{"id":4023,"date":"2024-09-20T07:34:54","date_gmt":"2024-09-20T11:34:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=4023"},"modified":"2024-09-20T07:35:38","modified_gmt":"2024-09-20T11:35:38","slug":"staying-centered","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2024\/09\/20\/staying-centered\/","title":{"rendered":"Staying Centered"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, <\/em>click here<\/a>

In his book Soul Keeping, <\/em>author and pastor John Ortberg recalls a visit that he and some friends made to an open-air street fair.

Among the attractions was a mechanical bull, the kind that brave or foolhardy people attempt to ride.

The man sitting at the remote-control panel gave Ortberg the lowdown. 

\u201cThere are twelve levels of difficulty on this bull. It might not be all that easy, but the key is you have to stay centered, and the only way to do that is sit loose. People try to clamp on too tight. Don\u2019t do that. You have to be flexible. 

\u201cIf you think you can be in control of the ride you\u2019ll never make it. You have to follow the bull. You have to keep moving. Shift your center of gravity as the bull moves.\u201d

Ortberg decided he would give it a shot. He climbed atop the bull, which began to move slowly. Then it picked up the pace. John held on tightly.

\u201cThen I remembered his advice,\u201d he writes, \u201cso I loosened up, and it kept moving faster and jolting and bucking and jumping. I was hanging on sideways. My arms were flailing around all over the place. I just hung on and finally the bull slowed, and it stopped, and I was still on the bull. It wasn\u2019t pretty but I made it.\u201d

Ortberg couldn\u2019t wait to see the look on the operator\u2019s face \u2013 some acknowledgement of his triumph. He glanced over at the man, who looked right back, shook his head, smiled and said, \u201cThat was level one.\u201d

John then adds, \u201cLevel two lasted maybe a second. The bull won.\u201d

Most of us do pretty well when life comes at us on level one. The problem is that life never stays at level one for very long.

The key is to have a center.

A center is an emotional and spiritual home base. A place where your soul is at peace. The point that doesn\u2019t move when everything else around you is in motion, or seems to be falling apart. Apart from a center, we\u2019re not going to be able to stay in the saddle when life escalates to levels two through twelve.

It\u2019s fairly easy to tell if your soul isn\u2019t centered.

Life feels not just busy \u2013 busyness is a constant for most of us \u2013 but hurried<\/em>. Hurry is the overwhelming sense that I need to be somewhere else or get on with the next task, rather than slow down enough to experience the present moment.

You\u2019ll feel impatient. And mildly irritable. And increasingly desperate to control circumstances that quite frankly are beyond your control.

Ortberg observes, \u201cThe soul without a center finds its identity in externals.\u201d 

If my life isn\u2019t centered in God, I\u2019ll try to live as if my work, my appearance, my accomplishments, or my circle of friends will allow me to stay on the bull for a few seconds longer. 

But it\u2019s obvious I\u2019m just fooling myself.

When life gets crazy this week, you can try to hang on tighter.

Or you can go a different direction.

Consciously choose to relax your grip. Offer this prayer: \u201cLord, please center me today in your hands.\u201d

And trust that God\u2019s sure grip will never let you go.
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here In his book Soul Keeping, author and pastor John Ortberg recalls a visit that he and some friends made to an open-air street fair. Among the attractions was a mechanical bull, the kind that brave or foolhardy people attempt to ride. The man sitting at the remote-control panel gave Ortberg the… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4024,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[807],"class_list":["post-4023","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-spiritual-center"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4023","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4023"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4023\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4026,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4023\/revisions\/4026"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}