Continuous Growth - Writing Update Month 3

Today marks 3 months into writing. I've been able to post every single week, except Thanksgiving. (Note to self: When holiday's approach, make sure to have an extra post ready to go ahead of time, even if you think you'll have time to do it during the busy week. You probably won't.)

I'm finally starting to feel like I'm hitting a groove with writing. Notice I did not say anything about being a "perfect writer" or feeling like I've finally found my voice. I think the whole "finding your voice" thing is a constant work in progress. Something to continually strive for.

Anyway, this past month has brought out a lot of interesting lessons for me on the writing path:

Keeping it God-focused and less me-focused. 

I believe that as sinful humans, we're selfish by nature. It's easy to want to take all the glory and boost our own egos. But I'm 99.9% positive, that's not the reason God has put this calling on my heart to write.

I believe God wants me to use my writing to point readers back to him. So that's the goal I need to keep in mind when I sit down at my laptop.

It's definitely nerve-wracking to have this thought process, I'll be completely honest. I feel like the last person in the world to be doing anything that points others toward Him. I feel like I'm just as lost and need just as much help as the reader. But another thing I've learned this month is that I need to...

Trust God with My Dreams

This was something I read in Chip and Joanna Gaines' book, Magnolia recently. Some of the struggles they endured that God brought them through are just miraculous. There's no other word for it. They were multiple times that they weren't sure they were doing the right thing, they just trusted that God would bring them through this dream by continually doing what he asked them to do. Day in and day out. 

Doing what God has asked me to do day in and day out is how I feel about writing. I have no idea if anyone will ever read this. I have no idea if building an engaging blog will ever be what I finally end up doing. 

But I have hope. I have faith. I trust that God sees these dreams in my heart and that He'll one day (in His own timing) bring everything to fruition. 

Just be Me 

This is also something that's been a constant work in progress over the past 3 months so far. It's easy to look at what everyone else is doing and to compare my writing style with other author's I love. But... 

This is something I'm going to work on the in the next month before I post another update. I'm going to work on just writing the way I write and going for it. Letting God take the keyboard and letting Hi do His thing while I do mine. 

Jeff Goins recently sent out a blog post and it was entitled Run Your Own Race. What fitting words for me at this point in my life. It's so easy for me to go down the road that leads to the comparison trap, but all that does is leave me exhausted and questioning myself and my abilities. I need to focus on my writing and my style. And trust that no one has voice quite like mine.

Looks like it's time to wrap this up and work on the next month ahead. Side note: My due date with Baby Larson #3 is this upcoming Thursday. I've already told myself that after the baby is born, I'll take the next 2 weeks off while I enjoy baby snuggles with the new little one. But then it's back to it! I don't want to get out of my habit of weekly posts.

As always: Onward and upward! 

How Doing Less Leads to More

If there's been a common theme the past couple of months in my life it would be this: Less, less, less.

I'm typically kind of a more is more person. More To Do's, more events, more goals, more food (Lord knows I'm 9 months pregnant).

But the whispers I've been hearing lately are telling me to take the every day and do less with it. Less cleaning, less planning, less goal setting, less worrying, less trying to take control of every situation.

I believe it's because by doing less of the small things, less of the daily activities the world tells us we need to do, we leave room to do more of the things God has placed in our hearts.

It opens up a whole new realm of possibilities. Less cleaning leads to more time spent with family. Less worrying leads to more joy. Less negativity leads to more life-giving positivity. Less hanging on to the things we think are good leads to more freedom to choose the things that are great.

In the past month, I took some time to practice an exercise that I've found to be incredibly beneficial, so I'd like to share it with you.

Your 5 Things 

I sat down in silence and in prayerful consideration, and created a list of 5 things that are most important to me - The 5 things I want most out of life. 5 things that when I'm laying on my death bed, I can truly say that I went all-in and reached for those goals on a daily basis.

These weren't 5 things that I just whipped up out of nowhere. I had been mulling over them for some time, and I felt that these were 5 things that God had laid on my heart.

When you preform this exercise, I encourage you to do-so through a conversation with God. It's between the two of you that you'll want to set life goals.

I also encourage you not to do any Googling or Pinteresting on this topic. I for one, absolutely love good research. Unfortunately, my "good research" sometimes comes with world views I don't agree with and advice that leads me down the wrong road. It also has a tendency to leave me with ideas that other people are using, which leads me to comparison instead of finding my own goals.

Really take some time to decide on your 5 things. It might take a couple of days before you've got them ironed out. And, I'm guessing, as life continues, there may be changes - small tweaks - to your list.

But the first and most beneficial thing you can do, is iron out the life you feel God has created for you.

Now Let Everything Else Go 

Now that you've got your 5 things ironed out, make like your best inner Elsa and Let it go.

Let go of the little things that are holding you back and keeping you down. Let go of the lies this life tells us and grab hold to the hope that God has a better purpose, a better plan.

For example, one of the things on my list was that our next home (and any home thereafter) be set up for better entertaining. I want a large kitchen with an island where we can all congregate and a large outdoor area where we can put a patio table up and let the kids run. Notice I didn't mention anything else about the house. It doesn't matter if it's in small-town Nebraska, or big-city, Georgia. It doesn't matter if it's in the country or in town. All that matters is that our next home has a better set up for entertaining, which is something I'd like to do more of. I'll let God take the lead on the rest.

