We live in a time when everything feels upside down. Changes to our society are happening so quickly that it feels like there is no stable platform anymore. Instead of standing on firm ground, with a purpose, we feel like we are standing on a bed of quicksand, with no clear path to safety. This feeling leads to anxiety, which is an all-too-common affliction these days.

Nowadays, it seems that there are competing theories about how to live at every turn. We are plagued by a million choices and a million things to do.
At the same time, society is manufacturing excuse after excuse to avoid personal responsibility for our behavior. There is always the standard one of blaming others for one’s mistakes. The culture of victimization is another. Another common excuse is that others are doing something and we must do the same thing to keep up with the pack.

Perhaps it seems to you that the rapid changes, and the lack of personal responsibility are unrelated problems. They are tied together. Both of these situations create a sense of purposeless and drifting in the soul. They leave us feeling as though there are no foundations left in the world.
I have had times in my life where everything seemed hopeless and bad. When I lived in those feelings, self-pity took over. I used excuses to justify behavior I knew was wrong. I felt like my skin was crawling, because I hated being inside of it.

I believe there is one way forward to solve these twin dilemmas of modern living. It is to find spirituality, or if you prefer, faith. Through faith, principles can be found which actually work! And with those principles, we find a power that can lift us above the fray of human problems and give us the strength to actually follow the principles faithfully. People of faith have a set of values that transcend and solve problems. We get a breather (by surrendering stress) and a better way.

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