Have you ever noticed that two people can commit the same offense and not be treated the same way?

In 1 Peter 1:6-8 the Bible says: 6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy,
In verse 6 it says that we may “suffer grief and all kind of trial” but it also says “in all this you greatly rejoice.” We will all have trials that seem to throw themselves at us but we can’t let them get us down. We are all called for different things and no single person has the same path to walk. The reason why some people seem to be treated differently for the same thing is because the people’s talents are different. Each person has a unique talent an their talent might be more equipped for the task.

Bill Vining Jr.

Connections: Investigating Reality

16 December 2012

Connections: Patterns and Relationships

Humans have always been said to be creatures of habit, and is it not true? But

what is a habit? A habit is a behavior that a person repeats so often that it becomes normal

to them and they may be unaware of it. The truth is that every single person develops

habits in their lives. Habits are created on the days we have to go to school or work. Habits

are created when we get ready for bed. And the other truth is that habits are patterns that

people create. Patterns are everywhere in the world. Everywhere someone looks they are

observing patterns, whether it be a pattern in the way things are categorized or in social

behaviors or in the geography of the land or physiological patterns, and they only need

to be able to recognize the labels, categories and organization of patterns. In the book

Connections: Investigating Reality it evokes the reader to learn how to recognize patterns

and understand them.

One such pattern, would be category trees. Category trees are a breakdown

of the information that is known. Take music for an example, there are many genres of

music; rock, pop, country, jazz, R&B, rap, gospel and so many more. To expand the

category of music, focus on one genre such as the rock genre. From the rock genre there

is hard rock, classic rock, alternative rock, grunge, Christian rock and the list can go on

and on. Then, from, let’s say, classic rock you have numerous bands, such as; Aerosmith,

Led Zeppelin, The Beatles, The Who, Pink Floyd, Eagles, Journey plus many more.

Category trees help people label the information, organize the information and categorize

the information for easy understanding and access.

To use a more hands-on example of category elaboration my class went to one of

the local supermarkets. One major pattern we noticed in the supermarket was how all

the items that needed to be kept cold were in one place. They didn’t have them all spread

out at random, instead they had them to where the customers could easily find the cold

items. From there we observed how all the cold meats were together, how all the cold

drinks were together, how the cold dairy products were together. We didn’t find a

package of hot dogs where the eggs were kept at and we didn’t find a gallon of yogurt

where the juices were kept at. Then, we observed how the 2% milk wasn’t with the

orange juice and the coffee wasn’t with the chocolate milk. The entire supermarket

held patterns within patterns. It had categories with many “branches” expanding upon

the category tree that the branches were a part of.

Another pattern would be relationship patterns, which doesn’t just strictly go for

relationships between people. Relationship patterns refers more to the logical and

cause-effect relationships. Relationship patterns are patterns that grow as pattern

awareness grows. For instance, what is the cause of teenage suicide? Some might

answer depression, bullying, money etc. But the real pattern is between teenage suicide

and emotions. Depression and bullying on a category tree would be “branches” off of

emotions. Another example of relationship patterns would be the pattern between

claustrophobia being caused by emotions. We start with claustrophobia, which by

definition means: fear of small, closed in spaces. Fear is an emotion, it is produced by the

mind. The mind makes the body think that it is trapped because the mind believes it and

thus the cause of claustrophobia is the emotions a person has. The whole point of

analyzing and solving relationship patterns involves quite a bit of critical thinking and is

a very important step to understand in order to expand the awareness of patterns.

Do people create habits? Yes. Do people always recognize and understand

created habits? No. People have become ignorant to the patterns in the world around

and thus people have become ignorant to the world because they do not understand

it. The learning process of recognizing and understanding patterns all begins with being

observant and quick thinking. It begins with honing the mind to unlearn in order to

relearn and Connections: Investigating Reality is a step in learning the see the world as

it really is, a complex creation of patterns between everything.