My point is, take some time to really detail what it is that's important to you, and then stop worrying about the rest. The rest will fall into place in it's own time. Focus on what the most important things are.

Check Your Daily Habits 

I don't know about anyone else, but I am really great at tricking myself into thinking I'm doing everything perfect. I want to live a healthy lifestyle, but then I eat fast food for lunch and wonder why I feel lousy and low on energy all afternoon. I argue and whine that I don't understand because I had a healthy breakfast and I convince myself that my lunch wasn't sooo bad... 

The honest truth that I have to keep reminding myself is this: If we want to really reach a goal, the best place to start is to check our daily habits. 

The number one thing on my list of 5 life goals is to be a professional writer. It's easy to get caught up in the quick-fixes and fun stuff that go along with writing. But if I truly want to be a professional writer, what I must do the most of (and on a daily basis), is actually write. Crazy, I know. But you'd be surprised how long it's taken me to figure this out. 

What's most important isn't always achieving the goal, but taking the time day in and day out to do the work that leads us one step closer to the end result. In order to really live the life that we love and trust that God has in store for us, we must give up the small, daily practices that are leading us away from where we want to be. 

Wrapping Up

When it comes down to it, what writing a list of 5 life goals has taught me is that focusing on what's most important, means letting go of the things that are less important. 

And letting go of the less important has left me feeling like I can breath a little. Like I don't have to have it all figured out, and I don't have to do everything perfectly. I only have to focus on the things that are life-giving to me.

So listen to the whispers that say Do Less, and find out what it is God wants for you in this life. 

Learning to Surrender it All When We Really (Really) Don't Want To

Have you ever heard the saying, "Let go and let God?"

Me, too. Turns out, though, I'm not so great at following that advice.

This isn't something I would have announced out loud that long ago. In fact, I'm not even sure it was something I saw in myself until very recently. I like to think I'm flexible and easy going.

But I'm learning I may be a little bit more of a control freak than I thought.

I have a vision in my head of how I want things to go, and when they don't turn out as expected, I become confused. Frustrated. Unsure of what to do next.

And as we've discussed, I'm not so great at feeling unsure. (I don't like surprises, remember?)

But there's something I've been working on lately. And let me tell you, it's hard. I've been working on letting things go.

Little by little. One small thing after another.

I've been working on turning it over to God and praying that I have the faith to know He'll take care of me and whatever situation I'm going through that's making me uneasy.

The Downside of Being a Pusher

All I can think of is the scene from Mean Girls where Tina Fey's character is talking to Lindsay Lohan's and she says: 

"I'm divorced. I'm broke from getting divorced. The only guy that calls my house is Randy from Chase Visa. And you know why? Because I'm a pusher. I push people." 

Oh how I can agree with these words. I, too, am a pusher. I like things a certain way, in a certain box. So I push. Most specifically, I like to push an agenda.

I like to steer my own boat. I see where I want to go and then I attack that journey with all that I have. I push forward, always trying to reach a goal and always feeling confident that I know exactly what's right for me. Do you feel this way, too? 

Here's a scary thought I've been juggling with lately: What if we started not pushing? (The horror, I know!)

Hear my out, though. What if we just... let it go? What if we just said, oh well. Here we are. Things are the way they are, then trusted that God would take it from here?

For this self-proclaimed pusher, this is definitely a scary thought. Stepping back and letting the chips fall where they may is not how I like to roll. It makes giving anything up to anyone (let alone the God of all creation) hard to do.

However, I'm also learning that... 

Letting Go is Sometimes all God asks of Us 

In the past few months, though the ups and downs, I've had a lot of whispers that are telling me to just give up. For those that know me, "just giving up" isn't exactly my favorite option. (See the reference above about being a pusher...) 

But what I'm realizing is that this feeling of needing to give something up is God's way of whispering to me: Let me handle this. 

Do you ever wonder how things would be different if we had just given them up to God in the first place instead of wasting time and emotional energy trying to figure them out ourselves? I wonder the same thing.

As the captains of our own boats, sometimes all God is asking us to do is to step aside and let Him steer for a bit. Let Him take hold and change course to the best journey only He can see.

I can sometimes be a slow learner in this department, so I also believe that God brings us through rougher periods of life as a gentle reminder to lean on Him and let Him take control.

I don't always enjoy these rough periods (does anyone, really?) but I've also seen how beautiful the end can turn out. I've seen how much learning and changing can happen as we let go and let God create a new path. 

Embracing Freedom

Ultimately what I'm learning most from practicing surrendering it all to God is that there is pure freedom in letting it all go. 

We don't have to try to fix things. We don't have to have it all figured out or have all the answers. 

All we have to do is trust that things will be taken care of the way they are supposed to be. It may not be the way we thought it would turn out, but this is where faith and trust come in - Having full confidence that God has our best interest in mind and has the exact right plan for us. 

There's freedom in letting it all go to the One who's in control and has all the answers. And it's a daily reminder for me that I'm not that person.  (Even though I often still try to be. It's a work in progress thing for sure.)

As I said, this is one of the hardest things I've ever tried to do. I'm not great at it. I still like to try to take situations into my own hands and navigate my own boat.

But I'm learning. I'm learning the freedom that comes with surrendering. I'm learning that even slow (very, very slow) progress is still progress.

Remember that we are loved, and remember that God truly does have our lives in His hands. He sees things we can't, and sometimes, all He's asking us to do is just let it go.