So often I ask myself, 'what is my gift?' 'where is my destiny?' 'what am I supposed to be doing?' God has placed in me so many diverse abilities that I often get caught up in the 'ability' and get in 'busy work' which spins me into an exhausted frenzy and eventually depression.
We have been focused on the prayer call over the past few weeks on 'Vision' and 'Goals'. The start of a new year often has everyone focused on 'righting' all the 'wrongs' of yester-year. Lose weight, gain weight, write a book, travel the country, learn a new instrument, stop smoking, quit drinking...the list goes on and on and on. Some of us start out really, really strong and get it in. We address the 'thing' that is usually the most obvious symptom to our problem. We got fat, we need to lose weight. We got skinny, we need to gain weight. We smoke cigarettes, we quit smoking cigarettes. You get the idea. The problem is we are addressing the 'symptoms' or outward signs of our problems and not the root cause.
When I moved to Charlotte, NC from NYC over 17 years ago, every house on my little street had a little flower bed. Either around their mailbox or around the tree in their front yard or right in front of their porch. So I decided, I wanted some flowers too. I went to Walmart, got a bag of dirt and some pansies (I think that's what they were) and I planted them around my tree. I spent all day digging and placing and watering. They were sooooo pretty and I had accomplished it. Then I went back to my regular life. A few days later, there were some funny looking things in with my flowers. I didn't like them, so I plucked them just below the surface level. My flowers were back to being pretty again. Mind you, this whole time, my neighbor - Mr. Charles (cuz you gotta put a 'Mr.' on people who are older than you names - lol, its a southern thang). So Mr. Charles was out there every day in his flower garden. I figured he just liked it out there. I on the other hand, enjoyed seeing my flowers when I came into the house but all that in the yard gardening and tending...notsomuch. So my flowers started to have a lot of funky green plants up around them (I later learned they were weeds). I asked Mr. Charles, how would I get the weeds out of my flowers. He said, 'Pluck them up at the root'. So, I did. (or at least I thought I did) and then they came back! WTH...Mr. Charles has led me wrong. "Mr. Charles, why do I keep getting weeds?" I asked. He responded, "Cuz you ain't plucked them all up!". So I asked, "How long do I have to keep plucking?" He responded, "For as long as it takes to get it all.".
You might think at this moment I had an 'aha' moment. But I did. But I didn't. I went behind my house and got my lawn mower and ran over the whole flower garden. Because I decided it was just too much work.
How much work are you willing to put in to find your destiny? How much work are you willing to put in to get to your 'peace' so that you can finally be free of all those weeds that keep destroying every step of progress that you make? Anything worth having is worth working for. God's word says that if a man don't work, a man don't eat.
If you'd like to dig deep and find out what God is trying to help you to be free from get real. Contact me for a consultation and we'll start your journey. No quick fixes. No easy outs. But good success. 704-493-2035. Let's get 'Back to Eden' - a Christian Approach to Living.
