The Hidden Force Shaping Your Decisions

What do you TRULY desire? What fuels self improvement and personal development?

Inspired by Francis Schaeffer's profound insights from his book 'How Should We Then Live?', we delve into the importance of examining our presuppositions and how they shape our worldviews, values, and actions.

Discover how to go beyond mere knowledge to gain wisdom, challenge societal norms, and truly understand what you desire from life.

Once you know this, you can better live a life founded on truth rather than external inputs.

00:00 Introduction to Three Dangerous Questions
00:29 Exploring Francis Schaeffer's Book
01:08 Understanding Presuppositions
03:05 The Impact of External Influences
04:21 Discovering True Desires
05:34 Living a Prosperous Life

⚡️ Get the guide + The Prosperity Fundamentals course for FREE in the pH community: https://www.skool.com/ph7/about

Transcript

Jim Johnson: 0:00

So I wrote an article this past week that has gotten a lot of feedback and comments, questions about these three dangerous questions that we probably need to do a better job of asking of ourselves to hopefully find something closer to the truth. And those three dangerous questions are what do I believe, why do I believe it, and is that actually true? And as I was doing that, lots of people wonder what I read and I wanted to just share with you a little bit of this book that I'm reading. Maybe you want to read it as well. But the first two paragraphs I actually want to read to you, it's by a guy named Francis Schaeffer. He is an American theologian and philosopher. here in the early, 19th century or 20th century. the name of the book is how should we then live the rise and decline of Western thought and culture. You can think whatever you want about all of that, but I want to share these first two couple of chapters with you and then give my own thoughts on those. There is a flow to history and culture. The flow is rooted, and it has its wellspring in the thoughts of people. People are unique in the inner life of the mind. What they are in their thought world determines how they act. This is true of their value systems, and it is true of their creativity. It is true of their corporate actions, such as political decisions, and it is true of their personal lives. The results of their thought world flow through their fingers and from their tongues into our external world. This is true of Michelangelo's chisel just as much as it is true of a dictator's sword. People have presuppositions, and they will live more consistently on the basis of these presuppositions than even they themselves may realize. By presuppositions, we mean the basic way an individual looks at life. In other words, basic worldview. The grid through which they see the world, presuppositions rest upon that which a person considers to be the truth of what Exists. Their presuppositions also provide the basis for their values. And therefore, the basis for their decisions. So, in other words, to summarize, what we think is who we become in word and deed, and our presuppositions are the lens of that worldview that we see everything through, and ultimately the basis for our values and decisions. I want to challenge a little bit of how you might want to proceed with this new piece of knowledge that I hope you dig a little deeper and gain some understanding, some insight, some wisdom so that you can use that to your benefit. And so. To uncover a little bit of what it is that we think and who we become, I think we need to consider what's in our heart. What is it that we truly desire? This thing that we desire, could be put on us by that external world. So the external world is giving us input that this is the type of life that you should have. This is the things that you should believe. This is what it looks like to live this perfect life. And my caution to you is don't let your presuppositions put you in a position of believing that everything you hear is true. For example, our world puts on us a lot of responsibility, busyness, frustration, confusion, because of just an overabundance of information available to us. And you can think of that information as knowledge. Like we're gaining this knowledge and we're hungering for it all the time. We're consuming it like crazy, which ends up putting us into this situation where we're an inch deep and a mile wide. In other words, we know a lot about a lot of things, but not a lot of depth about specific things. And so a bit of a challenge to first off, ask yourself, what do I presuppose about something? What do I actually believe? Why do I actually believe that? And is it true to filter your presuppositions to get closer to the truth? And as you get closer and closer to that truth, you'll start to find that your words and deeds start to become who you are because that thing that you desire in your heart truly Internally, not the external input, but this thing that you want to become or this person you want to be, this identity that you want to have comes from the inside, the heart. And that heart causes us to start thinking and whatever we think about the most is what we truly desire. So think to yourself a little bit, what do I desire more than anything in the world? Am I thinking that I want a bunch of money or a big house or these cars or whatever it may be? Or maybe I want to serve and be kind to others. Those things are very different from each other. One is internal, one is external and ask yourself, what do you truly desire? And once you kind of figure out what you truly desire. Not what you might think you desire. You can then dig into your presuppositions and say, Hey, is this stuff actually true? And if it's not, then you can start to put out into the world truth and share that with others and ultimately have. Great impact. That's what we're trying to do here at Prosperous Human, to live a life that is unburdened and free by the trappings of society and the false lies that they tell us of what it is that we should be, and ultimately have impact through the wisdom that we've sought so that we can share with others to improve their lives. So if you like this, Feel free to give us some feedback. If you got any questions about it, ask those questions and, uh, keep checking us out here at Prosperous Human. And most of all, click that subscribe button. Our subscribers will allow more people to see and hear this, to live a prosperous life, not based on presuppositions, but truth.