One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned over the past two years is that if I don’t like something about my life…I have the power to change it. Oftentimes, I feel locked up and stuck when it comes to a relationship, bad habit, job situation, or whatever circumstance I’m not fond of. Unfortunately when I feel stuck, I have a tendency to make some decisions that aren’t based on responsibility nor wisdom. I start to feel claustrophobic, and I just want to get out of whatever I’ve found myself in.
Most often this is when I live by the question, “What do I want to create?”
Frankly, I’ve lived most of my adult life through the lens of that question. I love to create things. I love to build organizations, teams, and now businesses. Unfortunately, I don’t like some of the things that come along with them…like overseeing a lack of finances, managing squirrely staff, and trying to drive things forward at too fast of a pace. In the past, I have developed relationships with people so that they can help me build whatever it is that I am trying to create. The result is shallow friendships with little more in common than the vision at hand.
I get tired of the vision (or more often the way in which it is being implemented), and I start to feel stuck…like I can’t change things.
I’ve felt this way about…
- Working in the corporate world.
- Managing businesses I’ve been involved in.
- Leading a church I started.
- Being in my own marriage.
In 2008, right before I decided to escape from much of my life to start a new one, I felt more stuck than ever. I didn’t enjoy my life, and I wanted out. So, I made a decision to change things up in order to get what I wanted. I was living by the question, “What do I want to create?” In the process, I made a big mess out of my life, but I did change things up quite a bit.
The funny thing is that I had the power to change things up all along…without having to make irresponsible and unwise decisions. I was blind to the fact that I could have experienced a different life without leaving the one I already had.
These days, I’m learning to ask a different question…”Who do I want to be?”
I’m just learning the answers to this question, but I like the results that I’m getting. Instead of setting out to create something, I’m trying to determine the type of person I want to be. Things will naturally be created as an outgrowth of me being this person.
- Instead of trying to build a big creative agency, I’m doing my best to serve the clients that I have the privilege of working with.
- Instead of setting out to plant a large church, I’m leading and loving a community of followers of Jesus.
- Instead of developing friendships to grow my business or church, I’m seeking to be hospitable to those who God brings into our lives.
- Instead of wanting to be a best-selling author, I’m writing to help those who are stuck and lack freedom in their own life.
- Instead of longing to have a different “more passionate” relationship, I’m serving and partnering with my wife to love our kids and have an adventurous life.
At any point I start to feel stuck, I ask myself why I’m doing whatever it is that I feel stuck in. Is it to build something? Or, is it simply because that’s the person I want to be? At any point I don’t like who I’m being, I can decide whether I want to make some decisions to get the results I want. I have the freedom to be the person I want to be, and I have the power to experience something different.
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