Grandma Brownies Rides Again!

Hi-ho Silverhair!  Away!  For those too young to know it, that’s a play on the Lone Ranger’s cry at the beginning of every show: “Hi-ho Silver!  Away![1]”

This is a picture taken a couple of years ago when I still had Prayer Bear.  I had my head on PB and my grandson had his head on his bear.

Lately, I’ve had a lot of contact with missionaries that have kids (see My Grandmother Anointing).  Yesterday two things came in the email.  The first was another invitation to babysit for missionaries (this time young teens) and the following prophecy newsletter (emphasis mine):

Take time to review all of the changes that have occurred in the past year.  In doing this, you will be able to see more clearly the texture of the future.  You won’t know the details, but you will be able to see a trend, says the Lord.  Be assured that I am leading you.  Psalms 32:8 I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will guide you with My eye.

See a trend?  Yes!  A great one, in which I’m playing the grandmother role more and more.  And the really wonderful thing about it is that God has ordained this grandmother role.  In every sense, it really is a grandmother anointing.  God is good!

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCO6smQrjJ8.

Know God by Name – God My Judge

 

And now the prize awaits me—the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me on the day of His return.  And the prize is not just for me but for all who eagerly look forward to His appearing, (2 Timothy 4:8, emphasis mine).

Just before moving to Italy the first time, I was involved in an accident.  Although it was technically my fault, the police told me that the accident was unavoidable.  Thank God that none of us was injured, though the car was badly damaged.  The other driver appeared unhurt, but the paramedics talked her into going to the hospital, saying that it would preserve a claim against me if it turned out that there were injuries that were not immediately apparent.

After moving, I discovered that she had filed a lawsuit against me.  Her injury claim was carpal tunnel syndrome.  Carpal tunnel is pinched nerves in the wrist caused by repetitive movement, like working at a computer day after day.  I didn’t believe that her carpal tunnel was caused by the accident—we only crashed once, after all.  The lawsuit exceeded the policy limits of my insurance policy, and her lawyer had blocked the sale of our house, pending the result of the trial (which could take literally years).  From my temporary residence in Italy, I had to hire an attorney to defend me.  My attorney set up a deal in which we would put the full amount of the sale of the house into an escrow account, pending the court’s ruling.  That way, at least the house sale could proceed.

My first reaction, of course, was to worry about all this.  But I was reading the Psalms every day, and throughout the Psalms are appeals to God as Judge, for example:

Do you indeed speak righteousness, you silent ones?  Do you judge uprightly, you sons of men? . . . The righteous shall rejoice when he sees the vengeance; He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked, so that men will say, “Surely there is a reward for the righteous; surely He is God who judges in the earth,” (Psalm 58:1 & 10-11, NKJV, emphasis mine).

So I decided to appeal my case to the highest court possible: the Court of Heaven.  I prayed: “Father, You judge my case, and I will be satisfied whatever Your verdict is, because I know that only You judge rightly.”

About a month later, she dropped the lawsuit and settled within the limits of the insurance policy.

Most people are uneasy at best, thinking of God as Judge.  If you’re unrighteous, then you have good reason to be uneasy at the thought.  But a righteous person (that is, made righteous through faith in Jesus), has nothing to fear.  In fact, it’s reassuring to know that the Judge is my Father, who loves me.

Earthly courtrooms are places where justice doesn’t always triumph.  But in God’s heavenly courtroom, justice is as perfect as our Perfect Judge.  God is good!

Know God by Name – God My Fortress

Jenny’s Prayer

Dear God, make me a bird so I can fly far, far, far away from here.

Dear God, make me a bird so I can fly far, far, far away from here.

Dear God, make me a bird so I can fly far, far, far away from here, (Jenny’s prayer from Forrest Gump).

As small children sometimes the only escape from an unpleasant or painful situation is to run away.  And running away is not only a physical escape.  Sometimes life is so pervasively horrific that the only means of escape is to leave their body altogether.  This is called dissociation, in which they detach themselves from their body.  It might not seem possible, but it is a very real phenomenon.  People describe hovering in a corner of the ceiling and watching the abuse of their body.  In this detached state, they cease to feel pain.  Dissociation can be a valuable tool for coping with things too terrible to endure.

