Audrey Rindlisbacher Podcast

Today we are led to believe that the fight between religion and science is something new. We are told that it is a radically new idea that the earth originated through spontaneous causes. And we are taught that ancient people only believed in God because they couldn't explain natural phenomenon. 

NOTHING could be further from the truth!

These ideas were prevalent in many civilizations, including Ancient Greece. The Greeks not only believed in a God that revealed truths to mankind and an afterlife where we would be held accountable to Him for our choices, they understood the need for worship and holy places to make us more virtuous and pure. 

This two-part podcast series first introduces you to the key words and ideas that clarify these religious debates, then it takes you into ancient writings to explore them and see how the religious debates we see around us are nothing new--they are actually very old. 

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

2:42  Mantic defined

5:35  Sophic defined

9:05  "Harmonizing" them

14:47  Civilizations "created by God" 

17:05 Mysteries of Eleusis

19:55  Musaeus

24:40  Religion was institutionalized  

25:45  Creation as an act of God 

Quotes from this episode:

All quotes from “Three Shrines: Mantic, Sophic, Sophistic” by Stephen D Ricks, Donald W. Parry and Hugh Nibley found in The Ancient State: The Rulers and the Ruled

MANTIC

“The Greek word Mantic simply means prophetic or inspired, oracular, coming from the other world and not from the resources of the human mind.” “‘Vertical’ Judaism, i.e. the belief in the real and present operation of divine gifts by which one receives constant guidance from the other world.”

“It supplies the element of hope in our lives by assuring us of the reality of things beyond.”

“Those who share the Mantic hope of things beyond, whatever those things may be, are in a very real sense a community of believers, just as Christians, Jews and Moslems form a fellowship of ‘the People of the Book,’ because of their belief in inspired books—even though they may not agree as to which books are the inspired ones.”

“None is more insistent on the need for revelation than Plato. Plato was the greatest champion of the Mantic.”

*Revelation, supernatural, duality, what’s to come

SOPHIC

“The Sophic, on the other hand, is the tradition which boasted its cool, critical, objective, naturalistic and scientific attitude; its Jewish equivalent is called ‘horizontal’ Judaism—scholarly, bookish, halachic, intellectual, rabbinical. All religions seem to make some distinction.”

“On the other hand, the Sophic society unitedly rejects the Mantic proposition, and it too forms a single community.”

*Reason, materialism, here and now, naturalistic

SOPHISTIC

“Sophistic came to be identical with Rhetorical, that is, a pseudothought form which merely imitated the other two in an attempt to impress the public.”

“HARMONIZING” SOPHIC AND MANTIC

“Whoever accepts the Sophic attitude must abandon the Mantic, and vice versa. It is the famous doctrine of Two Ways found among the Orientals, Greeks and early Christians—if you try to compromise between them you get nowhere, because as one of the Apostolic Fathers points out, they lead in opposite directions.”

“It is when one seeks to combine or reconcile the Sophic and the Mantic that trouble begins.”

MANTIC IN HISTORY

“Each great civilization thought of itself as having been carefully planned in the beginning, all its rites and patterns handed down from above, a complete, perfect structure, planned in detail from the beginning as the faithful reflection of a heavenly prototype present in sacred books of great antiquity.

"I had an inner certainty that I was on the right path in my life—the path God had chosen for me. Great things were going to happen in my life, and I had to do my part by preparing myself and being ready." ~Ben Carson

What if we just assumed that God has a specific path for us? What if we knew that "great things were going to happen in our lives"? Would we see our lives differently? Would we see ourselves differently?

By the time Ben Carson was in his early 20's, there was no question in his mind that God had big plans for him and that it was his job to put in the work and prepare himself thoroughly.

How as this made possible? Because of his mother! Ben could never have become the man he became or had the influence in the world he now has without the determination, vision, encouragement and hard work of his mother. 

