It’s all so superficial. Random texts. Photos. Status updates. We’re more connected than ever, yet we never go beyond the surface. I’m drowning in the surface waves. The air of everything’s-alright.
Everything is alright, on the surface of things. But the soul is beyond the surface. It longs for more.
We busy ourselves with the trivial pursuits, don the suits. Yet the fact remains that this life is fleeting. What can only be felt by the heart will be all that remains. And it’s all that matters.
So focus on forgiveness, kindness, truth, and wisdom. Caring, love, and healing. Being your best each day and helping those God puts in your way. Don’t be swayed by the ways of the world. And don’t compare yourself to every other boy or girl. You’re unique, don’t need to tweak a single thing. Just be yourself and let your soul sing.
Showing posts with label Purpose. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Purpose. Show all posts
October 13, 2012
July 6, 2011
Let It Be
Isn’t it amazing when it feels like a song or a book was written just for you? Lyrics that cut straight to your heart, a poem whose every line uplifts your spirit, or a book that speaks exactly to your current circumstances. These particulars in the universal remind us just how connected we all are.
For me, Pete Wilson’s Plan B is one of those books. From the moment I started the first chapter, I was immediately drawn in and I knew I would find just the encouragement I needed in my life right now. In this post, I’ll share some of my favourite insights from the book.
The basic theme of the book is that, in each person’s life, we all encounter times when things are not going according to plan. Moments of struggle, perhaps where nothing seems to be going right and we may feel that God has abandoned us. But as Wilson argues, it is precisely these times that we should trust in God the most. God works these situations for the good, to grow our faith and draw us closer to him and away from the things that distract us from being as close to God as we should.
As Wilson notes, “Your dreams may not be happening, and things aren’t turning out the way you expected, but that doesn’t mean your life is spinning out of control. It just means you’re not in control. It’s in those moments you can learn to trust the only one who has ever had control in the first place.”
It’s all about surrendering our lives to God and realizing that, even if things don’t turn out the way we expect them to, our lives are still working for God’s glory. Giving up control gives God room to work in our lives. And if we want to see God work in our lives, we have to first take that risk of trusting him. This involves stepping out in faith, before we’re sure of where we’re going.
These Plan B experiences can make us fearful and paralyzed with indecision, afraid of making any move. Yet, we are “fashioned for faith, not fear and worry.” The answer to this fear is to replace worry with a respect for God and his ways. To illustrate this point, Wilson includes this quote from Oswald Chambers: “The remarkable thing about fearing God is that when you fear God you fear nothing else, whereas if you do not fear God you fear everything else.”
The key, then, is putting all fears in God’s hands and then moving forward in trust. “When you respond in your current circumstances as if you were confident that God is there, you will see God in your circumstances.” It might not happen right away, but eventually it will.
On the question of knowing God’s will for our lives, Wilson is refreshingly frank: it’s a matter of trial and error. “Sometimes we get it all wrong. And sometimes we have no clue whether we’re getting it right until much later.”
Part of the problem is that we’re asking the wrong questions:
Often in life, the what, when, and where are not going to turn out the way you want them to turn out. You don’t always get to choose those things, but you get to choose the why. [...] If you can focus on the why, the what, the when, and the where will come. Hang on to your central purpose, and one way or another, the other details will work themselves out.
Another key point is that it’s as much about the person we’re becoming as where we’re going. God may call you to something that doesn’t work out, but that doesn’t mean you missed his will for your life. These situations can teach us crucial lessons on our journey.
Remember that God knows what you are going through and he is with you every step of the way. “He knows what he’s doing with your life, even if you don’t.”
Some other salient quotes from the book:
“While life is uncertain, God is not. While our power is limited, God’s is limitless. While our hope may be fragile, God is hope himself.”
“God has a perspective on life we don’t have—and God is working in your situation right now, even if you can’t see it.”
Trusting in God, having confidence in him even when times are trying, will give you the hope you need to keep soldiering on. And hope makes all the difference.
April 7, 2011
Just Dance: What Makes Meaningful Work
As a follow up to my post yesterday, there's a lot more I could've written about Outliers. But I just want to highlight the discussion in the book about what makes work meaningful, because this is a large part of success: if you love the work you do, you'll be motivated to put the effort in that's needed to be really great at it.
According to Gladwell, satisfying work has three key qualities:
Complexity is feeling engaged with your work and having the chance to use your imagination. I've often heard that one of the best ways to find the work you love is to pay attention to those times when you were so involved with something, you lost all track of time. Meaningful work will really draw you in.
Seeing the connection between how much time and effort you put into something and how successful you are at it is also important. If you keep slaving away at something and it's getting you nowhere, chances are pretty good you're not loving your job. But if it's clear what the result is of your hard work is—if there's a direct result that's important to you—then your work will be satisfying.
In combination, these three aspects are what makes work meaningful. Ultimately, it's not how much money you earn that's going to make you happy, but whether or not your work is fulfilling to you. This quote from Outliers sums it up perfectly:
So let's get out there and dance, shall we?