The problem with leaving the body is that it makes room for demons to enter the empty shell of their body.  And this is a very real possibility when they leave their body while it is being abused by someone who is demonically possessed.  Being spirits, demons notice the things that are going on in the spirit realm.  And being opportunistic, if they notice an opening, they will enter.  Psychiatry calls this Dissociative Identity Disorder or what they used to call Multiple Personality Disorder.  Psychiatry noticed the link between child victims of abuse, dissociation, and “other personalities” that were vastly different from the patient’s own personality.

I once knew a woman with DID.  Matilda had grown up on a farm, far from other people.  There she was physically abused by her mother (who had been diagnosed as schizophrenic) and sexually abused by both father and grandfather.

Matilda told me about her mother speaking to her own “imaginary friends,” and of hearing hooves on the wooden stairs of the farm house whenever her mother lit candles.  Her mother’s abuse wasn’t limited to beatings, which Matilda had suffered daily.  Sometimes she would tie Matilda down on the kitchen table and do “surgeries” on her genitals.  Later, the doctors told her that it was a wonder that she had been able to get pregnant with so much scar tissue in her vagina.

Matilda had become such an expert at dissociation that at the slightest physical discomfort, she would detach from her body.  I saw her do it several times, and the emptiness in her eyes was instantly evident.  That detachment was quickly followed by the manifestation of one of her “other personalities.”  I didn’t know that they were demons at the time, but looking back, it has become obvious.  Matilda told me that “Cindy” was one of her many child personalities, and was very playful and mischievous.  Having been around it, I wouldn’t call Cindy playful and mischievous.  Cindy never manifested without causing me some kind of physical pain.  Matilda laughed it off, explaining that Cindy was hyperactive and didn’t know how to handle the strength of a full-grown woman’s body, since she is only five years old.

Cindy was the only demon that I had learned to recognize, but Matilda told me that almost all of her “others” had at one time or another had an encounter with me, and that they all liked me.  I do remember her voice changing, her face changing, even her body changing sometimes.

Now that I know what I was dealing with, I am horrified at the thought of those encounters.  And I am especially horrified that my children had met Matilda, and that I had invited her into my house.

I am not a person who easily abandons friendships.  Matilda very suddenly turned on me one day, telling me that I was no longer welcome to contact her.  This happened soon after moving to Italy the first time, with my family.  Now I see the breaking-off of our friendship as a good thing.  I do pray for her, and especially for her deliverance.  Matilda did accept Jesus one day when I visited her house.  But I didn’t know that she needed deliverance, nor how to help her in that.  In my innocence, I still believed that hers was a psychiatric problem.

One of the problems that we have in the church today is the very one that caused me to fail to fully understand what it was that I was dealing with: that is that we are so afraid of people becoming fascinated by the defeated enemy that we fail to teach anything at all about him or his tactics.  If you notice, I emphasized the word that reveals the problem with that approach: fear.  Will some people become fascinated?  Probably.  But that shouldn’t stop us from teaching the average Christian about these things.  Will some people call it a negative message?  Probably.  But who cares?  The only one with anything to lose by teaching these truths is the defeated enemy.

We need to be wisely discerning, teaching all the truth of God’s Word.  Had I been equipped with the knowledge, I could have helped Matilda get deliverance.  I also would never have allowed a demonized person into my house or near my children.

Is it any wonder that most American Christians don’t believe in hell, eternal punishment, or the devil[1]?  They don’t want to preach a “negative” message.  So often people like Matilda only find help from psychiatrists and medications, when they should be enjoying permanent deliverance.  The church needs to be teaching believers these things in accordance with the Word of God:

Watch out for people who cause divisions and upset people’s faith by teaching things contrary to what you have been taught.  Stay away from them.  Such people are not serving Christ our Lord; they are serving their own personal interests.  By smooth talk and glowing words they deceive innocent people.  But everyone knows that you are obedient to the Lord.  This makes me very happy.  I want you to be wise in doing right and to stay innocent of any wrong.  The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet, (Romans 16:17-20, emphasis mine).

And again:

Be innocent as babies when it comes to evil, but be mature in understanding matters of this kind[2], (1 Corinthians 14:20).

