What are YOU LOOKING at?
Your EYES are the window to your soul (Psych). From the medical perspective, they’re also like a window to your brain. Eye-related symptoms are a key way for healthcare providers to find out brain conditions and issues. Eye health can also be a key indicator of issues affecting the rest of the body. Your eyes are one of your brain’s windows to the world. They gather light from your surroundings and help your brain build the picture you see (CC).
When you are sad or worried, you furrow your brows, which makes your eyes look smaller. Yet, when you're cheerful, we will say you're “bright-eyed” - that’s because people raise their eyebrows when they’re happy, making their eyes look bigger and brighter. The eyes send signals to the brain to create a picture of what you see.
What you look at affects your body, mind, and spirit. Our mission is to help you Love yourself, as yourself. Gal. 5:14™
Good News?
Step back from fear-inducing media (PNAS)! There may be a reason to consider the conventional journalistic saying that “if it bleeds, it leads.” News coverage is predominantly negative and negativity bias in reactions to news content is not uniquely American. All around the world, the average human is more physiologically activated by negative than by positive news stories. One answer may be the tendency for humans to react more strongly to negative than positive information. There is a human propensity to give more weight to negative information than to positive information. What you see shapes your mind and your FACE (Psych).
In a world full of negative messages, guard your eyes to guard your heart & health Prov. 4:23. Protect your eyes for a more peaceful and stress-free lifestyle. Choose to look at and consume goodness and see what happens. Your mirror will see the difference!
Look up, be present!
Distracted?
Texting while walking could be fatal and you're an easier target for crime (DOI). Pedestrian injury are an alarming trend with the number of pedestrian deaths climbing from 4,725 to 7,005 between 2011 - 2020 (NIH). With increased emphasis on physical activity, more people are walking and running on roadways and distraction happens. Both pedestrians and drivers are engaging with traffic while distracted by mobile devices and attention is diverted to smartphones instead of the roadway and potential hazards.
Texting while driving is illegal in most states because it could be fatal to you and others. More than 3,300 people were killed in accidents attributed to distracted driving, and an estimated 290,000 people were injured in crashes involving distracted drivers in 2022 alone (FCC). So, eyes on the road.
Look up to see the here and now! Temptations abound; let the past go, don't worry about tomorrow. Be here, be now; Be present Matt. 6:22. We miss out on life if we’re living in our heads rather than connecting with the immediacy of being alive, including spiritual practices that bring us back to the vivid present moment.
See no evil...
Choose a good perspective. Choose to read a book instead of scrolling social media, look out the window instead of at the TV, take a walk to find butterflies and see your surrounding. Also, choose friends and groups who align to your values of goodness and faith. Don't be a Lord of the Flies, act like one of the three wise monkeys and see no evil...
Who's hangin' around?
Who are you hanging out with? The three "wise" monkeys wouldn't look at evil things; why would you? God sees what you see Prov. 15:3. Experience peace by closing your eyes to monkey business and beware of the Lord of the Flies. Focus on God's love - there's no shame Rom. 8:1.
When you hang out with people who are influenced in bad ways or spending time with individuals who engage in negative behaviors can lead to you adopting similar habits or attitudes. Due to their influence your own actions and decisions could be impacted in a detrimental way; essentially, you might start acting like them and their negative behavior patterns.
Peer pressure is a significant factor and you could feel pressured to conform to the group's actions, even if it goes against your personal values. When surrounded by people who engage in certain negative behaviors, it can start to seem like the "normal" thing to do, making it even easier to participate. The bad habits or attitudes of these individuals can rub off on you, leading to changes in your own behavior like substance abuse, academic dishonesty, bullying and disrespectful behavior.
If your friends regularly drink alcohol or use drugs, you might be more likely to engage in those activities as well. Spending time with people who cheat on assignments or tests could make you more likely to do the same. Being around people who bully others might lead you to participate in similar actions, like its "normal." If your friends are consistently rude or disrespectful towards others, you could start to adopt those behaviors as well. If you're concerned about negative influences, set boundaries and clearly communicate your values and what behaviors you are not comfortable with.
Keep positive friends and surround yourself with people who encourage healthy habits and positive choices.
See Who You Are!
Experience true peace by focusing on God’s love and wisdom. Fill your day with prayer and gratitude to embrace His blessings. When you know who you are, and you care about yourself, you set boundaries and choose good people to surround yourself with. When you surround yourself with good people, they encourage you to look at and consume good things along with them. When you hang out with negative people or groups that focus on evil, they influence you to look at and consume evil along with them.
Find Lasting Peace in Faith
Our SPIRIT represents the eternal part of our being, where the God factor works. The spirit world is hidden from our external eye-vision but is nonetheless very real and visible to our internal heart-vision.
God's final judgment of all of us will no doubt reveal that what we considered important and precious was often rubbish in the eyes of God. Conversely, small forgotten moments we thought nothing of may be elevated and rewarded when God's records showed we uttered a helpful word of comfort to someone in need, or gave aid from a right motive. Accountability for sin in the eyes of God is measured in proportion to light received and the amount of revelation given. Deliberate sin is more serious than inadvertent transgression.
Later in life, some of us look back and see that decades have passed almost as if they were but months. Carl Jung noted that in the second half of life it seemed as if all the events in the past are equidistant from the present. An event that took place 40 years ago may flash back into our consciousness as if it had happened yesterday. In sudden accidents some have reported that their whole lives flashed before their eyes in great detail, in a what was really only a few seconds or less on the clock. When we dream at night, what seems to be many hours of time is shown by REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep patterns to be only minutes of elapsed time.
God is outside of time. He is an eternally self-existing, self-defining, living Being. Since he created time as we know it, we can think of past, present, and future as eternally present before His eyes.
Your Spiritual Eyes
Read the Bible with spiritual eyes! The Holy Spirit wants us to truly read and re-read the written Word of God through spiritual eyes, reading from your heart. It's then that passages of scripture you have read many times will begin to take on new life as a fresh dimension of insight is deposited from the throne of heaven.
For many passages, it will be as though we have never read them because of the fresh hidden truth that will emerge in this day.
Even the prophet Daniel foresaw our generation and knew the revelations he was privileged to observe were reserved for the time of the end. We have now entered that day and the new dimensions of truth will be unveiled for us to SEE John 16:13. The result of this fresh revelation of truth will begin to transform our natures from FEAR to FAITH. On the surface, it will make the coming year and days to follow seem turbulent. Nonetheless, the end result will be the re-establishing of God's church on a firm foundation of Truth and Faith.
Fear is a great enemy! God desires over-comers like us in these coming days to stand up, look up and be strong in faith, not fear. Even as the dawn of each new day begins, the anointing of heaven is disbursed in the spiritual atmosphere so those truly seeking truth can lay hold of it and obtain great insight with understanding. When God's people ask with sincerity for this deposit of TRUTH, it will be received. Our spiritual eyes will be illumined to see the scriptures from heaven's perspective not merely man's and hearts will be ignited.