This family is an incredible model for us to follow through all the 7 Laws of Life Mission -- as they devoted their lives to God, cared for themselves, embraced truth and educated themselves out of poverty and into the highest offices in the country!

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

2:27  Sonya Carson's early years

9:37  How Sonya handled opposition

14:00  How Sonya became self-reliant

20:02  How Sonya parented her boys and helped them get world-class educations

26:25  Carsons and the 7 Laws 

29:18  Ben's spiritually transforming experiences  

Quotes from this episode (all quotes from Ben Carson):

“Part of mother’s strength came from a deep-seated faith in God and perhaps just as much from her innate ability to inspire Curtis and me to know she meant every word she said.”

“Mother never let on how it hurt her, but her treatment in a mental hospital provided neighbors with a hot topic of gossip, perhaps even more because she had gone through a divorce. Both problems created serious stigmas at the time. Mother not only had to cope with providing a home and making a living to support us, but most of her friends disappeared when she needed them most…'I just decided that I had to go about my own business,’ Mother once told me, ‘and ignore what people said.’ She did, but it couldn’t have been easy.”

“Of course, mother worked. Constantly. She seldom had much free time, but she showered that time on Curtis and me, which made up for the hours she was away…No matter how tired she was, if we were still up when she got home, mother didn’t fail to ask about school.”

“‘That’s what I want to do,’ I said to my mother as we walked home. ‘I want to be a doctor. Can I be a doctor, mother? ‘Bennie,’ she said, ‘listen to me.’ We stopped walking and mother stared into my eyes. Then laying her hands on my thin shoulders, she said, ‘If you ask the Lord for something and believe He will do it, then it’ll happen.’ ‘I believe I can be a doctor.’ “Then, Bennie, you will be a doctor,’ she said matter-of=factly, and we started to walk on again.”

“Mother had a goal in mind…she planned to go back and reclaim the house we’d lived in…’Boys,’ she told us as the weeks and months passed, ‘just wait. We’re going back to outhouse on Deacon Street. We may not be able to afford living in it now, but we’ll make it. In the meantime, we can still use the rent we get from it.’ Not a day passed that mother didn’t talk about going home. Determination burned in her eyes, and I never doubted that we would.”

“My mother worked two and three jobs at a time…She was especially interested in the people, because most of the time she worked for the wealthy. She’d come home and tell us, ‘This is what wealthy people do. This is how successful people behave. Here’s how they think.’ She constantly drilled this kind of information into my brother and me. ‘Now you boys can do it too,’ she’d say with a smile adding,

“We want to love God-not with an empty, small, or flabby mind, but with a mind as large, as vigorous, and as disciplined as we can possibly make it.” ~Dr. Arnold Green

Our 1st Annual MDM Celebration event was a great success! We loved spending the day with stellar moms, collaborating and learning from each other and especially gaining insights and principles for better discernment. Check out these highlights from the event!

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

2:40 Introduction to Discernment

6:45  Judgment

11:07  Indoctrination

19:20  Workshops

22:00  Social Discernment 

25:16  Spiritual Discernment

29:38  Cultural Discernment  

Quotes from this episode:

“Moral education is impossible apart from the habitual vision of greatness.” ~Alfred North Whitehead

“Mr. Hutchins and I…taught a course in the philosophy of education last year. It was taken by men and women who were candidates for the Ph.D. in education, many of whom were already in responsible teaching or administrative positions. We began with this definition: ‘Education is the process where by the power of human nature become developed by good habits.’ I have italicized the word “good” because that, as usual, was the stumbling block. The class objected to the definition as normative; the science of education must be objective. Some of them said there was a nothing good or bad about education, and others shocked us even more by suggestion that education might just as well be a development of bad habits. The argument went on for days, requiring us to get down to fundamentals. In the course of it we discovered that these professionals in education had been thoroughly indoctrinated with scientism and positivism. The mark of indoctrination was that they really couldn’t defend their position; the marks of the doctrine they had swallowed were the familiar denials—of the objectivity of moral standards, of the rationality of men, of any method for answering questions except that of empirical science.” ~Mortimer Adler