Armed with the full knowledge of the Word of God, believers can help the demonized, and find deliverance themselves.  Plus, knowing the reality of the defeated enemy’s existence and eternal punishment, believers will shut off their televisions, computers, and other distractions, and get out there and share the love of Jesus with greater urgency.  Because if you really understand that the nice barista at your favorite coffee shop is in danger of spending eternity in hell, you’ll tell him about Jesus.  Again, the only one who stands to lose from this so-called negative message is the defeated enemy, himself.

God is our Fortress.  He will protect you from the rage of people or the defeated enemy.  He will also protect you better than dissociation ever could.  If Matilda had known, she could have hidden herself in God, rather than dissociating and opening herself up to demonic possession.

You are my safe refuge, a Fortress where my enemies cannot reach me, (Psalm 61:3).

God is good!

[1] http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/us/2007/march/most-dont-believe-in-hell/?mobile=false, http://www.christianpost.com/news/most-u-s-christians-don-t-believe-satan-holy-spirit-exist-38051/

 

[2] The context is the gifts of the Holy Spirit, which includes discernment of spirits (1 Corinthians 12:10).

Picking Flowers with God

I rarely report dreams on the internet.  I prefer writing about real life, and especially how God interacts with me.  However, this dream was about my blog, so it seems appropriate to report it here.

I was walking and talking with God.  I didn’t see Him, but I was aware of His physical presence beside me as I walked.  Plus, it was not a monologue, but a dialogue.  As we walked along I was picking exotic flowers of a stunning variety, and every color imaginable.

As I woke up I wondered about the dream because it was so beautiful.  It was like the Garden of Eden, though I don’t think I was naked.  I wish I could remember more of the dream, like what God said to me.  But as I thought about the dream upon waking, I realized that it was a dream about blogging.  My posts are exotic flowers of all sorts and colors.

It is always nice to get encouragement from friends and other readers, but this encouragement from God was real confirmation that writing is beautiful and also important Kingdom work.  How like God to give a gift that is both useful and beautiful.  God is good!

Know God by Name – God My Righteousness

Hear me when I call, O God of my righteousness! (Psalm 4:1, NKJV, emphasis mine).

Noah and Abraham are the first two people that the Bible calls righteous.  Righteous is defined as:

Characterized by uprightness or morality; having just cause for something.  Morally right or justifiable: as in righteous indignation at being falsely accused.  A virtuous, righteous and godly person.

And the Bible expands on Abraham’s righteousness:

For the Scriptures tell us, “Abraham believed God, and God counted him as righteous because of his faith,” (Romans 4:3).

Believe God and it’s counted as righteousness.  It seems too easy.  But there’s a whole lot about the Christian faith that seems too easy.  God deliberately made these things easy.  Why do we feel like we have to complicate the simplicity of belief?  I think this is why we must come to Him like little children.  Children are masters of simplicity, and therefore belief comes easily to them.

The defeated enemy and the marketing hucksters of the world have taken advantage of many of us, so that we tend to suspect the things that are simple or that seem too good to be true.  In marketing, things that seem too good to be true almost always have a twist.  They usually wind up costing you more.

But in the Kingdom of God (which includes all issues of faith), those things that seem too good to be true are not only true, but often result in win-win situations with our fellow believers.  I have experienced this many times and in various situations.  I would even venture to say that the things that don’t immediately appear to be win-win can also be a gain in the long-run for the person who doesn’t appear to gain anything.  In fact, I believe this to be the case for the investments of time and money that I have made in supporting missionaries.  Even if I don’t appear to get anything out of it in certain cases, I know that someday I will share in their crown.  Don’t discount the Heavenly investment.

The people will declare, “The Lord is the source of all my righteousness and strength[1],” (Isaiah 45:24, emphasis mine).

I love this statement from Isaiah because it is clear that I don’t have to manufacture righteousness on my own.  As I yield to the Holy Spirit and obey God, His righteousness will flow through me.  Again, it’s the simplicity of belief.

If you’re feeling confused, take it to God.  He’s not a God of confusion.  He is a God of Simplicity.  He is God your Righteousness.  As you grow more mature as a Christian, His Righteousness will shine forth through you.  God is good!

[1] The context of this verse is the conversion of the Gentiles—future Christians (from Isaiah’s point of view).

So This is How the Other Half Lives

I have seen how the other half lives, and I have to say that I hated it.  I’m not talking about men, I’m talking about night owls.

