E416: Why We Abandon Our Tools and How to Reclaim Them

Unknown Speaker (0:02): Tools are meant to be used. I recently started carrying around with me a tool kit and I put some different tools in it. Not the tools to fix a chair or the couch or a screwdriver or scissors or a hammer or nails not those kind of tools but rather tools for life and I've been thinking a lot more about this idea of tools and I want to encourage you today to think about the tools that we all know that we should be using that we use but then we also inevitably put them down. There's a book called The Tools and it's to psychotherapists and I've been reading that book. It's actually a really great book and they give five different tools that they share or have shared with their clients to help them in different situations in their lives, and one of the things that really stood out to me was that they said that even after the tools have been successful, have helped them to have transformed their lives, the clients would eventually put the tools down.

Unknown Speaker (1:12): They would put the tools down because they felt like, Well, I hit this mark. I got to where I needed to be and it's done its job. Now there's an individual that I knew years ago and he would come to the building where I used to work in Beaumont, Texas, the church building and he would say, you know, he would talk and we could tell that he wasn't using his medication and we would ask him, Are you continuing your medication? And he would say, No. And we would say, Why?

Unknown Speaker (1:40): And he would say, Well, because I feel good. I feel better. And so we would try to encourage him to see the reason why you're feeling better is because you've been utilizing the medication that's been prescribed to you. And I often think about that because whether it's medication, whether it's different tools in our lives that we know are effective, why do we put those tools down? Why do we stop and then expect that everything is just going to remain the same?

Unknown Speaker (2:13): So in this episode, what I just want to share briefly, this is going to be really short, what tools do you have in your toolkit that you know work in your life, help you, whether it's with stress or maybe it's the amount of sleep that you know or the mindset that you know you need to have, the habits and the routines that have helped you to be successful that now you have put down and no longer use. What will it take for you to pick those tools, back up and to begin implementing them in your life again? I want to encourage you to think about that and to go back to what you know is going to be effective. I was thinking about this even more last week. My family and I, my wife and my son, we watched all of the NBA Finals.

Unknown Speaker (3:05): Whew! That was a rollercoaster watching the Spurs and the Knicks. And I'm in Texas, but I will say I was rooting for the Knicks. And I told my wife, You know, I'm rooting for the Knicks because in 'ninety four, I was rooting for them. In 'ninety nine, 1999, I was rooting for them and they lost.

Unknown Speaker (3:22): So it's like, They have got to win this series. And they did. They won four games out of five. But the game three where they came back from 29 points down was just, I think, like a microcosm of what happens in our lives. The San Antonio Spurs did everything right in the first half but in the process of time and it happened in every game except for the one that they won in the process of time it's like they went away from utilizing the tools.

Unknown Speaker (3:55): They just fell in love with the three point shot but the things that they were doing that helped them to be successful it's like they suddenly stopped. And that really got me thinking even more about the tools that all of us use and know about that will help us to be victorious, will help us to be successful, will help us to follow through. Don't put the tools down. Tools are meant to be used. And so I want to leave you with that today.

Unknown Speaker (4:27): What's in your toolkit? Are you utilizing the very things that you know will help you to get to that next level? Here's the good news. Even if you have put them down, packed them away, locked them up, we all have the ability, if we so choose to, to unlock them, pick them back up one by one, and then do the next best thing. Are you ready to win?

Unknown Speaker (4:58): To win your NBA Finals? To win your Super Bowl? That's called life. We have this opportunity if we're willing to pick up the very tools that we know will help us. Please leave me a rating.

Unknown Speaker (5:14): Please subscribe. Please share this. And please have a fantastic day God bless take care