I've tried to explain this to my kids for many years. People get reputations. Your reputation often has an impact on what little surprises (blessings) come your way. For example, my brother in law is a well known SF Giants fan. My dad and I are also Giants fans, but my brother in law has the reputation of being a huge fan. Thus, when someone has some tickets to give away, they often think of him.
Without ever knowing it, there is a conversation in someone's head.
"I have these tickets to give away, who would really appreciate this gift?"
"Oh I know, Chris is a pretty big Giants fan! I should give him the tickets!"
It works the same exact way in opposite for people who have the reputation of being a grump. People sometimes get it in their heart to do something nice, but then they have a similar mental conversation:
"I would love to do something nice for so-and-so."
"except they're really grumpy and angry and wouldn't appreciate it at all, in fact they'd probably lash out at me."
"well I guess I won't do that nice thing for that person."
Because we are not omniscient, there is no way for us to know how many times people are thinking about us. We can't see what they might want to do, have decided not to do, or otherwise if they even think of us at all. We simply have no way of knowing exactly how close we came to something awesome, but didn't. Or how many awesome things are waiting right around the corner.
Likewise we can't know how many horrible things we've avoided, or how many things we've been protected against.
I've sat in a room on occasion, where people were considering giving a free gift to a well known grumpy person, and then decided against it. Their sole reason was 'they are grumpy, they won't like it anyway.' The next time I saw that grumpy person I thought 'dude, you totally lost out because of your attitude.'
When I hear people saying 'I'm unlucky' or 'No one ever gives me anything!' or any other famous quote from the Book of Grump, I have to wonder, how much of a self-fulfilling prophecy that attitude really is.
"No one likes me!" Not if you keep up THAT attitude!
Chuck Swindol is famous for saying 'the only thing in life we truly control, is our attitude.'
So my question is, "why spend your life with a bad one? If it's the only thing you can really control in your life, why are you betting against yourself?"
I have found, that the single strongest aid in helping me correct my attitude is the Word of God. Reading it sets my world in perspective, gets me outside the limited boundaries of my immediate surroundings, and shows me how Christ would behave.
For those of you with a lean towards being more Grumpy, I would highly suggest a daily reading of the Bible.
