My last post was about being afraid to make a change in your life… about being imprisoned in a life based upon a series of choices (which you have made) that has you afraid to leave the comfort of your prison and thus, the deterioration of your dreams.
I got to thinking more about that last night as I was out walking. I want to be clear that I am not advocating “change for the sake of change.” That’s just worthless, and you are deceiving yourself even further. In fact, that is how America was deceived during the last presidential elections – Obama threw around the word “change,” but it was a change with no purpose, direction, goal, or value. It worked to get him elected, but it certainly didn’t change anything in America. The last 2 years have proven his words were hollow.
When I talk about being afraid of change, here are the 3 main things I am talking about:
- Being paralyzed by a fear that you cannot do anything else except what you’re doing. You think there is little hope or little else you are qualified for, and so you accept the circumstances the way they are with a false hope that your current situation will change, improve, or one day your ship will come in.
- Reigniting your ability to dream; ressurrecting an old dream; giving birth to a new dream. Moving away from the fear will open a shaft of light into your life to begin to hope again and dream about a life that is better, a home life that is fulfilling, a relationship with God that has purpose, and having enough resources (both physically and financially) to share with others.
- Having a determination to step out of the prison you have created for yourself and stop listening to the lies you tell yourself and simply abandon the prison. It really is that simple.
The killer to all of this, and the killer to any dream or aspiration of freedom is when you begin to whine to yourself and others with questions like, “what if this happens?” “How will I…?” The biggest killer is asking the question, “how.” You need to ommit that from your vocabulary and let the how’s take care of themselves as you move forward. They always do, and God will not abandon you.
The second killer is thinking you will wait until something else comes along. Give me a break. That aint happening either. You might as well wait until you win the lottery. As long as you are in the prison of your bad choices (they are yours you know – don’t put the responsibility of your bad choices on someone else), you will never have the freedom for something else to come along. You will only sink deeper into the prison cell until it becomes solitary confinement.
I want to encourage you as 2011 continues to move forward (before long it will be Spring, then Summer, then Fall, then Christmas, then we’ll be celebrating the new year again with no changes made), to find the courage you had when you were dreaming in high school, in your early 20’s, or sometime when dreaming was once alive in you. Go there, find the courage, and walk away.
Is it scary to walk away. Yes it is. But you need to come to terms that the pain of staying in your current circumstnces is worse than being afraid of freedom.
The bottom line is that God never meant any of us to live our lives in chains (sounds like that Eagles song again). He didn’t send His Son to the cross so that we could live a miserable existence, self absorbed in our own life. Make a change, with purpose, vision, and hope.