Food for Thought: Life's Guardrails

What image comes to mind when you hear the word "guard rail"?

For me, I imagine myself hiking up a mountain trail, and there are rails along the way in some places - guard rails - that keep me from wandering off into the danger zone.

Well, I don't know if that is what happens on every mountain trail. I think it's like that out at the Grand Canyon, though.

Anyway, I was listening to a show by a local pastor here in Atlanta, Alan Stanley. I like him, as he is very practical. I like that. Keep it as simple as possible. Thank you, sir.

He comes on TV after Saturday Night Live, which is at one in the morning. I don't stay up that late. So I may catch the broadcast if I just so happen to wake up. That is rare.

Lo and behold, he has an app with all the broadcasts. So I can maneuver through those on my own time.

The other day while sitting at my desk crunching through paperwork, I listened to one of the broadcasts. It was from a series entitled "Guardrails". There were 6 broadcasts in that series, some 30 minutes in length. All were pretty good. (And they made my paperwork go by super fast).

But one episode stopped me cold. I had to go back and listen later... and take notes.

And I wanted to post my thoughts on it all today.

The subject, as I wrote earlier was guardrails. Pastor Stanley had a good definition for the word "guardrail".

A guardrail is "A system designed to keep vehicles from straying into dangerous or off-limit areas."

It is designed to take the impact. It will do some damage to your car, and it's purpose is to keep you from catastrophic damage that could occur if the guard rail wasn't there. It creates a small accident to save you from a major accident.

I thought about this. This is better than my mountain trail guardrail description. I see these mostly on the middle median on our ATL highways. I get nervous when they aren't there. It's like that out in the far suburbs. There are hundreds of feet of land in the median, but I would feel better if a guardrail was there.

Guardrails. They are pretty important.

So... if we have guardrails in on our roads, it is just as important to have mental guardrails for our lives.Guardrails for our finances, relationships, morality, ethics, reputation, etc.

Annnnnd that's what the series was about. But like I said, one broadcast of that series caught my attention:

The friendships broadcast.

We need guardrails when it comes to our friendships? Why?

Because our friends are a big factor in controlling the direction and quality of our lives.

I thought that was a bold statement to make in the beginning. But it caught my attention.

My attention was at 100% when he discussed all of this in light of the verse below.

Proverbs 13:20 NCV Spend time with the wise and you will become wise, but the friends of fools will suffer.

Proverbs 13:20 CEV Wise friends make you wise, but you hurt yourself by going around with fools.

I've posted this verse before, as it is one of my favorite scriptures. Why, I've read it some 15 years ago, and I memorized it. But not the version above. I know the Message version by heart.

Proverbs 13:20 MES Become wise by walking with the wise; hang out with fools and watch your life fall to pieces.

The message version. I like that version. Kicks you right in the teeth. Then turns around and kicks you in the teeth... again.

Now in context of this verse, a new definition of guardrails materializes:

Guardrails: A standard of personal behavior that becomes a matter of conscience.

Instead of doing things that are wrong outright, take time to step back, develop some rules (guardrails) on purpose that trip your conscience to stay out of the mess in the first place.

I think in this case, I can relate.  The whole guardrail analogy could be related to what we call "deal breakers" or "red flags". They are safeguards of sorts. Personal rules.

This is interesting as I can think of many times in my past where if I would've listened to my conscience and paid attention to the red flags waving in my face, I would've saved myself a lot of time and heartache... and I could've avoided a TON of mess.

Back to that verse of scripture. Pastor Stanley talked much about the "Fools" portion.

1. If you have friends who don't care about their own lives, they won't care anything about your life either.

2. Fools don't care about much, and don't realize that tomorrow is affected by today's decisions.

3. The companion of fools eventually will face and experience the consequences oftentimes of someone else's decisions. Your life will eventually be affected by their shrapnel. The explosions in their lives will eventually affect you in some way.

My goodness. The third one bothered me something awful. The whole use of the word shrapnel. Oh my. Because that is what it is. Emotional and mental shrapnel is something else. I've experienced. I know.

This is why I have a huge rule that I don't loan out money. If I can't afford to give it, I can't afford to loan it. I am not sinking my tugboat to save your cruise ship. You can hate me. And that's okay. I like to "locate" people. I don't care to deal with people who trip out on me because I won't do what they think I should be doing for their self preservation. So that's all fine with me.

Take that in context, now. You and I both know the difference between someone needing help and an alarm going off that tells us "something just not right about this person". I don't discuss nothing in terms of the latter. I disappear. Period.

Anyway, that was a personal mini-rant. I got messed over money-wise by a dude when I was 18. I lost my whole summer savings of $623.00. Looking back, thank goodness for that experience. It caused me to set up a special rule for myself.

It is funny how this broadcast brought back up THAT memory. Humph.

I found another statement profound:

"We all have a tendency to play as close as we can to the edge of disaster in our lives... We need to learn to stop deceiving ourselves, and set up guardrails."

I have played on the edge of the disaster in my life. This caused me to take time to think about if and how I do that now. I am still thinking on those areas that I never noticed. It gives me pause, it does.

So the core of the message was 5 things that should send off bells and whistles in our conscience when it comes to our friendships. Here are some guardrails to think about concerning our friendships. You should be on alert if:

1. Your core group isn't moving in the direction you want your life to be moving in.

2. You catch yourself pretending to be someone other than who you are when you are around them.

3. You feel pressured to compromise. In other words, when something has't been a temptation before becomes a live option now. (Compromise does not erase tension. It only weakens our resolve. The only thing that goes away without guardrails in our life is our resolve.)

4. You say I will go along with ya'll, but I'm not going to participate in what ya'll doing.

5. You hope the people you care about the most don't find out where you have been or who you have been with.

Wow. I tell you. I needed those on a mental post-it note on the wall of my mind some 25 years ago. And he explained each point in detail. Wow.

And the greatest part of the broadcast was the result of establishing guardrails in your life and paying attention to them: it then allows God to direct your path much better. It allows for protection.

How wonderful is that?

All in all, that was a great broadcast chocked full of information.

I thought I would share my notes with you. That is taken from the app "Your Move", the "Guardrails" series, the 6/09/2013 episode "Why can't we be Friends?"

This is good good food for thought.

Definitely worth posting about.