According to Gladwell, satisfying work has three key qualities:
- Autonomy;
- Complexity; and
- A clear connection between effort and reward
Complexity is feeling engaged with your work and having the chance to use your imagination. I've often heard that one of the best ways to find the work you love is to pay attention to those times when you were so involved with something, you lost all track of time. Meaningful work will really draw you in.
Seeing the connection between how much time and effort you put into something and how successful you are at it is also important. If you keep slaving away at something and it's getting you nowhere, chances are pretty good you're not loving your job. But if it's clear what the result is of your hard work is—if there's a direct result that's important to you—then your work will be satisfying.
In combination, these three aspects are what makes work meaningful. Ultimately, it's not how much money you earn that's going to make you happy, but whether or not your work is fulfilling to you. This quote from Outliers sums it up perfectly:
"Hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning. Once it does, it become the kind of thing that makes you ... dance a jig."
So let's get out there and dance, shall we?
July 7, 2010
Finding Your Mission in Life
Much could be said about Richard Bolle’s seminal bestseller What Color Is Your Parachute? I picked up a copy a few years ago, having seen the book at my university’s career centre library and hearing glowing recommendations about it.
Unlike a lot of books in the career and self-help genre, Parachute has a soul. Bolles—a former Episcopal clergyman—speaks from the perspective of one with faith and doesn’t hide this from the reader. So when he discusses finding your life’s work, it is framed in a spiritual context: finding the work you were made, by God, to do.
There is a plethora of job-finding tips in this book, but I want to focus on the chapter about finding your mission in life. This chapter reads like an essay—or perhaps a sermon—on finding one’s vocation and frames this issue in a new light.
Rather than thinking of your mission as one thing you are called to do, Bolles suggests that each person’s mission has three parts. Summarized, these are:
1) To know God, the One who gives you your mission.
2) To do what you can each day to make the world a better place, following God’s spirit within you and around you.
3) a) To use the talent that you came to Earth to use—your greatest gift, that gives you joy to use
b) in the place(s) or settings that God has caused to appeal to you the most,
c) and for what God most needs to have done in the world.
The first two aspects of one’s mission are shared by all human beings, while the third is unique to each individual. Bolles notes that “We were all sent here to bring more gratitude, more kindness, more forgiveness, and more love into the world.” Humans share this mission because the task is too large to be accomplished by just one person.
This interpretation of one’s mission in life makes sense to me. How can you know your purpose before you know the one who gave you that purpose? It is also comforting to think that one’ s mission is a continual life process, rather than something you just “know” and I somehow missed that gene.
What the third aspect seems to come down to is having the courage to follow your heart, knowing God will lead you each step of the way. And being perceptive to your own interests: What activities bring you joy and make you lose all sense of time?
Ultimately, what we are called to do in this world is an intersection between the work we want to do and the work the world most needs to have done.
Unlike a lot of books in the career and self-help genre, Parachute has a soul. Bolles—a former Episcopal clergyman—speaks from the perspective of one with faith and doesn’t hide this from the reader. So when he discusses finding your life’s work, it is framed in a spiritual context: finding the work you were made, by God, to do.
There is a plethora of job-finding tips in this book, but I want to focus on the chapter about finding your mission in life. This chapter reads like an essay—or perhaps a sermon—on finding one’s vocation and frames this issue in a new light.
Rather than thinking of your mission as one thing you are called to do, Bolles suggests that each person’s mission has three parts. Summarized, these are:
1) To know God, the One who gives you your mission.
2) To do what you can each day to make the world a better place, following God’s spirit within you and around you.
3) a) To use the talent that you came to Earth to use—your greatest gift, that gives you joy to use
b) in the place(s) or settings that God has caused to appeal to you the most,
c) and for what God most needs to have done in the world.
The first two aspects of one’s mission are shared by all human beings, while the third is unique to each individual. Bolles notes that “We were all sent here to bring more gratitude, more kindness, more forgiveness, and more love into the world.” Humans share this mission because the task is too large to be accomplished by just one person.
This interpretation of one’s mission in life makes sense to me. How can you know your purpose before you know the one who gave you that purpose? It is also comforting to think that one’ s mission is a continual life process, rather than something you just “know” and I somehow missed that gene.
What the third aspect seems to come down to is having the courage to follow your heart, knowing God will lead you each step of the way. And being perceptive to your own interests: What activities bring you joy and make you lose all sense of time?
Ultimately, what we are called to do in this world is an intersection between the work we want to do and the work the world most needs to have done.
June 16, 2010
Hello world!
Welcome to my blog! Soulicitious is going to be a place where I present my thoughts on finding meaning, direction, and purpose in one’s life on Earth. I’m writing from the perspective of a Christian (specifically, Catholic). But, no matter what faith one has, we likely all ask similar questions about our own lives, especially when we’re younger, still figuring things out.
I’m a twenty-something who’s been doing a lot of thinking lately about what direction I’d like my life to take. Since I’ve been reading so much about careers, happiness, and success, I thought it might be useful to provide mini-reviews or summaries of what I’m reading and generally talk about people, events, words, and really anything, that inspire me and may inspire you too.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)