My brother found a book, read it, loved it, had me buy him three copies from Amazon, then he gave me one of those copies. The title? Thoughts to Build On: Thought Power for Successful Living, by M. R. Kopmeyer.
It’s like a mini-Haanel translated for daily living. We’re taught to have no opinions. Chapter Five is a little twist in that. We are to separate fact from fiction and only believe the fact.
Imagine a past-middle-age man saying to you, “I’ve lost my fortune through unwise investments. It’s too late to start over. My family and I will live out our lives in disgrace and poverty. ”
There’s only one fact in that statement. The rest are opinions. Unless the man believes them all to be facts and lives his life as if they are. Then, they become facts.
Can you see where this is going? We need to have a clear understanding of what’s fact and what’s opinion in our thinking about our lives.
This is a game changer. Whether we like the Buckeyes or the Wolverines means nothing on the have no opinions scale. Whether we believe we’re all washed up or not in our inner self-talk is what really matters.
Eradicate the opinions. Focus on the facts. Make sure you teach yourself which is which.
I get that. I’ve actually always known that. The problem is the “feeling” not the thought for me. The emotion created from whatever. The hardest thing is learning how to cope with that since as humans it’s not possible to stop feeling–well for most.
I also recognize that my thoughts contribute to this too, but for me, the emotion is not always triggered by my thoughts but by something outside my will,and by anyone’s standard is hurtful, hard to deal with and sometimes devasting. I’m trying to learn to control the thoughts through the emotion that is triggered by whatever, which is so hard. Since MKE sometimes my thoughts are clearer and I do control reaction at times better but I don’t stop hurting until a bit of time has past and I can work through it. Yeah I know there is no microwave effect, lol. Wishful thinking…
I looked the book up, only found used and I can’t afford riught now, but sounds like a great book. I’ll put it on my wishlist to get.
Great post. I like the analogy used.
Juneta’s MKE Blog
Thanks, Jean – I needed to hear that today. 🙂
I found some copies of the book for $15 on amazon (paperback) or $52 for leather bound.
The significance of distinguishing between fact and opinion is enormous. The Mental Diet is definitely helpful. (Now was that a fact, or an opinion?) The Dictionary says this about fact:
1. something that actually exists; reality; truth:
Your fears have no basis in fact.
2. something known to exist or to have happened:
Space travel is now a fact.
3. a truth known by actual experience or observation; something known to be true:
Scientists gather facts about plant growth.
I guess the statement is a fact. Here’s another fact: I really enjoyed your short post.
Thanks, Rick.