“A man has as much authority intrinsically as he is able to speak the truth.” ~Mortimer Adler

“Judgment is automatic, like swallowing...judgment must be based on first principles...principles require the exercise of reason and judgment.” ~Thomas Reid

“Love requires wisdom and judgment - knowing what is best for someone and having the spiritual courage and mental discipline to take the necessary action.” ~M. Scott Reid

“When right feelings are not supported by right thinking, good men can be insensibly corrupted.” ~Mortimer Adler

“Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, and thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.” ~Samuel Adams

“Conscience is the most sacred of all property…and is the right of every man to exercise it as these may dictate.” ~James Madison

“Individual rights are moral principles identifying the social conditions required by man’s nature for his proper survival.” ~Ayn Rand

“God has formed us as moral agents...that we may promote the happiness of those with whom He has placed us in society, by acting honestly towards all, benevolently to those who fall within our way, respecting sacredly their rights, bodily and mental, and cherishing especially their freedom of conscience, as we value our own.” ~Thomas Jefferson

“We want to love God-not with an empty, small, or flabby mind, but with a mind as large, as vigorous, and as disciplined as we can possibly make it.” ~Dr. Arnold Green

“The least stain upon your character will do more harm to your happiness than all accomplishments will do it good.” ~John Adams

All of us want the same thing--to be happy. As mothers, we especially want our children to be happy. But how is happiness accomplished? Is happiness something we can control or just something we hope happens to us?

According to Aristotle, happiness is not only within our reach but is attainable for ALL of us! The best part is, in striving for happiness, we become a much better person in the process, because, as Aristotle teaches, happiness is simply the result of becoming a virtuous person!

Listen to this podcast for an overview of Aristotle's incredible classic Nicomachean Ethics where he defines happiness and virtue and then shows us the path to a virtuous, happy life!

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

2:10  Happiness and virtue defined

8:00  Courage

15:20  Temperance 

17:19  Liberality

21:04  Magnificence 

22:25  Proper pride  

26:07  Good temper

27:23  Truthfulness 

28:17  Justice

30:48  Equity 

33:08  Intellectual Virtues  

Quotes from this episode:

“…happiness is an activity of soul in accordance with perfect virtue…”

“Virtue, then, is a state of character concerned with choice, lying in a mean, i.e. the mean relative to us, this being determined by a rational principle, and by that principle by which the man of practical wisdom would determine it.”

“…it is no easy task to be good.”

“Again, wish relates rather to the end, choice to the means; for instance we wish to be healthy but we choose the acts which will make us healthy.”

“…we are masters of our actions from the beginning right to the end…”

“…sudden actions must be in accordance with one’s state of character.”

“Now by ‘wealth’ we mean all the things whose value is measured by money. Further, prodigality and meanness are excesses and defects with regard to wealth…”

“Nor will he neglect his own property, since he wishes by means of this to help others.”

“…the liberal are almost the most loved of all virtuous characters since they are useful; and this depends on their giving.”

“…for the magnificent man spends not on himself but on public objects.”

“For the unduly humble man, being worthy of good things, robs himself of what he deserves, and seems to have something bad about him from the fact that he does not think himself worthy of good things, and seems also not to know himself; else he would have desired the things he was worthy of, since these are good…for each class of people aims at what corresponds to its worthy, and these people stand back even from noble actions and undertakings, deeming themselves unworthy…”

“Vain people, on the other hand, are fools and ignorant of themselves, and manifestly; for, not being worthy of them, they attempt honorable undertakings, and then are found out; and they adorn themselves with clothing and outward show and such things, and wish their strokes of good fortune made public, and speak about them as if they would be honored for them. But undue humility is more opposed to pride than vanity is; for it is both commoner and worse.”

