“So far!” said David. “Then let me carry your pack for another mile.
“You are very kind,” said the soldier, but his face was still full of surprise.
So they went on, only now, the Roman soldier waited for David and walked beside him along the road. And suddenly, David found himself talking to the soldier as if they had known each other for a long time, and he told him all about his home and his family. And David listened while the soldier talked of his travels in faraway places. They were so busy talking that the distance seemed very short.
“Tell me,” said the soldier at last, “how did it happen that you offered to come this second mile?”
David hesitated. “I hardly know,” he said. “It must have been what the Master said, I think.”
Then he told the soldier all that happened out on the hill and all that he could remember of the Master’s teaching.
“Strange,” said the soldier thoughtfully. “Love your enemies. Do good to those that hate you. That’s a hard teaching. I should like to know this Master.”
They had come now to the top of a hill and the end of the second mile. David looked back along the road toward his home.
“I must go back,” he said. “The hour is late, and my parents will wonder where I have gone.”
The soldier took his pack and shouldered it again. The two clasped hands.
“Farewell, friend,” said the soldier.
“Farewell, friend,” answered David, smiling up into the soldier’s eyes. Then the two parted.
As David strode back along the road, the words of the Master kept running through his mind: “Whosoever shall compel thee to go one mile, go with him two.” And as he repeated the words he found himself adding, with a strange, deep joy, “It works! It really works!”
It’s so very true! I walked one mile with an enemy — I walked the second mile with a friend.”
I henceforth must endeavor to choose well the prism I peer through in each and every circumstance.
Turning Points
How we see things, circumstances and people and our subsequent reactions and underlying feelings reveal our attitude. I endeavor to choose well the prism I peer through in every circumstance. What new turning points await revelation as this journey continues I do not know. But assuredly, my eyes will be watching, so my “pen” can be reporting.
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