What happened is this: I had a busy week, attending evening meetings and so forth.  I didn’t get to bed until after one in the morning.  Of course, instead of waking at my usual five – five-thirty, I woke at eight.  I had slept seven hours, which is a good night’s sleep for me.  I can get by with five, but six – seven is ideal.

Normally I wake up with my brain fully online, feeling good, and wanting, but not desperate for coffee.  I spend some quiet time with God, letting the morning dawn.  Then I read my Bible and spend time in prayer.  Sometimes I will write.  Thus my day starts, and by about seven-thirty – eight o’clock, I am ready for some breakfast.

I think that because it was not in time with my natural ten-to-five schedule, it was a struggle to wake up.  I was grouchy.  Suddenly, I understood how those night owls feel when they wake up so grouchy and desperately needing coffee before they can become verbal.

Honestly, it was so unpleasant that I have resolved to happily remain a morning person.  I don’t know how people can start their day suffering like that, and needing to jump into action: shower, breakfast, race off to work or school.  I like my slow approach to the day, and especially time with God first of all.  It starts the day right.  God is good!

My Grandmother Anointing

I have recently noticed that I am old enough to be the mother of many of the missionaries that I have been supporting.  Perhaps that’s because many of the missionaries my own age have retired and returned to their homelands.  And who can blame them?  Especially when many of them have labored in the mission fields 20 years or more[1].

Many of these young missionaries are couples with young children.  Lately I have been privileged to spend time with these littlest missionaries.  Yes, they are missionaries.  When God calls a person or a couple with children, he is calling the whole family.  Children are the most naturally evangelistic people I know.  They share their faith as easily as passing the salt at the dinner table.  In fact, children can share their faith with people who wouldn’t normally want to hear about Jesus.

This past weekend I was hosted by a missionary family with four kids.  Their mom had told them: “Alisa Brown is coming to visit.”  So the youngest started right away calling me Brownie, which evolved to Brownies, then Grandma Brownies.  It was absolutely delightful to be Grandma Brownies to these kids.

The week before that I was babysitting an adorable baby in Turkey, getting some grandma time with him, too.  And this week I had a little family visit.

Being a mother was the most wonderful, amazing thing to ever happen in my life.  Then in 2011 I became a grandmother, which definitely kicked things up several notches.  In my ministry, much of what I do is mother missionaries: I open my home to them, do laundry for them, cook for them, clean for them, rejoice with them in their triumphs, pray for their needs—and babysit for them.  Being Grandma Brownies to these missionary kids has kicked things up several notches.  I love my life!  God is good!

[1] I would love to retire, too.  But having only started six years ago, I feel the urgency to finish the job I’ve started.

Jesus Wept

Having recently spent time in the swing, swinging and talking with Jesus (see In the Swing with Jesus), I suddenly realized that I understood this, the shortest verse in the Bible: “Jesus wept,” (John 11:35, NKJV).  It’s important to understand the context.  Most of John chapter eleven is devoted to telling the story of the death of Jesus’ friend, Lazarus.  Jesus deliberately stayed away during Lazarus’ illness, then went to visit his house when he was already dead.  His sisters expressed dismay over the fact that Jesus had delayed and now Lazarus was dead and in the grave four days.  They pointed out that if He had been there, their brother wouldn’t have died.  Jesus didn’t explain, didn’t even raise a defense.

Jesus knew all along what He was going to do.  His grand, master plan from the start was to raise Lazarus from the dead.  So why did Jesus cry?

I once had a theory that Jesus cried because perhaps His own human father, Joseph, had died, and He hadn’t been allowed to raise him from the dead.  This was based on nothing but the fact that Joseph disappears from the Bible narrative after the end of Luke chapter two, when they find twelve year old Jesus in the Temple, talking with the priests.  So I thought that His tears might be tears of regret for His step-father.

But having spent that time in the swing, where I passed whole days living very deliberately in the moment, I suddenly understood.  Here’s why Jesus cried: Jesus lived His whole life, living in the moment.

Think about it: if you knew that the slow, painful death on a cross awaited you, wouldn’t you start praying weeks, even months, ahead of time?  I would.  In fact, I would get all my friends to pray round-the-clock for me.  Not Jesus.  He didn’t start to pray about the cross until the evening of His arrest.  He knew that His life was leading up to the cross, but He didn’t waste a single moment worrying about it or even praying about it until that moment was upon Him.  He did ask His friends to pray with Him.  And what disappointing friends they turned out to be.  But He knew that, too.

