Nine roadblocks to happiness

by Ted Cunningham

1. Selfishness – You may have the mistake of thinking that cutting off a relationship in your life will change everything, but the deep truth is that wherever you go, that person is in your mind. You take all your past hurts and victories with you wherever you move. Serving is the antidote for selfishness. Give something expecting nothing in return.

2. Pride – Increase humility by recognizing that everything you have and everything you are comes from God. The antidote to pride is dependence on God. Humility also means being transparent. Humility lays the soul bare in dependence on God.

3. Insecurity – Find your security in Him.

4. Resentment – When seeds of resentment and bitterness are planted in our soul and given time to grow, their roots run deep. If we allow it to grow, before we know it, those roots will undermine our foundation and cloud our perspective. Not only resentment hurt you, but it will hurt those around you. The antidote for resentment is forgiveness. Forgiving – letting go allows you to pull out the deepest roots of anger and resentment. Forgiveness isn’t optional. You need to forgive just as much as the person who has hurt you needs to be forgiven.

5. Unresolved anger – when you resolve your anger and seek forgiveness, not only do you set the other person free, but you also get free.

6. Inability to recognize your weaknesses and mistakes – In the process of facing your own weakness, you become a ittle less judgemental and a little more loving towards others.

7. Misunderstanding forgiveness – We don’t have to forget in order to forgive. When you push the release buttons of forgiveness, however, you give up your right to bring up the issue again and make the other person feel bad about what he or she has done.

8. Fear of condoning the offense – You can offer forgiveness without condoning an offense.

9. The passage of time – no matter how much time has passed since an offense, you need to take steps to resolve it. (face to face conversation, write a letter, good heart to heart with God). Don’t allow time to stand in your way.

The nine roadbloacks to forgivenss do not hinder only one particular relationship in your life; they hinder all of your relationships. The belief you carry in your heart about one person is a belief you quietly carry in every relationship.