The people you make time for will find time for you.

It is just like Jesus, who invested His whole life to the people. We must also invest our lives in people. We are all being called to invest in people, to spend our time helping them realize who God is and grow in Him. If we invest in people then we leave a legacy behind us. If we invest in worldly things then our legacy will be forgotten.
The second part to that is that after we invest our lives in people, we have to keep that investment. We can’t let it slip away, we have to hold on to it tightly and treasure it always. We have to always remember it and not get ahead of ourselves, we have to remember the people we invest in and treasure them. And we also have to remember them and adjust to them, for if we move too fast our investment, the person, gets left behind and we lose our investment.
Don’t lose the investments you make in people. Even when it all gets rough, remember the people you invest in and remember that even at the face of death Jesus never forgot His investments.

I’ve been told that my weakness is that I’m too loyal-I can live with that. Time has taught me that relational investment is more than worth the risk. It’s perplexing to me that people can be more committed to their financial investments than what they invest in people. The people you invest in now are the people who will be invested in you tomorrow. And if you live as if you don’t need people, you will get to prove it later.

“Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.” John 15:16
Everybody invests their time in something that they find to their liking. It is inevitable, because a person who invests in nothing lives for nothing and we have to live for something. But the thing is, once you invest in something and put your time and effort into it, you can’t get that time you spent back. And quite often people don’t invest in the right things and end up wasting time.
In John 15:16 it tells us “ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain.” When I’ve read this verse other times I didn’t think too much about it but now I can see, the “fruit that remains” is the people we leave behind.
It is just like Jesus, who invested His whole life to the people. We must also invest our lives in people. We are all being called to invest in people, to spend our time helping them realize who God is and grow in Him. If we invest in people then we leave a legacy behind us. If we invest in worldly things then our legacy will be forgotten.

The reality is that all of us need others to succeed.

What Erwin says is true and his statement is backed up by the Bible. In Romans 12: 4-5 it says 4 For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, 5 so in Christ we, though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.
Too many times in life, myself included, we just want to be on our own and do things our own way. The truth is that we weren’t made to be alone and do things alone. Sure, we all need personal time, especially when we need to speak to God, but we aren’t made to have personal time all the time. We need to depend on each other. And as different as we all are, if we strive for God together then all our talents and gifts will work together to achieve that goal.

Walk with God, and get ready-it’s going to be exhilarating. Life will become a gift. When you dream with your eyes open, even when you shouldn’t find joy, even when life comes at you hard, even when you have tremendous pain and disappointment and you have every good reason to lose your joy, deep in the core of your soul there will be an unshakable joy.

I believe what Erwin is, and has been, trying to say is that when you are living wide awake is when you are living so in tune with God that every moment in life, no matter the circumstances, you have pure joy.
You have the joy of Lord in your soul, all within you, and it can’t be stopped by things that get thrown at you in your life.
Think of it like this: A river is a natural force that when released from a dam can’t be stopped. It isn’t stopped by a few rocks and boulders in its path and it always leads to somewhere. Whether it leads to a bigger river, a lake, or the ocean it always has a greater destination. And a river always branches off, it’ll have streams flowing from it that turn into bigger rivers.
We should be like rivers when we are dreaming wide awake. Our joy, once we tap into it through God, should be like a river released from a dam. Our lives should be full and our joy not stopped by troubles. Our live should always lead to somewhere greater, because we all have a different life to live with different purposes and through God we can live them out. And our lives should always leave disciples in our wake, our joy should be so great because of God that people can’t help but notice and we can’t help but share.
God designed us all differently but one thing that is always the same is the pure joy that comes from living wide awake with God.

When there’s an out-of-control fire, these hot shots start strategically positioned fires because they understand the only way to stop a devastating fire is to consume it with a new fire. That’s exactly what the Scriptures say. The only way you are going to stop being pulled around by destructive desires and passions is to allow God to awaken those passions and desires that will bring your life to wholeness and health and make you fully alive. You need to enjoy your life because it restores original intent. It takes you back to the way God created you. You’re supposed to enjoy your life. It’s a command.