“When the law speaks universally, then, and a case arises on it which is not covered by the universal statement, then it is right, where the legislator fails us and has erred by over-simplicity, to correct the omission—to say what the legislator himself would have said had he been present, and would have put into his law if he had know.”

“If follows that the wise man must not only know what follows from the first principles, but must also possess truth about the first principles.”

“…for virtue makes us aim at the right mark, and practical wisdom makes us take the right means.”

“If reason is divine, then, in comparison with man,

A continuation from part 1, this podcast takes you through the Characteristics of True Principles 7-12. With examples from novels, biographies and self-help books, each characteristic is brought to light and delineated to help you better understand the nature of true principles. 

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

1:50  7- Empower

9:00  8- Increase desire for good

16:13  9- Generate growth 

23:09  10- Improve health

30:20  11- Create win-win solutions 

33:47  12- Build unity  

Quotes from this episode:

"Let us look to America, not in order to make a servile copy of the institutions that she has established, but to gain a clearer view of the polity that will be the best for us; let us look there less to find examples than instruction; let us borrow from her the principles, rather than the details, of her laws." ~Alexis de Tocqueville

"There is only on way under high heaven to get anybody to do anything. Did you ever stop to think of that? Yes, just one way. And that is by making the other person want to do it." ~Dale Carnegie

"Life is difficult. This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult--once we truly understand and accept it--then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters." ~M. Scott Peck

"Life is a series of problems. Do we want to moan about them or solve them? Do we want to teach our children to solve them? Discipline is the basic set of tools we require to solve life's problems. Without discipline we can solve nothing...What are these tools, these techniques of suffering, these means of experiencing the pain of problems constructively that I call discipline? There are four: delaying gratification, acceptance of responsibility, dedication to truth, and balancing." ~M. Scott Peck

"Son, there is no question but what the thing you have done today deserves severe punishment. You might have killed yourself or the horse, but much worse than that, you have injured your own character. A man's character is like his house. If he tears boards off his house and burns them to keep himself warm and comfortable his house soon becomes a ruin. If he tells lies to be able to do the things he shouldn't do but wants to, his character will soon become a ruin. A man with a ruined character is a shame on the face of the earth." ~Ralph Moody

"How could I get into the good graces of this man? I remembered the book we were reading aloud by bicycle lamp, How to Win Friends and Influence People. One of the techniques advocated by Dale Carnegie was: find the man's hobby...'How smart of you, Doctor!' I said in German to the grizzled-haired man on the sofa.' 'Smart?' 'Yes, to bring these lovely dogs with you. They must be company when you have to be away from your family.'" ~Corrie ten Boom

"So far as motivational status is concerned, healthy people have sufficiently gratified their basic needs for safety, belongingness, love, respect and self-esteem so that they are motivated primarily by trends to self-actualization, defined as ongoing actualization of potentials, capacities and talents, as fulfillment of mission." ~Abraham Maslow

"Growth is, in itself, a rewarding and exciting process, e.g., the fulfilling of yearnings and ambitions, like that of being a good doctor; the acquisition of admired skills, like playing the violin or being a good carpenter; the steady increase of understanding about people or about the universe, or about oneself; the development of creativeness in whatever field, or most important, simply the ambition to be a good human being." ~Abraham Maslow

We live in a world of relativism--my truth and your truth, rather than THE truth. Yet, as mission driven moms, we are striving to build principle-centered hearts and homes. This is no easy task, especially when we've been given almost no clear instruction or direction in the skills of discovering and applying true principles in our lives. 

Among other tools we offer at The Mission Driven Mom is this invaluable one--The 12 Characteristics of True Principles! Armed with this simple list of attributes, we can now see principles more clearly.

In this podcast you'll be introduced to the first 12 characteristics, with the last 6 coming next week! Listen to stories, quotes and explanations of each in order to better understand the nature of true principles. 

