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“I’ll just shake it off and step up.”

A thought by Ray Johnston (2014-05-13) from his book, The Hope Quotient:  Measure It. Raise It. You'll Never Be the Same. (p.140). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)

So many of us, so many times need to do this, don’t we?

Ray gives us a good picture of what he means.  He says, “An old parable tells of a farmer who owned a mule that fell into an abandoned, dry well. The farmer decided that neither the mule nor the well were worth saving, so he enlisted his neighbors to help haul dirt to bury the old mule in the well and put him out of his misery. The old mule brayed hysterically as the first shovels of dirt rained down on him. But as he struggled, a thought struck the mule. Every time a shovel of dirt lands on my back, he thought, I’ll just shake it off and step up. So that’s what he did. Shovelful after shovelful, the old mule fought panic and just kept right on shaking it off and stepping up. Shake it off and step up! he kept thinking. Shake it off and step up! Before long, the battered and exhausted mule stepped triumphantly over the wall of that well and into a new chance at life.”

Ray then says, “We can learn a lot from that old mule. If we refuse to let regret, bitterness, worry, failures, and the guilt that rains down on us bury us, then those things have within them the power to lift us to levels we’ve never before reached. If we refuse to let the hope killers steal our future and bury us, then we set ourselves up for something great that God wants to do through us.

Refuse is a good word.  It is a choice that you and I can make no matter the situation we are in.


So, what do you need to refuse to let bury you and to lift you up to a new level of life?
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