Yes, We Have No Bananas:
(Click for Audio) You may not remember the song or the lyrics, as they were created nearly 100 years ago. But it was a popular song that mimicked how a Greek grocer spoke to the songwriting duo Frank Silver and Irving Cohn. Broken English by a Greek immigrant, along with a crisis in the banana production of the early 1900’s, produced a snappy song that has been recorded by hundreds of artists worldwide. [Source]
Yes…we have no bananas… Starting a response with one positive word but then going in a totally different direction by stating a negative word, confusion exists as to which way the answer lies. Positives and negatives. We all have them. We think them. We even speak them in the same sentence. Our speech pattern varies as we move between the distance of positives and negatives. Even the pitch of our voice modifies as we think of one or the other!
Broken English, however, is often the way we think within our high-speed computer that rests between our two ears. The brain works faster than the mouth, and when you are translating from one language into another or a new language, then the brain speeds through, and the mouth tries to catch up.
Having worked three hard school years to learn Spanish, I understand that the structure of sentences, and hence the way the brain must work, is different. Words can be masculine or feminine and are determined by ending letters and sounds. Verbs, nouns, and all those other sentence pieces and parts find themselves in a different order than what we learned in English. After all, a Spanish sentence written as a question starts with an upside-down question mark at the beginning. This should tell me something is about to be different about the sentence and thought.
How we talk is often a product of how we think and where we have come from. Our background produces layers of patterns we follow as we think, speak, and act. Current culture modifies these patterns, and the way we speak and the thinking behind our thoughts must change as well. Right?
Well, knowing how someone will approach a subject, we should be able to help them get from where they “were” to where we “want them to be” by speeding through the patterns and their internal processing, prodding them along a logical path to an obvious conclusion. Right?
Back in the 90s, I worked with a guy who was always seeing the negative. The economy, politics, the world stage. Everything was negative, and he just knew that “the end” was about to happen. If he could get you talking, before long, you would be negative, just like him. I think he wanted someone to commiserate with rather than someone to help him see the world differently. For over 3 years, weekly, I would instantly say something like, “Well, it’s supposed to get worse before it gets better, right?” He would cock his head in a moment of thought and say, “Yes. You’re right.” Then, his mood, tone, and words changed. He was past the hump of thinking bad and now into positive territory.
In fact, this made me think of some math rules for dealing with positive and negative numbers.
Add two negative numbers together, and the result is negative. Ditto on the positive side.
But if you add a negative and a positive together,
then the result will be which of the two has the largest number.
Positives must be larger than negatives to turn the tide!
~ME
I’ve known for decades that I look at things differently than others. With any new idea, many instantly see the pitfalls and negatives. Yes, they are there, but no, I do not live in the negative. Rather, I see the possibility. I may even provide a litany of the negatives, but the way my mind functions, I fan through them to determine how to turn them into positives. Though I may not relate all the positive I see, my brain knows I’ve thought it, and most times, the words are boxed up and never spoken. Later, knowing how I thought through the idea, the positive words may never come out because I’ve spoken them to myself subconsciously, thinking I’ve already spoken them to you!
Here’s My Thought
Sometimes I speak the negative to get it out in the open to work on applying my critical thinking skills and turn it into a positive!
However. I know of the negative, but I’ve seen the positive potential. Only I’ve not shared it properly with others. It’s all bottled up inside. Find the time, place, and opportunity; the floodgates will open, and I will tell you what I think!
Through the past 12 hours, a certain scripture has popped on my radar a dozen times. There must be a reason for it. Right? I think so. In varied forms and media, Jesus speaks, and these are his words.
But Jesus looked at them and said, “With men it is impossible, but not with God; for with God all things are possible.” (Mark 10:27 NKJV)
This makes me think of President JFK speaking about the race into space with the destination of the moon as the focus, and he does it at Rice University in Houston, Texas. [Read Speech here]
We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.
Though some declare an impossibility out loud, it is man’s inherent nature to think negatively, “It cannot be done!” But Jesus says, with God, all things are possible.
Here’s my take on the words of Jesus… Yes. God can do all things, and as our thinking goes, this must mean that we cannot do all things. Let’s turn this negative into a positive. My understanding of the words of Jesus does not mean we cannot do it, rather, when we do something “with God” it becomes a possibility.
Again…the words of Jesus add depth to this subject.
Jesus said to him, “If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes.” (Mark 9:23 NKJV)
Believe enough positive after you have gotten over the hump of the negative, and your viewpoint changes. It IS possible. Then, speak enough positive, and we will overwhelm the negative, as a flood of fresh water will thin the thimble of dirty water and it will no longer be noticeable….
Take a different view on the problems. Add God to it, and you can join Apostle Paul as he shares in my favorite epistle. (Remember, Paul was not one of the 12 apostles…)
I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.
(Philippians 4:13 NKJV)