{"id":1154,"date":"2012-06-24T09:00:19","date_gmt":"2012-06-24T14:00:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.barbdahlgren.com\/?p=1154"},"modified":"2012-06-23T18:18:43","modified_gmt":"2012-06-23T23:18:43","slug":"fellin-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/?p=1154","title":{"rendered":"Feelin’ Good"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

America is a feel good society.\u00a0 We want to feel good all the time.\u00a0 Therefore we have a love affair with drugs \u2013 all kinds of drugs.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some of us love the illegal variety, guaranteed to help us forget our troubles and get happy.\u00a0 Some love the legal variety, guaranteed to help us forget our troubles and get happy.\u00a0 We have drugs to wake us up and drugs to put us to sleep.\u00a0 We have steroids to buff us up and diet pills to reduce the buff. \u00a0We aren\u2019t satisfied to let our bodies rest and replenish when ill.\u00a0 We\u2019d rather pump them full of some concoction that will keep us going.\u00a0 After all, we are important.\u00a0 We simply can\u2019t miss that appointment, cancel that date, or postpone that meeting.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

To answer this public need to keep us dancing as fast as we can the drug company coupled with the medical profession work hand in hand to supply our demand.\u00a0 It\u2019s a marriage made, not in heaven, but at the bank. \u00a0They learned a long time ago how to keep us happy.\u00a0 They just tell us what we want to hear and have us pay for the privilege.\u00a0 They tell us this drug will lower your cholesterol and that drug will lower your blood pressure.\u00a0 This product will reduce your hot flashes and that pill will enhance your libido.\u00a0 Are they lying?\u00a0 No.\u00a0 These drugs will do what they claim, and so much more if you consider the side effects.\u00a0 In fact, sometimes one of the side effects of a drug is the very symptom it is supposed to treat.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

One of my favorite commercials shows a happy fellow enjoying life.\u00a0 The voice over says,\u00a0 \u201cBe sure to ask your doctor about this blah, blah, blah, blah life changing drug.\u201d\u00a0 The implication being that your doctor is far too busy to know about this drug himself so you, the patient, being fully educated through this media propaganda blitz, should tell him.\u00a0 Then the voice over lists the side effects, which run the gambit from a to z, so quickly the announcer sounds like Alvin the Chipmunk.\u00a0 Magazine ads are the same.\u00a0 Our eyes soak in the bold printed claims and skip the small printed side effects.\u00a0 It\u2019s marketing, folks.\u00a0 And it works.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Now don\u2019t get me wrong.\u00a0 I know that drugs can save lives, but drugs can take lives, too.\u00a0 Adverse reactions<\/a> to prescription drugs have increased dramatically in the past ten years.\u00a0 In fact they are the fourth leading cause of death in hospital deaths<\/a>, topped only by heart disease, cancer and stroke. \u00a0Therefore we need to count the cost and weigh our options.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

We can\u2019t blame the medical industry for offering us a quick fix.\u00a0 Many times that is exactly what we want.\u00a0 We\u2019ve decided if we can\u2019t pronounce it, it must be good for us.\u00a0 We\u2019re too busy to take advantage of the information age even though knowledge about health is plentiful.\u00a0 Even just taking the time to ask our doctor or the pharmacist a few questions can at least give us an idea of what we are up against.\u00a0 I guess it\u2019s quicker and easier to accept things than do a little research and find out for ourselves.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Spiritually speaking, people approach the Bible the same way.\u00a0 Rather than read the Bible for themselves, they prefer to flounder around relying on hearsay, assuming what they have always been told is what the Bible actually says.\u00a0 No wonder misconceptions abound.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I challenge you to read the Bible for yourself without preconceived ideas about what you\u2019ve heard.\u00a0 I suggest using a good, readable translation like The Message<\/em> and starting with the New Testament because it gets right into the teachings of Jesus.\u00a0 \u00a0You may be in for some surprises.\u00a0 For example Jesus didn\u2019t come to condemn you (John 3:17).\u00a0\u00a0 Believe it or not, He knows you inside and out, and loves you anyway.\u00a0\u00a0 If you have questions, Jesus is the answer and the only way this society is really going to \u201cfeel good.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

If that boggles your brain just take two aspirin and call me in the morning.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

America is a feel good society.\u00a0 We want to feel good all the time.\u00a0 Therefore we have a love affair with drugs \u2013 all kinds of drugs.\u00a0\u00a0 Some of us love the illegal variety, guaranteed to help us forget our … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1154"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1154"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1154\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barbdahlgren.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}