Discovery

In his book entitled “A Kick in the Seat of the Pants,” author Roger von Oech, a pioneer in the study of creativity, writes about the importance of re-setting our “mental channel” in order to help achieve a particular goal. If it is our intention for example to laugh when we really feel like crying, we can set our “mental channel” to look for things that make us happy.

This principle is the same for achieving any goal: Take a look around where you’re sitting and find five things that have blue in them. Go ahead and do it. With a “blue” mind-set, you’ll find that blue jumps out at you: a blue book on the table, a blue pillow on the couch, blue in the painting on the wall, and so on. Similarly, when- ever you learn a new word, you hear it six times in the next two days.

In like fashion, you’ve probably noticed that after you buy a new car, you promptly see that make of car everywhere. That’s because people find what they are look- ing for. If you’re looking for conspiracies, you’ll find them. If you’re looking for examples of man’s good works, you’ll find that too.

It’s all a matter of setting your mental channel. It is our “mental channel” that steers us in the direction we want to head. If we were to paraphrase von Oech’s statement to fit our Dreams 105 laughter instead of tears goal, it might read like this: Take a look around where you’re Sitting and find five things that make you smile. Go ahead and do it.

With a “smile” mind-set, you’ll find that things that cause you to smile jump out at you: a childhood toy, a favorite picture, your pet, and so on. In addition, when you smile, things seem to smile back.

In other words, if you look for smiles you’ll find them. It’s all a matter of setting your mental channel. “Seek first His kingdom...” (Mt. 6:33).

If you’re really looking for it, you’ll surely find it! It’s all a matter of setting your “spiritual chan- nels,