Category: Advice

“What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do.”

Tim Ferriss

Do you ever take the time to just sit back and observe your habits?

Well, I was about two weeks ago. I realized that I was spending a crazy amount of time on my phone, and I challenged myself to use my phone no longer than two hours. Then I realized I could do even better: one hour.

So, I met my goal…but I was still wasting time. Instead of going on my phone, I was watching Netflix, looking up whatever things I had forgotten to check on, and all sorts of things that would take up time that I should’ve spent doing other things.

The good news is that I did spend more time relaxing (without a screen) and doing my Bible study, but I still was wasting a lot of time. There is always going to be another way to do the thing you are trying to avoid.

I wasn’t even realizing what I was doing for about a week and a half, but a couple days ago I sat back and asked myself “what am I doing?”.

And that made me think. In the United States, we have so many opportunities. We have so many ways we can help each other, get to know new people, and try new things. But what are we doing?

More and more people are feeling anxious, lonely, inadequate. What are we doing that’s causing these problems?

In a country where we are generally known as being progressive and workaholics, the main prayer request I receive from my friends or the frequent complain that I hear is this: I really need to stop procrastinating! I’m not getting anything done.

Or, more personally, you may be letting yourself slip into a cycle or a mindset that you don’t want to be in.

A problem that I have is generally not admitting the truth to myself. I would (and still) say yes to things that I don’t want to do, and force myself to think that they will be fun just to please other people. I pretend like a relationship is fine when I know that it’s mostly one-sided. I forget who I am when someone else defines me.

You may have similar problems or something completely different. The important thing is to notice when you begin to slip into thinking negatively, listening to unwise council, spending hours not doing what you should be getting done, hanging onto a bad relationship. It’s hard to have difficult conversations with others, but having that difficult conversation with yourself? That’s the worst of it. You have to admit that you were wrong, or someone else you trusted was wrong. You have to change.

I think that our society needs to change. And I’m not going to just be that person criticizing the way things are and putting myself separate from that. I know that I have fallen into the same traps of overlooking people, letting what the world says influence my choices. I know that it takes a community, not just one person, to make the differences we wish to see in the world. But I also know that if every person did one intentional thing to become more productive, more loving, more informed…that would change everything.

Maybe if we all take just one step closer to becoming more of who we were created to be, we wouldn’t feel defensive when asked the simple question “what are we doing?” because you can answer in confidence. You can say, “I’m doing what it takes to love others…to change the world.”

So, what are you doing?

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”

Romans 12:2

“Everyone chases after happiness, not noticing that happiness is right at their heels.”

Bertolt Brecht

I think it’s really easy for us to simply miss the complete obvious. I know that I’ve done that before, and I’d consider myself a pretty observant person. I think that the easiest things for us to ignore, though, are the messages that we don’t want to hear.

Let me give you two examples, a funny one and a more serious one.

Say Gerald McHarold (not a real person obviously), the grossest guy at the office, has been giving you boxes of chocolate, saying hi whenever he saw you, and complimenting that ugly sweater you wear to please your grandmother. Well, you definitely don’t want to imagine yourself with Mr. McHarold here, so you pretend and even tell others that he has no interest in you. Yet clearly, as your best friend loves to point out, he clearly has been bitten by the love bug. But you might have tricked yourself so much into believing that he doesn’t like you that you stop noticing the evidence.

Or, you see a friend who you have always relied on suddenly changing. She is quiet, and distant, and she’s even stopped enjoying her favorite things. But you can’t stand the thought of her not being happy or not being there for you, so you ignore the signs that something is wrong. You might ask her if she’s okay, and she lies and says she is, but really, she isn’t. However, you don’t want to disturb this perfect image you have of her, that something could actually be going wrong, so you ignore the signs that you need to take uncomfortable action.

For me, neither of these particular instances prompted me to write this post. It was just a rather direct realization of mine that struck me hard, but has been sticking with me a lot lately.

What we have planned out in our heads may not be what ends up happening. And with a few particular things, God has been showing me that perhaps I have gotten as close as I can, and I will venture no further.

This reminds me of Moses, actually. He thought that he would go to the Promise Land. Come on, he KNEW it! He wouldn’t have traveled 40 years if he didn’t think he would reach there eventually. This could be like that dream job you were hoping for, that dream person you had your eye on, that dream connection with a family member or friend that you have been waiting for. We all have our “Promise Land”.

Yet he didn’t even reach the border.

And sometimes we don’t get what we deeply desire either. The job is given to someone else, our dream person doesn’t notice us, that connection never happens because the other person isn’t ready or can’t resolve their differences.

For Moses, the reason why he didn’t was because of a punishment for disobeying God. But for us, it can be a variety of reasons. Perhaps we didn’t actually do anything wrong, it just wasn’t part of the plan for our lives. But it hurts the same way.

There are so many stories of how people were being saved for something or someone greater. But they mean nothing at the time of the pain.

Moses, however, was given something to keep his hopes up. He was able to take a look at the Promise Land.

Now, for a while, I thought that God was being cruel by doing this, because I felt like it would like seeing your favorite dessert but not getting to eat it. (Only a million times worse, of course!) But over time, I realized that maybe this wasn’t a bad deal after all.

When God gives us a glimpse of what could be, of the greatness He has in store, we are more motivated to try harder. We can have hope that even if this isn’t the person, the job, the relationship…there is still something amazing out there for us.

But if we ignore the signs that we have to move on from our dreams and look to God’s dreams, then we might miss out on the glimpse of hope. We might even miss out on what God is trying to teach us from the heartache or from the potentially “not-what-we-exactly-wanted” outcomes.

It’s really difficult being real with our feelings. Sometimes it’s hard to admit how much disappointment we feel when our plans don’t work out. But if we are vulnerable and honest with God, then He can help us move on faster. He can help us see what we want for the future, and how we can become who we want to be.

All we have to do is stop, take a deep breath, and notice.

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”

Hebrews 11:1