Masihkah Kita Bersikap Rendah Hati?

Rendah hati mungkin adalah sebuah kata yang hampir hilang dari perbendaharaan bahasa kita. Hampir setiap hari kita mendengar atau menyaksikan betapa kita, menunjukkan arogansi kekuasaan atau kekayaan, kehebatan yang kita miliki. Saya memilik seorang sahabat yang sangat rendah hati, dia selalu menyapa setiap orang tanpa melihat status sosial, dia mau mengulurkan tangan untuk siapa saja disekelilingnya tanpa rasa malu atau gengsi, dia melakukan dengan sikap rendah hati.

Kerendahan hati merupakan salah satu indikator dari tingginya kecerdasan spiritual seseorang. Seorang yang tidak bisa menunjukkan sikap atau karakter rendah hati, berarti belum mencapai kedamaian dengan dirinya. Dari hasil riset yang dilakukan oleh Gay Hendrick, PhD dan Kate Ludeman, PhD terhadap 800-an manajer perusahaan yang mereka tangani selama 25 tahun, salah satu kesimpulannya adalah bahwa para pemimpin yang berhasil membawa perusahaan atau organisasinya ke puncak kesuksesan biasanya adalah orang yang memiliki integritas, mampu menerima kritik, rendah hati, dan mengenal dirinya dengan baik. Para pemimpin yang sukses ini ternyata memiliki kecerdasan spiritual yang jauh lebih tinggi dari manusia rata-rata. Mereka justru adalah manusia yang rendah hati.

Sayangnya, tidak semua orang mengerti bahwa rendah hati dan low-profile itu identik dg kemajuan dan progressifitas. karena itu, tidak jarang kita salah memahami logika realitas kehidupan. bagi yg berpendidikan rendah itu dapat dipahami, tapi agak aneh kalau sudah berpendidikan tinggi masih tidak bisa bersikap rendah hati.

Pribadi yang rendah hati biasanya justru memandang bahwa orang lain sebagai ciptaan Tuhan memiliki keunikan dan keistimewaan, sehingga dia senantiasa membuat orang lain merasa penting. Karena sesungguhnya setiap pribadi adalah istimewa. Setiap orang adalah spesial, unik, dan berhak untuk dihargai. Manusia adalah pribadi yang harus diperlakukan khusus. Manusia adalah makhluk yang sangat sensitif. Jika kita meragukan hal ini, lihat diri kita sendiri dan perhatikan betapa mudahnya kita merasa disakiti atau tersinggung.

Apa tanda orang yg tidak rendah hati? beberapa hal ini bisa dijadikan tolok ukur:

1. Tidak menerima kritikan walaupun konstruktif. ketika menerima kritik hal pertama yg dilakukan adalah menolak dan mencari alasan apologetik untuk menutupi kelemahannya;

2. tidak mau menerima kelebihan yg dimiliki orang lain. idealnya, setiap kelebihan positif yg dimiliki orang lain hendaknya dikagumi. mengagumi kelebihan orang lain akan membuat kita terobsesi untuk meneladani. sebagai contoh, saya yg sombong sangat
mengagumi sikap rendah hati jusman. saya mengaguminya dalam bidang ini, dan saya berusaha sebisa mungkin untuk menirunya.

Orang yang Rendah hati akan membahagiakan hati sesama. Kalau dia seorang bapak, keluarganya akan menghormatinya dengan tulus. Kalau seorang ibu, anak-anaknya tentu akan senantiasa merindukan. Kalau seorang pemimpin, tentu akan menginspirasi hati sekalian rakyatnya.Mari kita belajar rendah hati, dg cara mengagumi dan mengapresiasi kelebihan rekan2 kita yg tidak kita miliki.