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

4:11  How the 12 Characteristics came about

5:55  1- Foundational idea

8:55  2- True for all people, all the time

13:30  3- Increase freedom

17:47  4- Expand the mind

21:32  5- Enlighten the heart  

25:05  6- Enlarge the soul

Quotes from this episode:

"But things have been so admirably arranged by the divine Inventor fo the social order that in this, as in everything, political economy and morality, far from clashing, are in harmony, so that the wisdom of Ariste [the brother who saves] is not only more worthy, but even more profitable, than the follow of Mondor [the brother who spends]." ~Frederic Bastiat

"It is not without actual physical pain that I see such contradictions appear between the great laws of Nature. If mankind were reduced to choosing between the two sides, one of which hurts its interests and the other its conscience, we should have to despair for its future. Happily this is not so. To see Ariste regain his economic as well as his moral superiority, we need only understand this consoling axiom, which is not the less true for having a paradoxical appearance: To save is to spend." ~Frederic Bastiat

"They were standing a little straighter, and working a little more smartly. It did things to a man, Nat thought, to find out he had a brain." ~Jean Lee Latham

"It was not that my hygiene lessons had yet made that much difference, nor that I had grown accustomed to the smells because in other situations my crazy nose bothered me as much as always. It was rather that as I came to know the children and to think of them as persons rather that names in my grade book, I forgot my reactions and began to love them. I suppose the principle was that the higher affection will always expel the lower whenever we give the higher affection sway. For me, it was letting love for the mountain children come in the front door while my preoccupation with bad smells crept out the rathole." ~Catherine Marshall

"The nervous agitation of Alexey Alexandrovitch kept increasing, and had by now reached such a point that he ceased to struggle with it. He suddenly felt that what he had regarded as nervous agitation was on the contrary a blissful spiritual condition that gave him all at once a new happiness he had never known. He did not think that the Christian law that he had been all his life trying to follow, enjoined on him to forgive and love his enemies; but a glad feeling of love and forgiveness for his enemies filled his heart." ~Leo Tolstoy

"'But I saw her and forgave her. And the happiness of forgiveness has revealed to me my duty. I forgive completely. I would offer the other cheek, I would give my cloak if my coat be taken. I pray to God only not to take from me the bless of forgiveness.'" ~Alexey Alexandrovitch, Anna Karenina

Books from this episode:

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In our attempts to build principle-centered homes, sometimes we are tempted to think that if we could just find and teach our children true principles, we'd be home free! Unfortunately, that's not how it works. 

The life of Oscar Wilde is a perfect tutorial in principles ignored. Even though he was brilliant and funny, even though he was handed everything in life on a silver platter, even though he understand natural laws and principles well enough to write profound moral stories, he never listened to his own conscience. Even at the end, when it was clear his way didn't work and he seemed on the verge of confessing all and changing his ways, his willfulness and pride continued to stand in the way.

Join Audrey this week for an in-depth look at what happens when you know the principles but you refuse to let them save you. 

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

1:50  Oscar Wilde's childhood

4:15  Wilde's new worldview and fame

9:45  Wilde marries, has peace and begins rebelling

12:19  The Picture of Dorian Gray

19:42  Wilde spirals downward

27:25  De Profundis

33:40  Lord Alfred's reflections

Quotes from this episode:

“The artist is the creator of beautiful things...There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all...All art is quite useless.” ~Oscar Wilde from the Introduction of The Picture of Dorian Gray

Quotes from The Picture of Dorian Gray:

“Conscience and cowardice are really the same things.”

“Women represent the triumph of matter over mind, just as men represent the triumph of mind over morals.”

“I am perfectly happy now. I know what conscience is, to begin with. It is not what you told me it was. It is the divinest thing in us. Don’t sneer at it, Harry, any more—at least, not before me. I want to be good.”

“He sought to elaborate some new scheme of life that would have its reasoned philosophy and its ordered principles, and find in the spiritualizing of the senses its highest realization.”

