A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity, at no charge, to do something rather odd. A psychologist sat me in front of a board with flashing lights. The lights kept moving back and forth, left and right. My job was to follow the lights with my eyes and think about specific things the psychologist told me to think about. The theory of all of this is that, by having your eyes continually track left and right, you open up both sides of your brain and get them working together for greater creativity and deeper processing.

I was exploring a problem I was having at work at the time. The psychologist's questions were designed to help me do that. One aspect of my job is that sometimes I have to deliver news to people that they really don't want to hear and sometimes I have to challenge them to a new way of thinking. People don't like having their camembert moved but sometimes I have to move it. My problem is that I worry about their response.

Through this process, I had a bit of a personal breakthrough. This is so obvious that it's silly that I had never figured it out before. The reason for my worrying about how others will respond is that I have spent most of my life around someone who frequently responds quite irrationally, especially when his roquefort is moved or he is challenged. As a result, my pattern has been to fear that everyone will be that way.

Rationally, I know that isn't the case. But there's still an issue, as I go forward, with getting every ounce of my psyche to break through that fear. I did have an instance this week where a customer got me on the phone and was expecting me to be on the next plane to Scranton to see her roof problem. She followed up with an email that was equally mean-spirited as her phone call. I was okay though as I explained to her that I was not doubting her roof problems but that I need to focus my energy in different ways to help her. I could fly to Scranton but that wasn't going to help her one bit because my skills with a glue gun were not what she needed to have her roof fixed.

Where I am focusing now to help me get through this fear is to really understand who I am in God. I am His. That's all I need to know in order to know my importance and to see where my focus needs to be. Fact is, when I challenge them or shift their brie, most folks are going to behave rationally. Slowly, I am convincing myself of that. But, you know what, even if they do get all crazy on me, it makes no difference. I am who I am because I am my Heavenly Father's. So long as I seek to follow Him, I have no fears and poor behavior on the part of others will not hurt me one bit.