Psalm 139:23-24 (NLT)
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
24 Point out anything in me that offends you,
and lead me along the path of everlasting life.
I wanted pass along and interesting excerpt for Martin Linstroms book BUY-OLOGY. In it he challenges why we do what we do.
Play along with me for a moment as we head to the supermarket. Shouldn’t take long; there are only a couple of items on our list.
Lets make our way to the peanut butter section first. There’ Skippy, peter Pan, Jif. The generic supermarket offerings, plus a few virtuous organic brands- salt-free, no sugar added, the sort where the oil rises to the top.
Most consumers think about their choice for all of two seconds. In this case, let’ say you grab the Jif, and we’re on to our next stop.
Was your decision rational? It may have seemed that way to you as you made your choice, but it wasn’t, not by a long shot. If your decision-making process was conscious and articulated- my guess is it might have gone something like this;
I associate Skippy with childhood…Its been around forever, so I feel it’s trustworthy…but isn’t it laden with sugar and other preservatives I shouldn’t be eating?…Same goes for Peter Pan, plus the name is so childish. And I’m not buying that generic brand. It cost 30 cents less, which makes me suspicious. In my experience, you get what you pay for…The organic stuff? Tasteless, the few times I had it…always needs salt, too…Plus, didn’t I read somewhere that “organic” doesn’t necessarily mean anything, plus it’s almost double the price…Jif…what’s that old advertising slogan of theirs: “Choosy Mothers Choose Jif”…Well, I am a fairly discriminating person…
These are the subconscious conversations that go on in our heads every time we choose one product over another. Except, they are rarely, if ever, uttered aloud. Instead, we rely on almost instant shortcuts that our brains have created to help us make buying decisions.
As I read this I wonder how many 100’s of unchallenged decisions I make every day. Who cares about peanut butter? I’m more concerned about how many of my thoughts, emotional responses, coping mechanisms and words are simply outworking of an unchallenged, subconscious, inner life. My default mode is to do what I’ve always done. It’s not exactly what I want but it gets me through the day. Problem is, I don’t want to “get though the day”. Like you, I want to live a full life, and to do that I have to clear the clutter. I have to remove the unproductive and resolve to allow truth to permeate every area of my life.
Question everything. You may find that your have some grounded, godly and highly productive subconscious behaviors. You will also inevitably find that you have some silly, baseless and downright godless subconscious behaviors. Let the discovery of the good encourage you that you CAN be strong and you CAN make good decisions and let it be a propellant to change the bad .
