Joel Osteen

Sonhar faz bem, uma válvula de escape num mundo cada vez mais estressante. Imaginar um futuro brilhante, com casamento sólido, emprego instigante, ambiente familiar estável e amoroso é quase uma terapia. Mas o melhor é que isso tudo pode ser efetivamente conquistado. Todos esses itens podem sair da lista de 'por fazer' e 'por conquistar' direto para a de realizações. É só decidir que o momento chegou. A hora da virada é esta. Joel Osteen, considerado a voz da nova geração norte-americana, ensina, em 'O momento é este'', o que fazer para romper uma rotina sem propósitos e viver plenamente o instante. Independentemente de onde estiver ou dos desafios que estiver enfrentando, qualquer pessoa pode aproveitar a vida neste exato momento. Osteen analisa todas as atitudes de sabotagem que as pessoas usam contra si próprias. Desde 'eu não mereço' e 'isso não é para mim' até comportamentos pessimistas extremamente sutis. Sua experiência como pastor de uma das congregações religiosas que mais cresce nos Estados Unidos faz com que Osteen se conecte rapidamente com o leitor, num estilo conciso, direto e claro. Com uma linguagem acessível, ele combate, principalmente, a baixo auto-estima. Osteen organiza, nesta obra, um guia detalhado para chegar a esse nirvana emocional. São sete passos simples que prometem mudar a forma que as pessoas vêem a si próprias e ao mundo ao redor. O primeiro degrau nessa escadaria para o autoconhecimento e realização é expandir a visão. Logo depois é preciso desenvolver uma auto-imagem saudável, se amar e ver quais suas principais qualidades. Osteen também fala sobre o grande poder dos pensamentos e das palavras, como é preciso abandonar o passado e encontrar forças durante a adversidade, viver de forma altruísta. Mas o principal mesmo é o último passo - decidir ser feliz… (plus d'informations)

Você pode ser mais feliz ainda. Em 'O Que Há de Melhor em Você' o autor de sucesso Joel Osteen ensina o caminho para descobrir o potencial dentro de você e como usá-lo para viver melhor além de ajudar os outros a melhorarem também. Afinal Deus não o criou para ficar na média você foi criado para se superar! Você tem tudo que é necessário para completar o destino que Deus lhe preparou e não há limite para o que você pode conseguir se descobrir como ser uma pessoa melhor. Neste livro Joel Osteen um dos líderes cristãos mais conhecidos nos Estados Unidos vai inspirá-lo e motivá- lo a viver com mais alegria esperança e paz - uma verdadeira vida vitoriosa! Joel irá ajudá-lo a olhar dentro de si para descobrir como se tornar um melhor cônjuge e pai um melhor patrão ou empregado um melhor líder comunitário um melhor amigo.… (plus d'informations)

I have more thinks to say about Christianity and serious Christian thought, and the church’s attempt to justify its place in the world, usually by displacing others, and those who won’t go along with that, but I’m putting that off for now. Mostly, basically it just comes down to the Bad Christians, needing to be unable to see good in anybody else, you know. (‘Are you a good witch or a bad witch?’ ‘I don’t know; are you a good Christian or a bad Christian?’) But man—if you like—can rescue any system, Christianity or any other, (considering a system in the broad sense, not particular tyrannies), as I suppose he can also wreck any system, whatever. And that’s all I’m going to say about that today.

…. I like Joel. I would never want to hold the form of his faith against him. I believe that the religions, although differing one from another, are connected, because life is connected and is bound up in connection. Religion doesn’t have to work out, but to suppose one’s religion absolutely Unique, one would ultimately have to maintain that what one was doing was not religion, which I see as unnecessary (especially in the sense of my-religion-is-not-religion, you know).

And you have to have faith that things work out if you want to see the light, and light is not all subtle shades of grey, you know. Light is morning; it’s the springtime. It’s blessings. That’s what I see Joel as saying, and I’m not going to disagree with him just because he got it from the God of the Bible, you know.

…. And actually the opening story, You’re Closer Than You Think!, happens to kinda show the fallacy of standardized knowledge and legal knowledge, as opposed to personal knowledge (or psychology). The park service puts up a sign that says, you know—long long time it takes you to walk up this mountain: sue Yoda, you shall not…. But they don’t know you, or how long it will really take you. They probably don’t care. But the guy you meet near the top, coming down, looks to you, discouraged, struggling up, and says, You’re closer than you think.

…. (Nelson Normie) I won’t attract more money than I absolutely need for myself to survive, because then I might get greedy and go to hell! So, the children of the land might starve to death, but I’m on my way to heaven…. I also don’t need to feel good, you know!

~And yes, I DO realize I state things in a negative way; if you want a more positive way, read the book. 😹

…. ‘Christians’ don’t all believe in the same god, and not just because of things like theology, organizational membership, and liturgical theory. Christians are differentiated by their personality, their energy. Some believe in a god of hope, others in a god of fear. Probably the most profound compliment you can pay to a man or woman is that you see the value in their god. It’s up to you to decide which one provides value.

