O'Malley's Law

Some of you have heard of Murphy's law, but have you heard of O'Malley's law. In another life I worked at Radioshack and had a manager that told me about O'Malley's law. He said O'Malley's law states that "Murphy was an optimist."

I don't know how much more cynical you can get, but I have to say I've used O'Malley's law before. Cynicism is just so easy. Advertisements bombard us over and over again with a product that we don't yet have but that promises to make us happy. Then we get it and we still aren't happy. So we get cynical. It's sad that we are so easily manipulated.

Obviously, advertisements aren't the only food for our cynicism. There are life experiences that don't go our way, there are the constant comparison's with others who are smarter, more successful, wealthier, wittier, holier or more disciplined than we are. There are let downs, injustices and blatant unfairness in our world and in our lives.

The thing about cynicism is that it festers apathy, pessimism and self-pity. It can keep a person in a prison of selfishness. It can blacken the heart and isolate a person from meaningful relationships. It can create a spirit of judgmentalism and a false victim mentality. Cyncism is dangerous even for spiritually strong Christians because it can sneak in unnoticed and percolate in the depths of the heart without the person realizing its there.

So, search your heart and look for cynicism and make a conscious decision to be positive and engaged rather negative and isolated. If this article is true, it will not only be good for your spirit, it will be good for your body as well.