THE ARTICHOKE YOU!!!

  ‘Artichoke’ photo from PxHere

Do you love artichokes like I do?  (See photo above).  You boil or steam them and peel the layers, dipping them in melted butter or mayonnaise and scraping the meat off the leaf with your teeth.   Layer after layer, it just keeps getting better.  Finally, you reach the center, the heart of the artichoke.  It’s delicious!   The layers are a protection for the heart!  Sound familiar?  It is another perfect metaphor for a human being with our many layers perhaps protecting the ‘heart’ of who we really are. In fact, the scriptures admonish us to, ‘Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.’  Proverbs 4:23.
‘The mouth speaks what the heart is full of.  A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him.’  Matthew 12:34-35.

The artichoke also tells us that we have the potential to BLOOM!  It is actually a flower bud, a Perennial Thistle and if left to mature, becomes a bright, beautiful purple flower!

Behavioral Scientists seem to agree that our personalities are layered like an artichoke or an onion.  Each theory is different, yet the same in so many ways.  You can just pick one!!!
I picked Theresa Moore Griffins theory.  She is a corporate consultant, executive coach, speaker, facilitator and author.  She wrote an article entitled, ‘Get to Know the Three Layers of your personality.’  She introduces a personality model that includes three layers, spherical like an artichoke.  The Mask Self, the outer layer, the Lower Self, the middle Layer, and the Higher Self, the center or core of who we really are. This ‘Higher Self’ is after all, created in the image and likeness of God.  What I have appreciated from reading about layers of personality is the writers all seem to agree that we need to focus on this Higher Self.  One author, Michael Pruett, a Harvard Professor said, ‘We should deal with anything that threatens who we really are at our core.’

Theresa believes that our Higher Self, the core of who we are is good.  She writes, ‘This is the real you.  It is limitless, pure, and loving when it’s not being smothered by the Mask and Lower Selves.  The Higher Self is kind, respectful, compassionate, peaceful, joyful and wise.  Our unique talents, gifts, passion, purpose and potential reside here – in our Core.  When we are at our best, we are expressing our Higher Self.’

OR you can become ‘born again’!!!!!

The scriptures make it clear, ‘If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.’  2 Corinthians 5:17 NKJV.
Your ‘new creation’ is your new, Higher Self!  And it is very good!  You no longer have the sin nature you were born with!!!!  All the old mask self and lower self are ‘passed away’.  Now you have the opportunity to build on your new self!  That is what the Apostle meant when he said, ‘continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.’
Philippians 2:12-13.  In other words, work out what you have already been given within, salvation and your new Higher Self into the rest of your personality, your Lower and Mask self!

Apostle Paul tells us how to do it!  He reminds us that: ‘God’s’ divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.  Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.  For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love.  For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.  Therefore, my brothers and sisters, make every effort to confirm your calling and election. For if you do these things, you will never stumble, and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.’  2 Peter 1:3-11.

And the Apostle Paul continues to give us this assurance, ‘being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.’ Philippians 1:6.

NURTURE YOUR HIGHER SELF, THE REAL YOU!