If you ever were so upset you FIRED off a response or an email without thinking then that is an example of a lack or lapse of self control or control of your anger, emotions. It may have set ablaze hurt and unwanted consequences. Well, get ready for a season, a year of practicing controlling your anger and intentionally using the fire of knowledge, organized thought, embedded truth and facts, and wisdom from your experience, religious practices, and history. Yeah, all of that.

My religion has been challenged, disassembled, broken down, on so many levels over the past eight years. And here we are, religious or not, facing times externally and internally that seek to divide and conquer, steal, kill, and destroy. How do we not be rugs of Christianity or spirituality?

Large fires are sometimes “put out” with other fires by using a technique called “backburning” where firefighters deliberately set a controlled fire in the path of a wildfire, essentially burning up the fuel ahead of the main fire and depriving it of the ability to spread further; this is essentially “fighting fire with fire” to control the blaze and prevent its progression. Spiritual backburning is how we fight fire with fire. It is how we STRATEGICALLY fight the fires externally, personally, and internally. We will have to contend with falsification, outright lies, delusion, narcissistic behavior, evil, destruction and the response can’t be out of emotion only. It must be coupled, infused with facts, truth, honesty, and the love of a mama bear defending her cubs. Yes, love is not always meek and mild, soft in tone. It’s not baby Jesus in swaddling cloth but maybe adult Jesus flipping over tables with a righteous anger. Mind blowing, huh?

But it must be a controlled response of fire. The more you practice, the better you become at it. And I am not opposed to letting an idiot “have it” no more than I am not opposed to silence. In fact, wisdom will let you know what is needed. I admire those who “never” lose it because I am not one of those. I lose it less and less over the years and with growth in my life. Experience is a great teacher that never retires. Some are skilled in scare tactics, pushing buttons, name calling, spewing hatred. It does not mean they are intelligent. Some can even hold top positions. Doesn’t mean they are qualified. Some are qualified and that doesn’t mean they are will be good at it. How many “bosses” have you worked for and how many in “management or CEOs” have ruined a company? Many. So, a controlled response packed with wisdom and knowledge and truth and so on, will be your mountain peaks while they are scuffling in the valley, wallowing in the mud.

~Nikki

¹⁰ The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. -Book of John 10th Chapter

“add to your knowledge, self-control,” -2 Peter 1

“A person who cannot control their anger is like a city without walls” Book of Proverbs 25:28