Quotes from De Profundis:

"She and my father had bequeathed me a name they had made noble and honoured, not merely in literature, art, archaeology, and science, but in the public history of my own country, in its evolution as a nation.  I had disgraced that name eternally.  I had made it a low by-word among low people.  I had dragged it through the very mire.  I had given it to brutes that they might make it brutal, and to fools that they might turn it into a synonym for folly."

"I must say to myself that I ruined myself, and that nobody great or small can be ruined except by his own hand.  I am quite ready to say so.  I am trying to say so, though they may not think it at the present moment.  This pitiless indictment I bring without pity against myself.  Terrible as was what the world did to me, what I did to myself was far more terrible still."

"The gods had given me almost everything.  But I let myself be lured into long spells of senseless and sensual ease.  I amused myself with being a flâneur, a dandy, a man of fashion.  I surrounded myself with the smaller natures and the meaner minds.  I became the spendthrift of my own genius, and to waste an eternal youth gave me a curious joy.  Tired of being on the heights, I deliberately went to the depths in the search for new sensation.  What the paradox was to me in the sphere of thought, perversity became to me in the sphere of passion.  Desire, at the end, was a malady, or a madness, or both.  I grew careless of the lives of others.  I took pleasure where it pleased me, and passed on.  I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character,

If you were asked what rules the world, what would you say?  Money, politicians, scientists? Incredibly, what really rules the world is none of these, but an intangible entity: ideas. From ancient Greece to the French Revolution, history is replete with evidence of the power of ideas.

Join Audrey Rindlisbacher for this podcast as she gives evidence supporting the claim that ideas do in fact rule the world.  You'll hear how Athens and Sparta were shaped on dramatically different ideas and how they developed for good or bad as a result of those ideas.  You'll also hear about  The Great Ideas Movement in the early 20th Century and why it's vital mothers learn about The Great Ideas and get involved in The Great Conversation happening today.  

“Ideas matter. Ideas rule the world. It’s important for moms to start learning who it is that’s putting forth these ideas, why these ideas have such great power, and how they are affecting the daily life we find ourselves living in.” ~Audrey Rindlisbacher

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

1:21  Ideas rule the world

5:15  Solon of Athens’ ideas vs. Lycurgus of Sparta’s ideas and the results

10:27  The power of ideas today

14:14  The Great Ideas through history

26:05  Why mothers need to know about the ideas shaping society

28:35  Why it’s important for mothers to engage in The Great Conversation

Quotes from this episode:

“The density of ideas in Plato or Shakespeare or Thomas Hardy frustrates the mind that comes to them ready to draw conclusions. To tackle a course of reading successfully, we have to retrain our minds to grasp new ideas by first understanding them, then evaluating them, and finally forming our own opinions.” ~Susan Wise Bauer

“These books are the means of understanding our society and ourselves. They contain the great ideas that dominate us without our knowing it.” ~Robert M. Hutchins

“The liberally educated man has a mind that can operate well in all fields. He may be a specialist in one field. But he can understand anything important that is said in any field and can see and use the light that it sheds upon his own. The liberally educated man is at home in the world of ideas and in the world of practical affairs, too, because he understands the relation of the two.” ~Robert M. Hutchins

 “A classic is a book that is contemporary in every age. That is why it is a classic. The conversations of Socrates raise questions that are as urgent today as they were when Plato wrote. In fact they are more so, because the society in which Plato lived did not need to have them raised as much as we do. We have forgotten how important they are. Such books are then a part, and a large part of the permanent studies. They are so in the first place because they are the best books we know. How can we call a man educated who has never read any of the great books in the Western world?” ~Robert M. Hutchins

“My challenge for you is to engage more in the conversation around the great ideas and to start picking up the classics where these ideas are found and start talking about them…” ~Audrey Rindlisbacher

Books from this episode:

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For many years Audrey and her family have been pursuing principle-centered living. It is a journey that has been bumpy but rewarding. Through all of the books, all the experiences and all the trial and error, a few governing principles have emerged as most powerful for obtaining and maintaining peace--peace of conscience, peace in the home and peaceful interactions in the world. 

