Conversations With Cinthia

These days, "boundaries" is a word that arises in popular conversation.  Somehow, though, we still don't display better boundaries for all our popular understanding.  Today, Cinthia offers the following guideline for boundaries within relationship: "What I value, I will protect; what you value, I will respect."  She also uses a word we don't often hear in popular culture these days: self-control.  What do boundaries and self-control have to do with one another?  What do they have to do with Jesus's teaching that our "yes" should be "yes" and our "no" should be "no?"  As always, Cinthia presents timeless truth in a way that's probably slightly different than the way you've heard it a thousand times, generating lots of food for thought and inspiring practical steps toward being the person you were meant to be.  Join her for the fourth part of an amazing series!

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And now for the specifics...  Having a relationship with Person A is very different from having a relationship with Person B!  Having spent the last two episodes helping us with the basics of making relationships work with fallen human beings in general, today Cinthia tackles what it means to be in relationship with an individual.  Gender, temperament, and personality can hugely impact our relational functioning, but these differences are often ignored or even denied in our culture.  As a result, we are rarely educated to have awareness of how these things impact our communication, let alone actually start to communicate respectfully with people who differ from ourselves in these areas.  Join Cinthia for a quick primer in how gender, temperament, and personality impact our relational functioning and how to improve your relationships with people who may differ from you in these areas.

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What does it look like to have appropriate expectations in a relationship between adult human beings?  Last week, Cinthia launched a course on how to enjoy relationships, which are inherently complex, without making them complicated.  Today she continues this exploration, looking in more detail at what it means to have healthy expectations for ourselves and others, but without lapsing into parenting each other or becoming judgmental and petty.  She also discusses the difference between acceptance and agreement when someone messes up, even when the "someone" is you.

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Does it ever seem like your education prepared you for everything but life with other humans?  Do you ever wish you could get a really practical course in how to manage human relationships?  Today Cinthia tells us how to let relationships be complex without making them complicated.  She introduces such topics as having appropriate expectations, keeping good boundaries, respecting basic differences in gender, temperament, and personality, and living peacefully in a world that demands our immediate attention all the time.  Today's focus is on appropriate expectations.  If you've heard people say that you should let go of all expectations so you won't be disappointed, Cinthia has another perspective to share, one that could help you make a lot more sense of how to approach relationships.  Join Cinthia to get started!

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What is it like to be loved by you?  Our love is not as pure and perfect as God's and is flavored by our personalities, habits, etc.  Do your loved ones know you love them?  Do they enjoy your love?  Cinthia discusses how to offer love that feels like love to your loved ones.  This includes some discussion of how forgiveness relates to the restoration of trust, how to accept forgiveness without continuing to focus the relationship on making yourself feel better, and learning how another person likes to be loved instead of offering only what you would like to be offered.  Join Cinthia to consider how your love might be coming across to others and how to make your love that much sweeter to your loved ones.

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The past is powerful.  If we use it for self-abuse, it can deprive us of so much that God wants for us in the present and the future.  Cinthia explains that God does not give us the ability to remember our pasts so that we can self-flagellate, but so that we can learn and repair.  God gave us time for a reason.  If remembering your past still feels like waking up only to find the nightmare was real, join Cinthia to explore how to use your memories in the way God intends.  You can't rewrite history, but you can redo things in the present and create a new future for yourself and, often, for those you failed.  Don't miss this episode.  The present and future are gifts.  Don't let the past steal them.

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Are you afraid of the wrong things?  In a world that tells us both to be fearless and to worry about everything, sometimes we shrink back from risks God wants us to take -- while taking risks with things God wants us to value and protect!  Cinthia discusses the difference between confidence and arrogance, what it means to take our cues from God the way a child who trusts a good parent would do, and how to deal with the reality that we will make mistakes.  If fear ever gets in your way, join Cinthia for a look at whether the things you fear really deserve to be limiting your life.

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How would it help your loved ones if you took better care of yourself?  Would they worry less?  Find you more patient and pleasant to be around?  Toss their plans for the rescue mission they're planning for the day you finally crash?  For our purposes, "self-care" doesn't mean self-indulgence or treating luxury as necessity; it means taking basic care of yourself, the way you would do for a pet, a child, or any person who cannot perform basic tasks for their own well-being.  It means eating well, exercising, resting, drinking water, managing your own thoughts, etc.  As much play as "self-care" seems to get on the Internet these days, lots of us still struggle with taking care of business, family, ministry, pets, friends, the car, the yard, the house, and a thousand other people and things... but neglecting the basic boundaries and tasks that would maintain the bodies and brains God has entrusted to us.  Join Cinthia for an honest look at whether you are maintaining yourself well enough that relationship with you is a positive experience for others.

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Love sounds great, doesn't it?  We all love love, we want it to make the world go round etc. But would you say you live in love, moment by moment and day by day?  What would that even look like?  Cinthia explains that this is exactly what God does with us and what He wants to do in us.  Still, love is confusing on earth, starting with the fact that something so wonderful can feel terrible at times; just look at the cross.  It can be painful, making us want to avoid love.  Yet, if we want 2020 to be the best year possible, we have to start by aligning ourselves with the agenda of the One Who will be running the universe this year.  He is Love, and coming to know Him involves learning how to love.  Join Cinthia to explore where to start, why to keep going, and how to think about the things that get mixed up with love but aren't the real thing.

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Have you ever wondered why your brain picks the thought trails it does, especially the ones that involve worry or negativity?  Cinthia explains this today -- your brain is trying to help you -- but also encourages us to re-work this, noting what worry and negativity do to our bodies and lives.  If you like learning about the brain and how to help it function well, you will love this episode.  In order to have the best year possible  and be the best versions of ourselves, we have to remember... worry and peace cannot coexist!  This is about so much more than false positivity.  Join Cinthia to explore how to reduce your Eeyore tendencies in 2020.

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