And these situations are always the ones where each person you speak to about it gives you conflicting advice. So you suck it up and try every single piece of advice you're given, to no avail. And the most painful thing about all this advice is that everybody is so sure you just haven't been trying hard enough or doing it the right way.....all completely oblivious of just how hard you actually have been trying.
Well the other day someone said the most revolutionary thing to me. "maybe you're trying too hard". I don't think I've ever heard that phrase before. It seems so completely counter-cultural. Isn't our whole North American Society built on the tenet of success being a direct result of effort? That your life is exactly what you've worked to make it? If you are dissatisfied with your body, work at a diet and exercise plan. If you are dissatisfied with your job, work harder to make it better.
But somehow the words ressonated as sound to me. I am so tired of trying, it's exhausting! And trying is not getting me anywhere, which is so demotivating. There should be a "never give up" prize! It's hard to keep stepping up to bat when you strike out every single time!
So, I am officially done. I'm not going to try anymore.
Here's the weird part, making this decision has been completely liberating. I'm not sad, or feeling like a failure - I just feel free and lighter somehow.
4 comments:
I'm not quite sure which life challenge you're referring to here, but I do believe it is possible to try too hard. By what scale are measuring your success? Yours or Gods? I know I've been guilty of beating myself up in such situations, only to have somebody point out that maybe MY goal was thwarted, but there is evidence of the fruit of the Spirit and so can that come from failure?
My point was kinda that giving up on trying is not in fact failure, and can sometimes be the correct course of action.
I'm a firm believer in the fact that some people are just trying so hard to accomplish their goals that all they end up doing is exhausting themselves.
Like Em, I don't know what you're specifically referring to, but you've always struck me as someone who believes that God will provide for you when He chooses to. If that's so, why not just sit back, relax and enjoy life, rather than working so hard to accomplish something that you're burning yourself out?
No words have ever resonated more with me. I am thoroughly defeated. So give us an update... How did your new attitude/approach work out for you?
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