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I can find the fault in you easier than me!

Too many times I have faced situations where I was very quick to find fault in others that should’ve well been assigned to myself. Especially if at the time I was in “remission” of the offense in question!

Humane nature, like I stated the last article I wrote, wants to blame others for fault instead of taking full responsibility for the actions at hand. I don’t want to take the blame for what I could easily shift, in whole or part, to someone else. It’s the truth isn’t it? We want to find someone else to blame, but that’s not the topic of this article! I mean, why beat a dead horse!

However, the relation of the former article and this one is close.

Take an inventory of your biggest gripes of others in your life and if you are honest with yourself, because no one else can be honest about you as well as you! The epistles say, “no one knows the heart of the man except the spirit of the man”, and it’s true. We know ourselves better than anyone else. If you will take this challenge, you will find that the very thing you detest in others is ever present in your own reality.

Say it ain’t so! It can’t be! But yes friends it is the truth. I have been so mad at people before about things that were very present and real in my life. For example, I can call out the critical nature in anyone around me, without seeing the very trait in myself. All the while it’s exists in me and maybe even bigger than in the person that my criticism is focused on! I know, it’s a hard reality, but it’s true! How else could I be such an expert at calling out the mess in others unless I had great experience in it myself!?

I know someone may be saying, “man you are really telling on yourself”, but the real truth of the matter is that if we are not willing to be transparent with each other, then there will not be true growth. I do this often when I’m speaking publically, whether in church or to a group of people! I use my own life as an example, because it’s the best material I have. So when I begin to walk down the trail of criticism regarding someone else I need to ask the question, “Is this really me finding fault in them that I see in myself?”

I know this may not be the most exhilarating thing to do, but if we will try, it will curtail much of our divisive conversations and actually make us a better friend and communicator. If your think about it, how many times did a critical conversation end well? Where both parties felt really good about what just transpired? It’s one thing to take an issue to someone who can help change the situation and completely another to take it to someone who can only mirror your feelings of irritation. That’s called horizontal and vertical communication.

Side note: when you communicate vertically it ends quicker, because the vertical population diminishes quicker than the horizontal population. Just imagine a pyramid and how it is shaped. If you speak on the same level that you are on, then the flow works it’s way down to the general population, but if you speak up, then the conversation has less space to spread in. Anyway, the point of this whole article is to criticize yourself and take inventory of your own actions instead of calling it out in others. When we do this, it eliminates a lot of the gossip that so easily spreads.

So, in the next conversation you have, just ask yourself honestly, “am I really talking about me in this conversation?” I heard a Baptist minister say one time, “when I talk about others I always ask myself the questions… Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary?” That’s always stuck with me! I haven’t always followed those rules, but I’m trying to! And I’ve found that speaking well of others always produces more than speaking the negative.

Hope this helps!

Barry


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​© 2017 by Barry Tubbs Ministries

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