Audrey and her life are far from perfect, but the re-centering these principles provide is a constant source of aid in difficult times and direction in good times, as she diligently strives to be more than she is. 

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

2:50  Principle 1: Always forgive

9:42   Principle 2: Ask empowering questions

14:52  Principle 3: Submit to all truth

24:42  Principle 4: Be diligent

29:40  Principle 5: Have a vision

Quotes from this episode:

“After 15 years of research, I feel that we have found sufficient evidence of the power of forgiveness so that I can offer our knowledge to those who want to be free from the bondage of anger and resentment.”—Robert D. Enright, PhD

“Think about questions that expand your mind because you will receive answers to any questions you ask.”  ~Keith Cameron Smith

“I shall presently condemn and quit any opinion of mind, as soon as I am shown that it is contrary to any revelation in the Holy Scripture.” ~John Locke

“[Diligence] is the element of being awake, of thinking about what I’m doing, of striving to make improvements as I go.” ~Audrey Rindlisbacher

“Where there is no vision, the people perish” ~Proverbs 29:18

“Think about how you can have a clearer vision for where you’re heading in life and what foundation you’re building.  Live those 4 foundational laws of life mission.  Get them really solid.  Don’t short circuit the system.  Make sure you have a solid handle on those so you can continue to build a foundation in your home and hold a vision of where your family is headed.  And in the meantime bring as many people as you possibly can.” ~Audrey Rindlisbacher

Links from this episode:

Principles of Addiction Recovery

Principles of Forgiveness

Principles of Addiction in Action

3 Keys of Clear Thinking

 

 

 

Books from this episode:

"When our motives are wrong, nothing else can be right." ~Stephen R. Covey

Why is this? Why do our motives and intentions matter so much? Why is it that even when an individual seems to be doing all the right things, we turn away in disgust when we discover they had wrong intentions? What are intentions anyway? And how are they playing a vital role in how we see ourselves, others and the world?

Most importantly, though, what do our children need to understand about intention? How is intention connected to actions, behavior and character? And how can understanding these connections empower us to train up children of noble character?

This podcast answers these questions and more, as Audrey explores the very critical concept of intention!

Listener's Guide:

Use the time stamps below to skip to any part of the podcast. 

2:00  Return to Covey story from "Principles Stink!" podcast

5:16   The definition of intention  

8:37  Action vs. behavior  

12:00  Goodness and character  

13:53  The best way to build a child of noble character

17:35   A principle for teaching your child

21:18  Can you live principles with the wrong intention?

23:00  Wrong intention erodes character

26:00  Intention is either about you or others  

29:44  Audrey's wrong intention in her relationships  

Quotes from this episode:

"Intention: mind strained on an object; eager in pursuit of an object; anxiously diligent; design, purpose, meaning." ~Webster's 1828 Dictionary

"Right actions do lead to good thinking, and thinking good does sponsor right actions, just as improper thoughts can produce undesirable acts." ~Neil J. Flinders

"Encouraging and emphasizing right actions among children (birth to puberty) is the most productive, while encouraging and emphasizing good thoughts and intentions is the most appropriate and productive approach for adults (puberty through adulthood)." ~Neil J. Flinders

"Viewing others' actions means that we must comprehend their intentions as well as their behavior. It means that we must put ourselves in the others' shoes, as the saying goes. This means empathizing, using our capacity to participate in another person's feelings and ideas." ~Neil J. Flinders

"When our motives are wrong, nothing else can be right." ~Stephen R. Covey

"I realized that Sandra and I had been getting social mileage out of our children's good behavior, and, in our eyes, this son simply didn't measure up. Our image of ourselves, and our role as good, caring parents was even deeper than our image of our son and perhaps influenced it." ~Stephen R. Covey

"If we do not have morality and intention, we are not truly acting in the world; we are not free." ~Audrey Rindlisbacher

Books from this episode: