About a year ago, I got a knot in my stomach that wouldn’t go away. Have you ever had a knot in your stomach? Most of us, at some point in our lives, have had an aching longing sensation that something wasn’t right. I can’t remember the exact day it came on, but I remember the feeling growing and persisting with each passing day that I chose to ignore it.
One day, I woke up and was tired of the knot. Ignoring it didn’t make it disappear, so I knew that I would need to face it sooner than later. I began to ask myself what’s wrong. The answer, in all its clarity, rocked me to my core. I realized two things had happened:
- My life’s focus was out of balance. I thought mainly about work, career development, then the rest of my energy went to family. Occasionally I gave God the time of day but for all intensive purposes I just showed up for church and small group.
- I had forgotten what I was passionate about. I still remember the day when my brother and I were driving home from a convention and he asked me what I was passionate about. It was at that moment when I realized that I didn’t even know anymore.
I realized that I had to make changes or I was on the fast track to burnout and depression.
Through the journey I made several changes leading up to the decision I made today:
- I shared my hurt with several close friends. They have become my prayer warriors, cheerleaders, and accountability partners.
- I began to pray, and pray simply for obedience. I prayed that God would give me the wisdom, humility, and discernment to be obedient to His will.
- I started working with a coach. The goal of this was to help me rediscover my values and gifts, so that I might express and live them in a way that honors God.
As part of the journey with my coach, we identified 5 “essence words” that describe who I am at the core. My five words are:
- Connection
- Joy
- Authenticity
- Spirit
- Leader
As I began to reflect on those words, I began to pray for wisdom, humility, and discernment to be obedient to express and live out those words in my life. Simply put, I asked God how I could act on this knowledge. Immediately after asking this, an idea popped into my head. The idea was to commit to praying every day until the end of the year. Make the idea known to others, and ask them to share their prayer requests with me so I can lift them up.
Why did I chose to write a blog about the experience?
The more I think about this idea, the more excited I become about the journey. I believe this exercise will be a transformative work in my life and a journal will help me process and see how God uses this. By making the journal public on this forum, it’s my hope and prayer that others would be blessed and encouraged by what God is doing through prayer.
I’m so excited to be starting this journey and see where it leads.