…. I don’t want to lean too hard on this point, but the cool Christians and the neo-traditionalists—say Rachel Held Evans—not that they’re always wrong, but they’re not always right, and one of the cool books that Rachel name-drops in one of her books, from the blurb/concept, it almost made it sound like Joel owes them something, because they’re were cool & loyal and they failed or whatever, and Joel inspires people…. but he “doesn’t deserve” that, right. And—not leaning into this, don’t lean too hard into this, goosecap—but he doesn’t owe them anything. His success is up to him and theirs are up to them, to the extent that it’s not all up to God, right. Not being able to keep the lights on is not a badge of honor to brandish late at night when you feel afraid but don’t want to change, you know. God knows the top 40 media doesn’t care about the over 40 crowd, but I wonder how many over-40 churches have almost consciously decided—at what point could you not notice it before you intentionally didn’t—that having their local church die with them was preferable to treating their 30-something children as equals, or basically just being inconvenienced in their own day, you know.

Or choosing a book that’s not cool for the book club, you know.

…. And you might think I’m just being snide because I’m not a Christian anymore, but sometimes I toy with the idea of going back to church just to be part of the community again. (Not that the Episcopalians were big community types; they’re cold, English.) I don’t live in a city where it’d be easier/vaguely possible to find spiritual dissidents like me; in much of America, it’s Christianity or secularism, which often means isolation, unless you’re Jewish, or maybe in college, or something like that. But I’d never go back to my dad’s Ocean Grove/Village Christian culture for any non-family event (Oprah’s a threat to democracy! And Biden is worse than that—he’s a Democrat!), and I’m also done with cold, English, 1500s-era Latinate English worship, you know. It would have to be something like Joel’s church. I’m not even sure I’d like Brian McLaren’s church. (~insert joke about cool people here~ “Man, they’re so cool, that….).

If I’m going to play nice with the church people, I’m at least going to be treated with respect. And not as a museum-visitor, you know.

…. I remember when I thought I needed Brian McLaren’s permission to read Joel Osteen, you know—which he never gave, so after a while…. Hey, another overpriced book that will make me feel bad inside and alienated/entitled/alone/better than etc! Brian will approve of that!

The bibliography= the lunch table, you know.

…. I don’t always agree with Joel’s metaphysics, but I feel like I should slow-binge-read his books, to train me to think less oppositionally.

Because if it’s as just as jail for serial killers and cheap peanut butter for the starving children, and as proven as Algebra I, but it makes you miserable—you and the people around you—if it takes you further from what is best for you in your life…. Why would you think that that it’s from a good god, you know?

Because the spiritual life is not about historical re-enactments of the Roman Empire, or the US Civil War, you know.

Believe it or not, it’s ultimately about something as uncool as happiness. Happiness, kindness, self-respect, relationship…. Putting a smile on God’s face, you know.

…. Okay, I know, I know: I’m oppositional. But it just kills me, that someone like Brian could reach out to some radio evangelical from back when the Beatles were still together—and hated on by radio evangelicals’ fans—because of the international alliance of grumpy straight men who can’t get a date—but could never bring himself to say something nice about Joel just because he’s happy.

And alive. That is just sad to me, you know. Like if some 18th century novelist writes an idiot character it’s ironic and fascinating, but if Stephenie Meyer does it, she’s the enemy, you know…. It’s just garbage thinking, you know; it’s trash.

People settle for crap that’s a lot less than their best.

…. (preacher comes back from the international alliance of grumpy straight men dharma talk on heaven and hell) Oh honey, I was going to cheat on you…. I was going to cheat on you….!
(motherly) Oh my, my little Bob—you’re so honest….
(blubbering Bob) …. But she said ‘no’! She said, she said—she said, ‘No!’ (he blows his nose on her sleeve).
(motherly) (starts to feel a little….)
(blubbering Bob) (wipes his teary eyes) But it’s ok. Say, I forgot to pay my car insurance; you know these books I write don’t really sell…. Could you loan me some money? I’ll pay you back?

Da-na-na-na-na! Na na na, na!….

…. It’s easy, since Joel is handsome, to think on some level that he’s trying-to-be-the-white-man, but although it’s not his style to talk about racism, he certainly talks rather a lot sometimes about Black people of achievement. Racism happens, but it doesn’t benefit anyone to say, That guy is defeated. That girl is finished. They never had a chance. ~It certainly doesn’t make them feel good!

~Ah, but the glorious future of justice happens when everyone realizes that it’s my way or the highway—when masculinity triumphs over femininity, and all the dirty dirty moderations that moderate themselves.

(child Hermes) Mommy: I feel sad. Beam me up, mommy; the people on this planet are sad. I don’t wanna be their friend anymore. It’s too scary….

(shrugs) The elite always try to crush femininity, and everything soft, but only a few men are really all (or mostly) masculine. Sometimes I think that the average person is more feminine than masculine, you know. And then the boy at the top, the big cock fighter, gets all paranoid atop his pyramid…. “Some people even like Joel Osteen!” 😱… (plus d'informations)

At first I was somewhat put off by this book, since I found it to be overly religious and always referring to God.

But I got used to the author’s style of writing or, rather, disregarded it, since I found the content of the book to be encouraging and what I believed to be correct.

