Cain and Abel In the course of time Cain brought to the Lord an offering of the fruit of the ground, and Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and his offering, but for Cain and his offering he had no regard. So Cain was very angry, and his face fell. The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.” Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him. (Genesis 4: 3 to 8) Everybody knew about the story of Cain and Abel.  There are many elaborations about the meaning of the story too.  One thing amazed me is how Cain killed his own brother in cold blood just because the Lord looked with favor on Abel and his offering, but on Cain and his offering He did not look with favor.  This also happened between Esau and Jacob.  Jacob gave Esau some stew in exchange for Esau's birthright and later deceived his father Isaac into blessing him in place of Esau.  When Esau found out, he wanted to kill Jacob.  Don’t even mention Joseph and his brothers. Just because Jacob favored Joseph more than his brothers, his brothers wanted to kill him. Jesus also gave a parable of the prodigal son.  When his older brother heard that their father had killed the fattened calf because the lost son had come back safe and sound, he became angry and refused to go in (Luke 15: 11 to 32). By comparison, we could find that the angry sibling was often the one who was working hard.  And it's often the older sibling too.  It makes sense.  Because the older one was more responsible.  Is it bad to be responsible?  Was that the reason for the sibling rivalry?  Well, if we are too focused on the result then we could easily become the angry sibling.  To be responsible means that we want more control and results.  If we didn't get the result as expected or deserved then we would become depressed, jealousy or angry.  On the contrary, if we focused on the process or progress of the event then we would be more joyful. Just to give you an example.  Yesterday, I went to the Travis County Property Appraisal (TCPA) office to protest my property tax.  I have already submitted an eFile protest and got my property value lowered from $820K to $772K.  But I was not satisfied.  So, I filed a formal protest.  I took pictures of our house inside out which show the cracks and deterioration and printed them in color.  I also used the material that TCPA sent me for the formal protest to show the differences between the 2016 sale price and the appraisal value of Lost Creek.  The average shows that the appraisal value is 14.5% higher than the sale price.  I also collected two recent sales in the neighborhood to show that the appraisal value is $100K higher than the sale price in both cases.  Finally, a copy of the zillow estimate of $699K for our house. Well, after reviewing my data, both the realtor panel (two guys and one lady) and the county officer agreed that my property appraisal needs to be adjusted.  So, they spent some time going through some fancy calculations on both sides by hand and the PC.  The new appraisal value is now $799K.  It's $27K higher than the first offer of $772K.  And since this is the formal offer, the previous old offer is no longer valid. It doesn't make sense, does it?  Without knowing the condition of my house, the county offered me a lower appraisal value than after knowing the condition of my house.  Should I get angry?  If I focused on the result, then I should be.  However, I enjoyed it instead.  Just to see those real estate professionals take my case seriously made me feel that it's all worthwhile.  Especially, when I was preparing those materials, I felt that I was neither helpless nor hopeless.  With a cheerful and fresh spirit, I could do a lot based on limited resources.  It all depended on how open our mind is.  Don't limit your mind on the result.  Don’t let anxiety control you. Set your mind free like a bird in the sky and open like a lily in the field.  Then you would feel that you could overcome any difficulty.  Emmanuel. (To return, select <- on the toolbar)