Conscious Decisions

Hi Everyone, I wanted to share with you a paper that I wrote this week for school. It was about making conscious decisions. So... please read below.

I have found myself engaging in numerous conversations with individuals who want to change their life. They want to heal from their hurts, disappointments, failures, and perceived shortcomings. They say that they want to grow, change and to be better than their circumstances say they are. However, in talking with them I was not fully convinced they really wanted to heal, change, or make a choice to be better. I was met with excuses, people not really wanting to allow God to change them, their future and purpose. I found that in all the discussions the same two words kept coming from my mouth. They were conscious decision.

Conscious means: aware; aware of your environment, yourself, facts and objects; in a state of mental awareness. Decision means: the act of deciding; a judgment or conclusion reached by deciding. We must make a conscious decision to change. We must decide that we want to heal. We must decide that we want to change, that we want to rise above our circumstances. We must decide we want to be better.  I am learning that a lot of times in life people try to make things more difficult then they have to be.

The first decision that many people fight with is giving their life to God. There is this fear in believing in someone you can’t see. The fear that you will lose yourself and become one of those Jesus freaks that everyone talks about. Making a decision to give your life to the Lord is the best thing anyone can do. You are never alone after that. He is always with you.
When you make the decision to give your life over to God, you must then make a conscious decision to allow Him to begin to change you from the inside out. This is a painful process because God begins to bring your hurts, failures and disappointments to the surface. Many people stop the process because they can’t handle dealing with looking into the mirror of their life. Some stop at this point in the process because even though they want something more than their current situation, they would rather stay where they are and be comfortable than be uncomfortable for the sake of change. Others will say they can’t let God work in this because it’s just too painful. All these decisions are made purely on their emotions. It comes down to this. You have to make a conscious decision to allow God to help you change. It all comes down too making a conscious decision to allow God help you overcome your hurt, disappointments, failures, and perceived shortcomings so that you can walk in your purpose.

Here are some excuses I have heard on why people can’t change, heal, and overcome their circumstances. They can’t change because it is too hard; They are this way because of the way they were raised so they can’t help it. We can all change. We can all become better people and Godly people no matter how we were raised but again it comes down to making a conscious decision. I was raised in a home with abusive alcoholic drug addicted parents but I am not an abusive alcoholic drug addicted adult. I made a conscious decision to be different than my parents. It wasn’t easy but I knew it was a decision that I had to make. The people who used the excuse of its too hard were half way correct. It is not easy to change; too make a choice not based on how you feel in the moment but rather on what you want out of life and what you know is right. Making excuses or saying I can’t is the easy way out of a situation. If you tell yourself and those around you that you can’t then no one expects anything from you and you never let anyone down.

Everyone has a future and a purpose although not everyone believes it. It is disheartening to listen to people tell me their dreams and what they want to do with their life but then never chase after these dreams. So many people never go after their dreams because it is more comfortable and safe feeling to just continue their life of meritocracy.  People are not willing to sacrifice security to take a risk and step into their destiny. Make a conscious decision go after your dreams and your purpose. Make a decision to live a life with no regrets. Make a decision to fight for the things you want out of life and too not settle for less than God’s best for you.

I think that once people start to make conscious decisions in their life, they will go a lot further. It is easy to make a decision based on feeling or out of your emotions but I think that it is an entirely much harder thing to make a decision when you are solid as a rock. When you make a decision out of emotion and you don’t follow through, it seems like not a big deal because you were just emotional that day. However, making a decision when you are not emotional and then not following through leaves you feeling as though you failed or didn’t live up to the expectation you had for your life, your day, your situation, or your circumstance. So I think that if people would start seeking God and making decisions based on what they know then maybe there would be more people in the world who aren’t staying where it’s comfortable.

Much love,

Dallas