I’ve heard most, perhaps all, of what he writes before, but it’s good to be reminded of lots of positive things to think and do.

I found the book repetitive, but that didn’t matter since repetition helps us to integrate the information.

The object of the book is to help the reader to become a better person, and in my view the author succeeds in giving us valuable pointers to achieve this goal.

Joel’s father was the pastor of Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas, and at least when writing the book Joel himself was pastor there. It was apparently America’s largest church and millions of people throughout the world saw his weekly television broadcasts, though I personally have never seen any of them.

My computer now tells me that Joel and his wife Victoria have left the church for some reason, but I can see nothing about this on Joel’s website.

He tells us that God has given us everything we need to have a “victorious life” - we just need to do something with what he has given us.

“Becoming a better you is all about growing, learning, and improving.”

The more we learn to trust God, the better we will be.

We need to press forward. We are valuable, we have a gift.

Dwelling on negative thoughts about ourselves will keep us from becoming all God has created us to be.

When one door closes, another will open.

We shouldn’t put up with being just “good enough”.

Joel continually substantiates his advice by referring to stories from the Bible. He also gives us examples of people, perhaps from his congregation, who have been helped by him; he also provides stories from his and Victoria’s life. He is not afraid to recount incidents where he was in the wrong.

He (God) wants us to have a little heaven on earth, right where we are.

Don’t talk about the way you are, talk about the way you want to be.

If negative patterns exist in our family line, we should recognize this and do something about them, and not just keep passing them down.

At the end of each section, Joel provides us with “action points”, summarizing what he has been advising.

We need to love ourselves, otherwise we’re not going to be able to love others.

Feel good about who you are. Whatever you send out always comes back to you.

He repeats what New-Agers have been telling us for years. Words are like seeds. They tend to produce what we’re saying.

Therefore, we should say things such as “I am blessed”, “I am prosperous”, “I am healthy”, and so on.

These words will eventually permeate our subconscious mind, and will thus change the way we see ourselves.

With our words, we can either bless our life or curse our life.

None of this is new, of course, though it may be for some.

As regards our inner dialogue, we should be telling ourselves things like “Something good is going to happen to me. I have a bright future. The best is yet to come.”

Replace the negative recordings with new, positive, uplifting messages.

Our children need our love, encouragement, and approval. We should never put our children down.

We have something to offer that nobody else can give.

Compliment people freely. Every day try to find somebody you can compliment.

Find the good in every suggestion. Treat people with respect.

One little bit of kindness can brighten somebody’s day.

“I am a peacemaker, not a troublemaker.”

“I will overlook minor matters and I will forgive quickly.”

We should seek to make every person we meet feel important.

Identify any bad habits and make a decision to do something about them.

Joel explains how he’s changed his behaviour in relation to his wife. He used to argue about things to show how he thought they should be done. Now he doesn’t fight.

If you worry, you must replace the negative thoughts with positive faith-filled thoughts.

Even the Bible tells us

“Dwell on things that are pure, things that are wholesome, things that are of a good report.”

We should always keep new goals in front of us.

Our habits today will determine our future.

We’ve been focusing on what’s wrong instead of what’s right, and these negative patterns will keep us from enjoying our lives.

“Happiness does not depend on your cirumstances. It’s a choice that you make.”

“Be grateful for what you have, rather than complaining about what you don’t have.”

You can’t control people or change them. “Only God can do that.”

Train your mind to see the good.

“Don’t magnify your problems, magnify your goal.”

Joel quotes the apostle Paul as saying “I have learned how to be content no matter what state I’m in.”

When something doesn’t turn out right remind yourself “I know God has something better in store for me.”

He tells us about a young woman who had experienced a hurricane in New Orleans. Everybody else had been complaining about what they had lost.

She said “I thank God that I’m still alive and I have my health. I thank God that my children are okay.”

A reporter asks whether she had any power or air-conditioning.

She replies that she has no power and doesn’t even have her home. It was swept away in the flood. She said “I have my hope, I have my joy. I have my peace. I know God is on my side.”

Your first priority is to take care of yourself. You’re not responsible for other people’s happiness. And some people don’t want to be helped. They don’t want to change.

Be kind to everyone around you but refuse to be manipulated.

“God, not my will, but your will be done.”

Joel’s grandmother was told by her doctor that she was in the beginning stages of Parkinson’s disease. But she told him that she refused to have that. She went home and never did come down with Parkinson’s disease.

Prepare to have a blessed, prosperous, healthy, joy-filled, abundant, long life.

Don’t just believe, expect.

“When you do the right thing with the right motives, there’s no limit to what God will do in your life.”

We attract what we continually think about.

In Proverbs, the Bible says ”Where there is no vision, the people perish.”

So don’t give up on your dreams. God has something important for you to do.

Live with enthusiasm. Get up each morning and think of all the things you can be grateful for. If you need to, make a list.

Most of this may seem quite trite because we already know these things. But though there is not much new in the book, still I found it inspiring and encouraging. We need to be reminded of everything he tells us. I recommend that you read it, if you wish to become a better you and improve your life.… (plus d'informations)