Jika apa yang anda pikirkan mengenai orang lain berubah, maka sikap dan tindakan mereka terhadap anda juga akan berubah. Karena manusia sangat sensitif satu sama lain dalam banyak hal, kita biasanya sangat peka terhadap apa yang dipikirkan oleh satu sama lainnya. Jika hubungan kita dengan isteri/suami, kekasih, teman, rekan bisnis, rekan kerja atau orang tua kita tidak sebagaimana kita harapkan, cobalah lihat lebih jauh ke dalam pikiran kita – apa yang sesungguhnya kita pikirkan saat ini tentang orang tersebut. Orang seperti apa (suami/isteri, kekasih, sahabat, rekan) yang kita ciptakan dalam bawah sadar kita. Kita pasti memiliki hal-hal atau gambaran yang sangat negatif atau jelek tentang seseorang tersebut.

Salah satu ciri kerendahan hati adalah mau mendengar pendapat, saran dan menerima kritik dari orang lain. Sering dikatakan bahwa Tuhan memberi kita dua buah telinga dan satu mulut, yang dimaksudkan agar kita lebih banyak mendengar daripada berbicara. Kadang-kadang hanya dengan mendengarkan saja kita dapat menguatkan orang lain yang sedang dilanda kesedihan atau kesulitan. Dengan hanya mendengar, kita dapat memecahkan sebagian besar masalah yang kita hadapi. Mendengar juga berarti mau membuka diri dan menerima, suatu sifat yang menggambarkan kerelaan untuk menerima kelebihan dan kekurangan orang lain maupun diri kita sendiri.

Ada peribahasa Jawa yang mengatakan : ngluruk tanpa bala, menang tanpa ngasorake, lan sugih tanpa bondo. Artinya menyerang tanpa pasukan, menang tanpa harus menindas dan kaya tanpa harta. Filosofi yang terkandung di dalamnya menunjukkan kerendahan hati yang sangat dalam. Dalam mengkritik atau memenangkan suatu persaingan kita tidak perlu menunjukkan kehebatan maupun memamerkan apa yang kita miliki, bahkan ketika kita menang sekalipun tidak ada rasa pamer atau kesombongan yang terlihat.

ciri manusia rendah hati lainya adalah senantiasa berani mengakui kesalahan dan meminta maaf jika melakukan kesalahan atau menyinggung perasaan orang lain. Manusia rendah hati adalah manusia yang sangat peduli dengan perasaan orang lain. Bedakan dengan mereka yang senantiasa peduli dengan apa yang dikatakan orang lain. Orang seperti ini bukan rendah hati, tetapi rendah diri atau tidak memiliki rasa percaya diri, sehingga dia selalu khawatir dengan apa yang akan dipikirkan atau dikatakan orang lain tentang dirinya.

Bayangkan kalau ada orang yang rendah hati, menghormati sesama, dan suka melayani. Tidakkah hati Anda menyukai dan terkesan dengan keikhlasannya? memang tidak mudah untuk selalu rendah hati dan memilih hidup melayani. Apalagi kalau terjebak pada dorongan biologis dan egoisme semata. Maunya justru dilayani.

Rendah hati pada hakekatnya bermakna kesadaran akan keterbatasan kemampuan diri, jauh dari kesempurnaan dan terhindar dari setiap bentuk keangkuhan.Rendah hati akan mendorong terbentuknya sikap realistis, mau membuka diri untuk terus belajar, menghargai pendapat orang lain, menumbuh kembangan sikap tenggang rasa, seta mewujudkan kesederhanaan, penuh rasa syukur dan iklas di dalam mengemban hidup ini.

Rendah hati bukan berarti merendahkan diri dan menutup diri melainkan secara aktif mendengarkan, berbagi, dan berempati sehingga terjalin hubungan harmonis dua arah. Dia dapat menyesuaikan kondisi emosi dan egonya untuk menempati kondisi emosi dan ego teman bicaranya sehingga sang teman merasa didengarkan dan dihargai.