Jesus cried over Lazarus’ death, mourning with His friends, because that was what He was feeling in that moment.

This is a lesson for us because Jesus had all the faith in the world.  He lived by faith more fully than anyone else before or since.  So His tears were not due to a lack of faith.  Jesus didn’t doubt that He could and would raise Lazarus from the dead.  He was simply feeling the emotions of that moment while Lazarus was still dead and Mary and Martha were grieving.  He shared their grief and He felt their disappointment in Him.  He didn’t try to escape the pain of that moment by thinking about the very near future and how happy they would soon be.

The fact that Jesus lived each moment of His life being completely present in the moment leads to a thought that I am (in this moment) finding very hard to write.  That difficult thought is this: Jesus was fully in the present moment for every single second that He was being falsely accused, beaten, spit upon, stripped, nailed up, abandoned by the Father, and dying on the cross.

I recently shared some of what I call my “embarrassing naked stories” of being an American living in Italy, where modesty is viewed very differently.  In a nutshell: the medical professionals of Italy give you nothing to drape over your nakedness.  Nor do they give you female professionals just because you’re female.  It made me very aware that I was from the country founded by the Puritans.  In those situations I coped with my nakedness by going to my Happy Place in my mind.

If I found myself unable to stay fully present in those moments of nakedness, I can’t even imagine how Jesus stayed fully present in His moments of extreme physical and emotional trauma.  Yet, I know that He did.  I know it because Jesus wept.  I understand it now.  And knowing this brings an even deeper appreciation for what Jesus did for me.  It is so much more than I had even realized.  And to say, as I always do, that God is good in this moment feels like the grossest understatement in the world.  All I can really say is sincerely, from the bottom of my heart: Thank You, Jesus!  Thank You!  Thank You!  Thank You!

Exploring Istanbul

As the conference progressed, I have had time to get to know each of the attendees.  And, we were served dolmas today (stuffed vegetables, see Turkey in the Straw).

One of the attendees I’ve met lives in Istanbul: Gerda.  In fact, she has lived in Istanbul for the last twenty years.  I found myself sitting next to Gerda at lunch one day, so I asked her about the two things I really wanted to see in Istanbul: Hagia Sofia and the Grand Bazaar.  She said that they are definitely worth seeing.  But she added that close to the Hagia Sofia there is also the Topkapi Palace and the Archeological Museum, which has examples of paleo Hebrew in stone as well as some very old Bibles.  She also said that in addition to the Grand Bazaar, there is also the Spice Bazaar, which to me sounds much more inviting.  And all these things are within walking distance of one another.

After the conference we returned to Istanbul, and me to my fancy airport hotel (see The Turkey has Landed).  But as much as I had been looking forward to my sightseeing day in Istanbul, I woke up with a migraine attack.  Now, I’ve been healed of migraines.  I have no doubt about that.  Nevertheless, the defeated enemy sometimes attacks me, and often these attacks happen around the time of a mission trip like this one.  Usually I am able to pray the migraine away, but this one was bad, really bad.  I woke up headachy, nauseated, and weak.  I could barely make myself get dressed and go to breakfast, but I did so, believing that a little nourishment would help.  It didn’t.  I went back to my room after breakfast and seriously considered skipping my sightseeing day.  Eventually I found the strength to get out of the hotel and go into town.

I took an airport bus to the city center.  From there I took the Historic Tram (that’s what they really call it) to the tunnel, called Tünel, the second oldest subway in the world, linking the popular Galata district to Taksim.  From Galata I took another tram over the Galata Bridge to the European side of Istanbul.  There the tram passed the Spice Bazaar.  I got off at the Sultanahmet stop, which stops right in front of the Blue Mosque.  But I was looking for Hagia Sofia.

Since I had little energy, I figured that I would go and see Hagia Sofia first and then if I saw anything else it would be a bonus.  But I had walked in the wrong direction.  Sometimes a wrong turn can be a really good thing.  I somehow wound up at the Grand Bazaar.  I walked in, but found the shopkeepers so aggressive and my own energy so low that I quickly walked out again.  I had no strength for shopping at all.  I found a shady spot to sit and consulted the map.  I saw where I had gone wrong and retraced my steps.  I don’t know how I had missed it from the tram except that I was just feeling so wretched that I just did miss it.

