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.

Youth as a Time of Searching

Pope John Paul II wrote, in Crossing the Threshold of Hope, that youth is a time of searching for answers to basic questions. He notes that we’re not only looking for meaning in life, but also “a concrete way to go about living” that life.

As a youth struggling with how to fulfill my mission on earth, how best to use the gifts I’ve been given, I can definitely relate to this observation. I am full of questions, from “Where to begin?” to “How?” to “Then what?” and I’m overwhelmed with advice, from family and friends, to career counsellors, to self-help books, to the saints and the Gospel itself.

It’s a very humbling experience, because when you’re in school, all you have to do is what’s expected of you. You know the drill and the rewards are clear: study, work hard, get good grades. But as soon as you leave that comfortable bubble, things are no longer so clear cut.

In everything that I’ve been learning from this experience, the strongest lesson is this: that I am not alone. I am not the only one who is uncertain. And I am certainly not the only one who cares about making a difference in this world, who wants work that is meaningful and truly engages my spirit.

The prevailing message in this world is that, when you get to a certain age, you’re supposed to have it all figured out—or at least pretend you do. But the reality is that, with ever-increasing options for work and the ever-changing nature of the job market, it becomes even harder to choose.

But choose we must. And what we decide to do with our lives is our responsibility and gift to God.

[Photo from here.]

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.