Sikap rendah hati bukan akan membuat kita jatuh martabat, sebaliknya, malah akan membuat kita 'naik'. Naik kredibilitas, naik martabat, dan yg lebih penting lagi, naik kemampuan dan meningkat kemajuan kita. dengan bersikap rendah hati kita melakukan penabungan dalam bank emosi kita.

"Sikap rendah hati bukan akan membuat kita jatuh martabat, sebaliknya, malah akan membuat kita 'Terangkat' "

Kehidupan Sang Elang

Elang merupakan jenis unggas yang mempunyai umur paling panjang didunia. Umurnya dapat mencapai 70 tahun. Tetapi untuk mencapai umur sepanjang itu seekor elang harus membuat suatu keputusan yang sangat berat pada umurnya yang ke 40. Ketika elang berumur 40 tahun, cakarnya mulai menua, paruhnya menjadi panjang dan membengkok hingga hampir menyentuh dadanya. Sayapnya menjadi sangat berat karena bulunya telah tumbuh lebat dan tebal, sehingga sangat menyulitkan waktu terbang. Pada saat itu, elang hanya mempunyai dua pilihan: Menunggu kematian,atau Mengalami suatu proses transformasi yang sangat menyakitkan --- suatu proses transformasi yang panjang selama 150 hari.Untuk melakukan transformasi itu, elang harus berusaha keras terbang keatas puncak gunung untuk kemudian membuat sarang ditepi jurang, berhenti dan tinggal disana selama proses transformasi berlangsung.

Pertama-tama, elang harus mematukkan paruhnya pada batu karang sampai paruh tersebut terlepas dari mulutnya, kemudian berdiam beberapa lama menunggu tumbuhnya paruh baru. Dengan paruh yang baru tumbuh itu, ia harus mencabut satu persatu cakar-cakarnya dan ketika cakar yang baru sudah tumbuh, ia akan mencabut bulu badannya satu demi satu. Suatu proses yang panjang dan menyakitkan.
Lima bulan kemudian, bulu-bulu elang yang baru sudah tumbuh. Elang mulai dapat terbang kembali. Dengan paruh dan cakar baru,elang tersebut mulai menjalani 30 tahun kehidupan barunya dengan penuh energi!

Dalam kehidupan kita ini, kadang kita juga harus melakukan suatu keputusan yang sangat berat untuk memulai sesuatu proses pembaharuan. Kita harus berani dan mau membuang semua kebiasaan lama yang mengikat, meskipun kebiasaan lama itu adalah sesuatu yang menyenangkan dan melenakan. Kita harus rela untuk meninggalkan perilaku lama kita agar kita dapat mulai terbang lagi menggapai tujuan yang lebih baik di masa depan. Hanya bila kita bersedia melepaskan beban lama, membuka diri untuk belajar hal-hal yang baru, kita baru mempunyai kesempatan untuk mengembangkan kemampuan kita yang terpendam, mengasah keahlian baru dan menatap masa depan dengan penuh keyakinan.

Halangan terbesar untuk berubah terletak di dalam diri sendiri dan andalah sang penguasa atas diri anda.Jangan biarkan masa lalu menumpulkan asa dan melayukan semangat kita. Anda adalah elang-elang itu. Perubahan pasti terjadi. Maka itu, kita harus berubah!

Give Is More Valuable Than Given

Don't do something you made regret someday, think won't get better that way. Do what the interest most important in your life..., do not throw your time with useless !!! Appreciate the little that has anything you get in this life & do not get to ignore all of that...! Give is more valuable than the given, don't do something in instant way if you can still try that a way... because that's would be more better results! "Changes will come if we want to change that !"

My Prayer

Dear Lord, I thank You for this day. I thank You for my being able to see and to hear this morning. I'm blessed because You are a forgiving God and an understanding God. You have done so much for me and You keep on blessing me. Forgive me this day for everything I have done, said or thought that was not pleasing to you. I ask now for Your forgiveness.