I bought a ticket and went inside.  It truly is an engineering wonder to imagine that this dome with its buttressing half-domes was constructed in the sixth century.  But the really surprising thing is that there are cats all over the grounds and even inside.  The cats must be so used to seeing hordes of tourists day after day that they simply saunter around, staying just out of reach, skillfully ignoring the humans as if they were just an annoyance, which I guess they (we) are.  I knew that if there was a lot of enemy resistance, it had to be because our defeated enemy didn’t want me to enter the Hagia Sofia and do what I would normally do: pray.  So I gathered all the strength I had and prayed as the loud speakers from the minarets began to wail the blast-volume call to prayer.  Although I had little strength, prayer thankfully doesn’t depend upon my strength, but upon my God, who is bigger, stronger, and all-powerful.  I let the Lord of Hosts do all the fighting.

By this time my energy was spent, so I got on the next tram and returned to Taksim and the airport bus stop.  When I got to the hotel (about seven PM) I was worn out.  I hadn’t eaten since the breakfast that I had forced down, but I found myself not hungry at all.  I laid down to rest and slept for ten hours straight.

When I woke up early the next morning, I still wasn’t hungry, but I was feeling decidedly better.  The headache and nausea were gone, though I still felt very weak.  Breakfast did help renew my strength.  So I packed and caught my flight back to Milan.  This last day, my day of sightseeing, was more exhausting than a whole week of babysitting and walking little Joey around and around in his stroller.  But I knew that it was important, too.  God is good!

In the Swing with Jesus

Someone recently had mentioned the book The Wounded Heart to me, saying how much it helped her, despite the fact that her “wound” was not childhood sexual abuse, which is the primary focus of the book.

Then another person had mentioned to me about testing your Emotional Intelligence (EQ) and how much it helped her (the results of my free online test are below).  Hmm . . . Maybe there is something I am supposed to be learning in order to improve myself.

God has already done a lot of inner healing, but I know that there are still unresolved issues that I need to deal with.  I’m just not convinced that EQ or The Wounded Heart is the right answer for me.  The thing is that I could literally spend hundreds of dollars on books and workshops trying to find the solution, but without knowing the right direction, it would do me little good.  And I definitely don’t want to lose any of the progress I’ve already made.  Many of the solutions require a person to look back at the times they were wounded, and re-hash them.  I will do that only if I truly believe that it is going to benefit me in the long run.  What I don’t want to do is to find myself remembering or talking about the past and stirring up negative feelings for people that I have worked very hard to forgive and to love again.

So this is some of what I have been doing daily in the swing[1] while little Joey naps: praying to understand what it is that I need to do in order to completely heal emotionally.  Today I remembered the prophecy newsletter that arrived in my email inbox just yesterday:

Define that feeling of restlessness.  When you do, you will find that there is something you need to do or consider doing.  It is a nudge to get you moving in the right direction.  Quiet your inner being so that you can allow Me to show you the way you should go, says the Lord.  Rise up in confidence that I am your very present help.  Psalms 46:1 – God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

So while I was on the swing, I started swinging higher, really enjoying the sensation.  Then I noticed that the swing next to me was also swinging.  Jesus and I were swinging together.  So I began talking to Him.  He is a really good listener.  He didn’t reveal anything big to me, but I felt reassured that revelation will come, and with it, healing.  God is good!

So here’s the results of my EQ test:

You have slightly above average EQ, with room to grow!  You are likely sensitive to the emotional climate of the people around you when you and they—peers, friends, family and key clients—are under pressure.  You are aware of the effect your behavior has on others.  While you may be adept at tuning into others and their needs, you must remember your own.  Don’t be afraid to honestly communicate these difficult needs and feelings.  This is one of the most important aspects of Emotional Intelligence: being able to skillfully air your grievances.

Things to consider:

What situations generally create pressure and stress for you?

How are you handling these situations?

What negative thoughts play over and over in your mind on a regular basis?

Are these a true picture of reality?

When you are triggered emotionally, what are some of your less effective default behaviors?

If you can learn to be more aware of when emotions are driving your behavior and stay calm in your high pressure moments, you will see a big increase in your Emotional Intelligence, which will lead to increased performance and more effective relationships—at work and at home!

[1] The Lord provided a swing in response to my prayer for a rocking chair, see Turkish Delight.