Imagine your feet firmly planted in the chocks, you’re so filled with anticipation you almost want to jump the cracking of the starter’s gun. You feel awesome and can’t wait any longer. The gun signals your start and you’re off.

Two weeks ago that was my position. But Friday I was hit head on with my biggest wall – my health. I’ve never shared my health with you, and with reason. I want the site to be more about helping you. And yet, maybe by telling my story you can benefit. So here we go.

I was born in Michigan, but soon moved to the Dallas/Fort Worth area of Texas as my parents were called into the ministry. They asked their pastor where they should go to Bible school, and Texas was the answer. At around 11, my parents felt called to the the jungles of the Amazon in Brazil. As a kid, you can imagine, I was in paradise. I felt like Tarzan and Indiana Jones all rolled into one.

Most people ask about the food. And the food there was pretty good. Fresh everything. So I can’t attribute any health challenges to living in the jungle. I graduated from high school there full of life and dreams.

Back in Texas, where I ended up, I did need some dental work done. Not sure if this was because of the fact we grew up eating hard candy in the ’60′s, but I had a mouthful of trouble.

The dentist said he couldn’t help me that day. Too much swelling. He told me to take this new antibiotic out on the market that I would have wonderful results. Little did I know that small prescription would change my life forever.

I did take the prescription, but had a horrible reaction to it. I broke out all over in a rash that painfully itched.

So, I did like most anyone else would and headed to my General Practice doctor and asked for him to take a look at it. Naturally, and this is important to follow, he did not look too much to the cause but to the effect. His prescription (to counteract the first one) was Prednisone.

The Prednisone, if you’re not familiar with it, is a form of cortisone and it did make the rash disappear. But as soon as I ran out of the medicine, the rash came back! I went back to my doctor and he gave up… and sent me to a dermatologist. A biopsy later, I was diagnosed with Dermatitis Herpetiformis.

Dermatitis Herpetiformis is sorta like it sounds. Has to do with the dermis – layer of the skin, and the effect does look a lot like herpes. Thinking back, I never thought – great, I have herpes – I just wanted to find a cure. This isn’t herpes. What it is, is a form of Celiac. I asked the dermatologist, OK…what now? And he had two answers.

First, I could take Dapsone, or… simply stop eating anything that has wheat gluten in it.

What? Did I hear that right? No more wheat in my diet? That’s right – eliminate everything and the painful blisters that had made their way around my knuckles and joints would be gone.

You know, at this stage in my life, I wasn’t totally on board with healthy foods and living. I admit, I loved the high fructose corn syrup, fat filled foods. So I accepted the dapsone prescription, and went on my way – still not knowing what was happening in this stage of my life. I was simply following doctor’s orders.

In my next update, I’ll tell you the single choice I made that added years to my life, and my advice to anyone with allergies – a simple tip that could get your life back.

There is a real cool thing in learning the law of attraction that is called giving yourself permission.  And this is something I really had a challenge with because I was brought up to believe that we weren’t really worthy of much.  I don’t blame my parents.  It was more of a cultural kind of thing.  Just the way people believed in that sphere of influence.

Maybe you don’t know what I’m talking about.  I probably should explain just what giving yourself permission means.

There are a lot of times that we feel we could enjoy life more if we had this or that – mainly more money so we could do grand things – but even non-money related things, such as when someone gives us a gift, or we are chosen as a leader, or an honor is bestowed on us.  And we don’t know how to accept it initially – or sometimes not at all.  We don’t “allow” ourselves to have.

When I was growing up, the part about being humble was taken to the extreme and sometimes we thought we had to act like rugs and let people walk all over and take advantage of us.  I guess this comes from misinterpreting “turn the other cheek.”  I no longer believe this way.

It’s sort of like wanting to take grandma to see your kid’s sports game but they don’t want to go because it will be too much trouble.  And so they miss out on all the joy and happiness of watching their grandchild simply because they thought (mistakenly) that they’d be a burden to someone.

And this doesn’t mean going to the other extreme and taking advantage of people by making yourself a nuisance out of selfishness.  It means accepting when something is sent your way – for you – you take it in and it is yours.  Rejecting it causes these things to no longer come.  When you open yourself up, give yourself permission to have, then these things begin to flow into your life.

You rob joy by not giving yourself permission.  You rob the giver and you rob your blessing.

So what I want you to do today is to let yourself have what is dutifully yours.  It belongs to you and has your name on it.  Think of it as part of what David was talking about in Psalm 23.  The goodness and mercy following you.  Don’t reject that when it appears – just because you feel you don’t deserve.  You DO deserve.

Do you like learning about this?  If so, do me the kindness of leaving me a comment below.  I really get juiced to see what you think of these things and it helps me to better help you.

Talk soon,
Dave