Guest Author - Linda Steele
Unfortunately we are exposed to a huge amount of negative thinking every day. These negative thoughts that are expressed verbally in your presence have a profound effect on you. They hurt your self-esteem, promote negative thinking on your part which in turn hinders your future ability to overcome life’s challenges.
Now imagine losing your job, having 3 children to raise, the bill collectors at your door, and finally losing your home. This could lead to a generous amount of negative thinking. When Connecticut residents Paul and Tracey McManus took a financial dive after the 2000 dot-com bust, they found themselves faced with insurmountable odds. Instead of caving in to the pressures, they decided that the only way to overcome this challenge was to think and act positively. In “The Secret of the Ages, Robert Collier states that “you become what you think about most”. So Paul and Tracey decided to think about not what they had lost, but what they still had - their family, their love for each other and their health.
They wrote and self-published “The 7 Great Prayers for a Lifetime of Hope and Blessings” as a result of coping with this particularly difficult time in their lives. Their book, gained popularity through word of mouth and their website and traveled to 163 countries to people of various faiths. Paul and Tracey say that their book is for people of any faith and you should define “God” for yourself.
The 7 Great Prayers is a guide to improving one’s life through simple daily prayers that will do much for one’s spirit. They define prayer as “a sincere request to God in words or thought”. The prayers that they offer in the book are simple but very powerful because they are “sincere”. The book also offers positive affirmations that you can use no matter what your situation.
Paul and Tracey take us through the 7 steps for a lifetime of hope and blessings: (1) set a goal, (2) tap into your unique God-given gifts, (3) live in a state of gratitude, (4) decide to live now, (5) ask with faith, (6) be alert and receptive for signs and (7) bless others. They offer a 21-day program that they say will transform the prayers from words on a page to habits of thought that will enrich our lives with countless blessings.
Through prayer and focusing on the positive, Paul and Tracey provide insight into how they survived as a family while watching all they had worked for being taken away. Paul and Tracey show us that each of us has the potential to shape our world as much as our world shapes us. The next time you are faced with difficulties either great or small, the key is to be positive, affirmative, and be proactive with The 7 Great Prayers for a Lifetime of Hope and Blessings.