Please keep me safe from all danger and harm. Help me to start this day with a new attitude and plenty of gratitude. Let me make the best of each and every day to clear my mind so that I can hear from You. Please broaden my mind that I can accept all things. Let me not whine and whimper over things I have no control over. Let me continue to see sin through God's eyes and acknowledge it as evil. And when I sin, let me repent, and confess with my mouth my wrongdoing, and receive the forgiveness of God. And when this world closes in on me, let me remember Jesus' example -to slip away and find a quiet place to pray. It's the best response when I'm pushed beyond my limits. I know that when I can't pray, You listen to my heart. Continue to use me to do Your will. Continue to bless me that I may be a blessing to others. Keep me strong that I may help the weak. Keep me uplifted that I may have words of encouragement for others. I pray for those that are lost and can't find their way. I pray for those that are misjudged and misunderstood. I pray for those who don't know You intimately. I pray for those that don't believe. But I thank you that I believe. I believe that God changes people and God changes things. I pray for all my sisters and brothers. For each and every family member in their households. I pray for peace, love and joy in their homes that they are out of debt and all their needs are met. I pray that every eye that reads this knows there is no problem, circumstance, or situation greater than God. Every battle is in Your hands for You to fight. I pray that these words be received into the hearts of every eye that sees them and every mouth that confesses them willingly.

This is my prayer...Amen.

How To Forgive Someone

Choosing to forgive the person does not mean that you condone the act. It is necessary to remove yourself from a situation in which the other person committed a dangerous act. Only you know what acts you can and cannot live with. Forgiveness does not include allowing the person the opportunity to hurt you again.

Restitution is Different from Retribution

Forgiveness does not mean that you are not entitled to restitution. If someone damaged you, you have the legal and ethical right to be made whole again. Seeking restitution has nothing to do with forgiveness, and you should never feel that you should not seek proper restitution from someone whom you have forgiven. Suing someone for the money that he stole is an example of restitution.

However, retribution is entirely different from restitution. Retribution is the desire to damage the person who damaged you. If you achieve forgiveness of a person, then your desire to damage him or her should subside. Suing someone for 10 times the amount that he stole, just to make him suffer to pay you back is an example of retribution.

Forgiveness is a Gift to Yourself

By choosing to forgive, you take back the personal power that was stripped away. You cannot be a victim if you refuse to be victimized. Continuing to hold onto anger and hurt feelings lets the original act work against you long after it was committed. Forgiving the offender, however, statement that you are no longer willing to allow him or her to hurt you.

How To Forgive

Although forgiveness brings many benefits, particularly to the ‘forgiver,’ to forgive is not always easy. In fact, many people who would like to let go of anger and forgive are stumped with the question of how to forgive. While everyone may have a unique perspective on how to forgive, the following strategies have been proven effective for a variety of people.

Express Yourself

In contemplating how to forgive someone, it may or may not help to express your feelings to the other person. If the relationship is important to you and you would like to maintain it, it may be very useful for you to tell the other person -- in non-threatening language -- how their actions affected you. If the person is no longer in your life, if you want to cut off the relationship, or if you have reason to believe that things will get much worse if you address the situation directly, you may want to just write a letter and tear it up (or burn it) and move on. It still may help to put your feelings into words as part of letting go. People don’t need to know that you’ve forgiven them; forgiveness is more for you than for the other person.

Look For the Positive

Journaling about a situation where you were hurt or wronged can help you process what happened and move on; however, the way you write about it and what you choose to focus on can make all the difference in how easy it becomes to forgive. Research shows that journaling about the benefits you’ve gotten from a negative situation -- rather than focusing on the emotions you have surrounding the event, or writing about something unrelated -- can actually help you to forgive and move on more easily. So pick up a pen and start journaling about the silver lining next time you find someone raining on your parade, or keep an ongoing gratitude journal and forgive a little every day.

