How to Benefit From the PH Library?

Over the years, I have read literally hundreds of books on success, self-image, goal setting, people skills, financial success, etc.  These books, both Christian and secular, were valuable to me in my personal growth and the results that I was able to achieve professionally, financially and all areas of life.

The challenge for me was I would read an absolutely awesome book, full of great information, and I would highlight it of course, but it would go back up on the bookshelf when I was done, and I may never think about it or refer to it again.  No matter how “pumped up” I got, no matter how much my faith was “stirred up,” after a few days the information was pretty much forgotten.  All the great wisdom and nuggets I gleaned from the book would soon be a distant memory, more times than not. 

My solution to this problem was to transcribe highlights/cliff notes of my favorite books, as well as excerpts of books and newsletter articles.  My intent was to distill the meat/nuggets, i.e. the primary concepts being taught in these books/newsletters to a PDF that is readily accessible and at my fingertips at all times vs. putting the book back on a shelf.  Again, in most cases, once a book is back on the shelf it is out of sight, out of mind, no matter how impactful the book was. 

Typically, this “distilling” process would reduce the size of a book by about 90% of its original size down to what is really important – cutting out all the fluff, all the trivial stories, all the insignificant content and get to the heart of what is valuable – what do I need to know to master the information and make it mine?  The objective is to completely integrate the principles being taught into my thought process and daily walk – repetition being the key to internalizing the information and assimilating the principles being taught.   

Reading a book one time will have little to no impact on your thought process and daily walk!

Taking 10-20-30 minutes every day to renew our minds in God’s word and program our computers for total and absolute success can be transformational.  In the spiritual realm, the seed is the Word of God (Mark 4:14), and the ground is our hearts (Mark 4:15). I was determined to find this time every day to plant seed into the fertile soil of my heart, knowing that I would receive a harvest in due time if I didn’t grow weary. 

We renew our bodies each day with breakfast, lunch and dinner. We renew ourselves each night through sleep. God wants us to do the same things in our spiritual lives. Like interval training for the physical body, this quick “spiritual workout” to renew my mind would stir up my faith and reinvigorate my spirit and take my thinking to a new level.  A sense of excitement and joy would rise up within me that my head couldn’t necessarily figure out.  I would get myself “fired up” lol.  I think of Nehemiah 8:10, “…the joy of the Lord is my strength!”

Just like watching a favorite movie 5-10-20 times and you know every line and every scene in the movie by heart, my goal was to become a walking and talking encyclopedia of some of these classics – thoroughly saturating/brainwashing my mind on a daily basis for total and absolute victory.  Again, repetition being the key to the renewal process and to achieve transformation.

This process of renewing the mind requires making time in the Word a top priority and putting other reading, sports talk, social media, the TV and other non-productive distractions on the back burner.

The challenge is to find the time and have the discipline to intentionally focus on renewing the mind with God’s word and other great content.  We’re all super busy but we all have 24 hours a day to work with.  The bottom line is, we’ll find the time and generate the discipline if we want to change and grow badly enough i.e. to achieve transformation. (Rom 12:2)

I know this process worked for me and I believe it gave me a huge advantage not only in my professional life, but every area of my life.  I never wanted to live any aspect of my life on my own power and I certainly did not want to rely on my own intellect.  So, I intentionally committed everything to the Lord on a daily basis in order to walk by faith in the power of the Holy Spirit.  And I was totally focused / fanatical to ensure that I was renewing my mind daily to the Word and feeding my computer awesome information to grow personally. 

So the Papa Hawk Library is a compilation of some of my favorite and most impactful “highlights/cliff notes” that I’ve created over the last 30 years. The vast majority of the articles are short 2-4 page documents.  They are broken out by topic – faith, renewing the mind, finances, spiritual warfare, prayer, etc. 

The two principles I have really been led to focus on, and I know have made a HUGE impact in my life, is the importance of consistently renewing our minds in God’s Word, as well as managing our finances according to God’s laws of finance and stewardship.   

I have developed some strong opinions given my lifetime of experience plus all the research/reading/listening I have done.  One of the objectives of putting all of this information together on this site is to save you a LOT of time in reading a lot of different books or exploring the limitless volumes of information at our fingertips today.  I’ve created 160 documents total over the years but have only posted approximately 80 to this site as a starting point.

My goal has always been to get through at least 3-5 pages of these consolidated “highlights/cliff notes” every day, in addition to my regular bible study.  In doing so, I essentially “brain washed” myself for total and absolute success, saturating my brain with the promises and truth of God’s Word, refusing to be influenced by the world, by what the circumstances may look like or what my feelings may be trying to tell me.

I was doing this back when I was building my career and I still aspire to get this planting of seed and renewal done every day here in retirement.  I never want to stop growing.  I still want to have a “walking and talking” mastery of the information being taught in these books, as well as the Word itself.   Faith comes by hearing, and hearing and hearing – repetition is vitally important to getting this information down into your heart and mind. 

Long-term change through the renewing of the mind is the master key to all Christian growth.

I have often referred to the wisdom covered in these articles as “the secret” and I am providing these “secrets” to everyone free of charge.  Again – I hope to save you a LOT of time as it basically took me many years to recognize, understand and integrate some of these critical thought processes into my daily walk. 

Even though I’m retired, I’m still pumped to continue to grow in my faith, renew my mind and achieve transformation (Rom 12:2) as I pursue God and the plan that He has for my life.  I still love reviewing these nuggets and constantly renewing my heart and mind to these principles and the victory that we have thru Christ Jesus.

I hope that the information on this site is helpful in order to assist you in attaining your goals.  Feel free to reach out to me if you’d like to visit more. I’d love to answer any questions you might have and discuss your situation specifically.  😊