When your life is an out-of-control fire you need a hot shot, or a disciple of God, to come and start new fires within you to stop the out-of-control fire. This mean you have to allow God into your life, and just like Erwin says, you have to allow Him to spark passions and desires that will bring your life to wholeness.
God designed us to be beings of passion and integrity. He wanted us to experience the world, not just live like robots who enjoy nothing. He created us the way He did because He had a plan for us. While His plan is different for everyone He does have one thing that He has planned for us all. He wants everyone to live life like it should be, filled with passions and desires that are fueled by Him. The underlying part of that is that God wants all of us to enjoy life with him, not just on the Earth but an eternity in Heaven.

So many things bring me pleasure. Life for me is an endless exploration of beauty and mystery. It’s not that I don’t have bad days; I do. We all do. But learning how to enjoy life when those tough days come at you is an art form. While life is filled with pain and sorrow along with celebration and laughter, the scriptures challenge us to find joy in every circumstance we face

I have to say, learning to enjoy life even during the tough days is a challenge that, well to be blunt, many people fail to overcome. And I can admit that I’ve been one of those people who have failed at that. There are, and always will be, challenges that will seem to be thrown at us in our lives. And the only real way that you can overcome those is to get in tune with God.
I mean just think about it, you have God on your side!! What wouldn’t give you joy about that?
I want to challenge everybody to find their joy through God and to keep that joy.

Being able to recognize the patterns that fill the world is an important step in being able to understand the world and the way people are able to recognize patterns is by going through thought processes.
One of the most used thought processes is Comparing. When using this thought process a person looks for similarities in two or more objects. With Comparing two or more objects you find patterns of similarity.
The thought process that works right alongside with Comparing is: Contrasting. Contrasting is when a person looks for differences in two or more objects.
Recalling or Remembering is another main thought process in finding patterns. Recalling or Remembering is where a person brings to mind previously learned information. In finding patterns you would use these by using what you already know to state a fact or in some cases make an educated guess.
Which leads up to the fourth main thought process: Hypothesizing. Hypothesizing is making an educated guess for an unknown solution based on what you know already. These four thought processes are only one of the many used in finding patterns.

In our Connections class one of the ways we used these thought process was to find human behavior patterns. Some of the most common patterns we noticed were in body language, dress, speech and traditions.
The patterns we found in body language were, what I would consider, the most important because your body language tells nearly everything about you. If a person is slouched and quiet then they are most likely insecure about their surroundings. If a person has a relaxed stance and smiling then they are most likely confident people.
Another pattern of body language is the body language involved in greeting. There are different patterns, different expectations, in different environments. If you compare the greetings at a church to fast food restaurant then you have two completely different environments and two completely different social and body language patterns.
One of the other patterns we observed in human behavior is speech. The way people speak to a stranger compared to the way people speak to a friend are completely different, in most cases. In a church people nearly always greet each other with a smile and exuberant “Hi’s” and “How are you’s?” And in a public place like a grocery store people more often than not won’t even greet each other, they just go on with their business. The previous mentioned patterns are but a few of the many patterns we observed and recorded.

The other project we worked on with patterns was finding patterns in school. The most important pattern we noted were the questions that people get asked at a public school, and even some private schools. You get asked questions that just ask for a person to use only one or two thought processes. These questions, most of the time, just call for Recalling or Remembering. And using the thought process of Comparing and Contrasting the normal school system doesn’t stimulate the brain as much as the Connections class we are working on.

Every single lesson in Connections: Investigating Reality creates thought invoking problems that you solve by using thought processes. When the solution is found, you discover that there are so many different layers to the world. You find the patterns that connects everything in the world. Connections shows you what you are missing and makes you see new things in a new light.