All posts by Tom Savage

Three Groups of People Targeted for Alzheimer’s Project

Alzheimer's Disease

Alzheimer’s Project: Three Target Groups of People

I invite you to participate in The DADS Project; a strategy with three primary goals: Prevention, Reversal, and Cure of Alzheimer’s disease. With this project, I am seeking to reach three specific groups of people.

  1. People with no memory issues

Many people are living well into their 80s and 90s with the number of people reaching 100+ growing every year. The question is: “What will be the condition of the mind in these years?” Do you desire your mind and brain to be alive, bright, and alert for the last 5, 10, 15 years of your life or be in a condition of not knowing your friends and loved ones. The #1 goal of The DADS Project is prevention of Alzheimer’s disease. Even if you have no memory issues now, I encourage you to attend The DADS Project Workshop. Investing in the health of your brain now could pay rich dividends for years to come.

  1. People with some memory issues

Do any situations like these describe you?

  • You forget where you parked your car at the shopping center
  • You forget the name of a friend or familiar person
  • You forget how to complete what use to be a normal task

If these or similar memory issues describe you, you might be headed toward Alzheimer’s disease. The #2 goal of The DADS Project is reversal of the trend toward Alzheimer’s disease. My desire is to help freshen your mind and your brain and reverse what may be a trend for you.

  1. Caregivers of a victim of Alzheimer’s disease

Those who are already physically and mentally handicapped due to Alzheimer’s disease are not candidates for The DADS Projects. However, for those who are caregivers, you would want to know that the #3 goal of The DADS Project is to see a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. There are amazing things being done these days in the work to find a cure for Alzheimer’s disease. I will share some of this during the workshop. Quite possibly something learned in this workshop will help you help others.

I urge you to participate in a workshop when one is scheduled near you. The time you will invest in this workshop could be one of the most important things you could ever do to care for your mind and your brain. I hope to see you at a workshop soon. Below you will find links to two recordings. Click on the most appropriate one for you to learn more about the dynamics of the workshop.

Scheduled Workshops 

To host a workshop, click here

To know about participating in a workshop click here

Remembering my dad today on his St. Patrick’s Day birthday

Thoughts

2015-03-17 07.02.29Earl Savage

March 17, 1926 – December 30, 2014

Some of the many ways his family and friends remember him: An American through and through, a soldier, a veteran, a husband, a truck driver, a Christian, a fellow church member, a gardner, a cattleman, a good friend, a father-in-law, a grandfather, a great grandfather, Papaw, and to Sherrill Mayse and me – our Dad.

Guilt Motivation

Thoughts, , ,

What % of pastors preach down to people or use guilt motivation? This question comes from my coaching and mentoring practice. It is not unusual for people to leave a church service “beaten up” or “beaten down” depending on the verbiage of the client. Why do preachers preach this way? Where does it come from? Is it from their insecurities, a faulty Holy Spirit theology, a moral twist in their character or somewhere else? I do not see Jesus or the Apostles preaching that way but it seems this is a style for some preachers.

Why is this so? I posted this question recently (3/12/15) on social media. Because of the feedback I received, this is an expanded treatment of that question. 

It is well known that negative preaching is some of the easiest preaching. Preachers who are unprepared or unlearned often default to negative, judgmental, and legalistic preaching when they have nothing else to say. However, there could be more in the mix here. Let’s consider some options.

The preacher is insecure: Insecure preachers hide behind a mask. In their fear of being found out, they preach down to others to lift-up themselves.

The preacher is unprepared: The man may be unprepared due to all the plates he is spinning or laziness. Preachers who are unprepared may go negative, preaching louder and louder, to cover up the lack of real substance.

A faulty Holy Spirit theology: Rather than preaching the truth with clarity and passion while giving the Holy Spirit space and time to bring illumination and conviction, some preachers see their role of doing the correcting themselves. When they do not see an immediate response to their messages, guilt motivation is the default card they play. This is sometimes described as “beating the sheep.” I recall Jesus telling us to feed sheep. I do not recall Him tell us to beat the sheep.

A moral twist in their character: One of the indicators of a moral twist in a person is they have an argumentative spirit. A moral twist in a preacher leads quite naturally to negative and judgmental preaching. Many years ago, a well-known preacher preached harder and louder against all the immorality in our land. Later, he was exposed as being deeply involved in the very immorality he preached against.

Performance-based acceptance: We see this in the world but we do not need it in the church. Performance based acceptance says, “You do what I say and I like you. You do not do what I say and I do not like you.” Most church attenders want to like their pastor and want their pastor to like them. Many parishioners will conform to the style and the demands of the preacher because if they do not, he may not speak to them or visit them when they are in the hospital.

Praise God for the godly men who hold the torch high everyday. Praise God for those who study to show themselves approved unto God, as workmen who need not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. May we always strive to preach the truth without any mixture of error. Some topics are difficult to address. We are passionate about many things. However, may we remember, the enemy is not sitting out there in the pew. He is the prince and the power of the air. Let’s feed sheep, not beat sheep.

Have a great day![vfb id=9]

How Rx Dependent Is Our Culture?

Thoughts

How psychologically dependent are we as a people when it comes to prescription drugs? Several years ago, a pharmacist friend expressed his observation after many years of filling prescriptions. It was and is his conviction we are psychologically Rx dependent.

We don’t need to take a survey to test his premise. We only need to ask ourselves and consider our own thoughts on the matter. Imagine this scenario:

  • We are sick or just not feeling 100%
  • We make an appointment with our doctor
  • We get dressed and go to the doctor
  • We arrive and pay a copay
  • We wait 45 minutes to an hour in the waiting room
  • They finally call us back
  • The nurse weighs us and takes our vitals
  • She asks us why we are there
  • She jots down a few notes and leaves the room promising “The doctor will see you in a few minutes.”
  • We wait for another period of time (maybe as much as 30 minutes)
  • The doctor comes in, examines us, and in a few minutes tells us what we need to do to feel better

The premise of my pharmacist friend is – if we leave the doctor’s office without a prescription in hand, we feel like we have wasted our time and our money. If the doctor prescribes weight loss, multivitamins, exercise, and a better eating plan, what is our psychological response. “I did not need to go to the doctor to hear all that. I already knew that. I did not need to pay a copay for a doctor to tell me to eat better, lose weight, and take care of myself.”

The problem: We want a prescription. We want the doctor to give us that little slip of paper we cannot read, so we can take it to a pharmacist we may not know, and take a drug with possible side effects, with the confidence that drug will make us better. Do we ever influence the doctor to give us a medication? Do we ever ask him or her “What can I take for this?” Only you can answer these questions.

If this is not you, great! However, in my conversations with people, it seems most people believe we are over-medicated as a nation. How are all these chemicals interacting with each other inside our bodies? Does over-medication have an impact on our brain or other parts of our body? Could this have anything to do with the steady increase in the  numbers of people developing Alzheimer’s disease? Are we psychologically dependent on prescription drugs? These are important questions.

Disclaimer: Allow me to close by saying, those of you who know me well know how I appreciate, love, and pray for the medical community; these professionals who have dedicated their lives to care for our physical bodies. I am not talking about medications our bodies need because of surgery, physical trauma, or a breakdown in the system somewhere. I am talking about us; our psychological dependence on prescription drugs. Could this be the leading cause of our being over medicated as a nation?

Have great day!