Cultivate Empathy

While you don’t have to agree with what the other person did to you, when working on how to forgive, it often helps to put yourself in the other person’s shoes. Research has shown that empathy, particularly with men, is associated with forgiveness, and can make the process easier. Instead of seeing them as ‘the enemy,’ try to understand the factors that they were dealing with. Were they going through a particularly difficult time in their lives? Have you ever made similar mistakes? Try to remember the other person’s good qualities, assume that their motives were not to purposely cause you pain (unless you have clear indicators otherwise), and you may find it easier to forgive.

Protect Yourself and Move On

One of my favorite clichés is: ‘First time, shame on you; secondary time, shame on me.' Sometimes it’s difficult to forgive if you feel that forgiveness leaves you open to the future repeats of same negative treatment. It’s important to understand that forgiveness is not the same as condoning the offending action, and it’s OK (and sometimes vital) to include self-protective plans for the future as part of your forgiveness process. For example, if you have a co-worker who continually steals your ideas, belittles you in front of the group, or gossips about you, such ongoing negative behavior can be difficult to forgive. In fact, blanket forgiveness of someone who is continually hurting you isn’t necessarily a good idea for your emotional health anyway. However, if you make a plan to address the behavior with human resources, move to another department, or switch jobs to get out of the negative situation, releasing your anger and trying to forgive will bring the benefits of forgiveness without opening you up to further abuse. You don’t need to hold a grudge in order to protect yourself.

Get Help If You Need It

Sometimes it can be difficult to forget about the past and forgive, particularly if the offending acts were ongoing or traumatic. If you’re still having difficulty knowing how to forgive someone who’s wronged you in a significant way, you may have better success working with a therapist who can help you work through your feelings on a deeper level and personally support you through the process. You must looking for a mentor (someone who more mature and stable in emotion than you, who really you believe) who can help you work through your feelings on a deeper level and personally support you through the process.

Again, forgive is not about FEELING, but about DECISION

Have a blessed life!

The Benefits of Forgiveness

Betrayal, aggression, and just plain insensitivity: People can hurt us in a million ways, and forgiveness isn’t always easy. Whether you’ve been cut off in traffic, slighted by your mother-in-law, betrayed by a girl friend/boy friend, or badmouthed by a co-worker, most of us are faced with a variety of situations that we can choose to ruminate over or forgive. But forgiveness, like so many things in life, is easier said than done.

Forgiveness can be a challenge for several reasons. Sometimes forgiveness can be confused with condoning what someone has done to us: “That’s OK. Why not do it again?” Forgiveness can be difficult when the person who wronged us doesn’t seem to deserve our forgiveness -- it’s hard to remember that forgiveness benefits the forgiver more than the one who is forgiven. Ultimately, forgiveness is especially challenging because it’s hard to let go of what’s happened. However, it’s important to let go and forgive. Here are some reasons why:

• Forgiveness is good for your heart -- literally. One study from the Journal of Behavioral Medicine found forgiveness to be associated with lower heart rate and blood pressure as well as stress relief. This can bring long-term health benefits for your heart and overall health.
• A later study found forgiveness to be positively associated with five measures of health: physical symptoms, medications used, sleep quality, fatigue, and somatic complaints. It seems that the reduction in negative affect (depressive symptoms), strengthened spirituality, conflict management and stress relief one finds through forgiveness all have a significant impact on overall health.
• A third study, published in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, found that forgiveness not only restores positive thoughts, feelings and behaviors toward the offending party (in other words, forgiveness restores the relationship to its previous positive state), but the benefits of forgiveness spill over to positive behaviors toward others outside of the relationship. Forgiveness is associated with more volunteerism, donating to charity, and other altruistic behaviors. (And the converse is true of non-forgiveness.)
  So, to sum it up, forgiveness is good for your body, your relationships, and your place in the world. That’s reason enough to convince virtually anyone to do the work of letting go of anger and working on forgiveness.

The key is : Forgiveness is not about FEELING, but about a DECISION
Take decision to release Forgiveness, and you will health and free!