Byrnesys Blabberings

Jim’s tip of the week is Encouragement you can read his post here

For some reason I have really been trying to encourage people recently, mostly people at work, but some others as well, I honestly cant say why this has happened, I certainly havent made an concerted effort to do it, but it just begins and I recognise it and keep doing it.

While I have certainly not let it permeate all my relationships, Im realising as something which is truly a Jesus action. I say this because, I often ponder and even stress about "How can I be Jesus in this, or this" and encouragement I think is one of those small ways where you can be Jesus to those around you, effortlessly.

Growing up with my good friends from Arkansas (though now good ‘ole citizens of the United Kingdom) I have seen lots of encouragement from and between them, but British culture seems far to "dignified" for that, or else as Jim describes in his post are far too negative.

Often we stay away from being encouraging thinking we will be "too much" or seem weak, these are based on primarily our own in-securities in how people view us, and again as Jim mentioned there far too little encouraging in the world for "over doing it"

On the flipside I guess there is false-encouragement, and this is a difficult one, because while we want to encourage false-encouragement or essentially lying about something can be quite damaging. The way I try to keep myself in check with this is that I only encourage when I have noticed something to be true. For example, I think in my head "Thats really great" or "That looks good" or "What a great way to put it" and then I make sure I verbalise it, and make sure I know I mean it.

Is there any tips that you have learnt from trying to encourage people? I would be interested to hear them.