Quickly Finding your Strongest Self

Podcast: Play in new window

Listen: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Pandora | TuneIn | Deezer | RSS | More

Rhythm.

Balance

Strength.

Softness.

In dance, all of these things come together in just the right way.

Too much of any one pulls things off balance, but when you get just the right mix, you rise above – unstoppable and appearing effortless.

Today’s theme is the dance of life…. 

Rhythm.

Balance

Strength.

Softness.

In dance, all of these things come together in just the right way.

Too much of any one pulls things off balance, but when you get just the right mix, you rise above – unstoppable and appearing effortless.

Today’s theme is the dance of life…. 

I was going to call it consistency, but that just seems too small a word to capture what I really mean.

Think of a time when you were or you will be in the zone. You actually become a crossroads. A convergence where intention, discipline, study and practice meet.

Take a minute to just feel that competence.

You are a perfect nexus – connecting the world outside with the best of what you were born to be and do.

One of the reasons we sometimes feel inadequate is because we orient ourselves to what we see on the outside. The popular and funny ones on Instagram. The successful ones at work. The talented ones in sports or business.

Relax your grip. You’re dancing too closely – clinging to your partner. When we index and compare ourselves externally like this, we get pulled off balance — away from who we are and toward a thousand reflections in a shattered mirror that surrounds us.

We become exhausted from all this chasing of the expectations we feel from the outside world. The perfect partner. The perfect job. The perfect house or car or on and on. There is not enough of us in the picture – only distorted reflections.

When we tire, then we might swing toward inwardness…. This may look like depression or anxiety or simply feeling numb and withdrawn.

Once we cut ourselves off entirely from the outside world and close the window blinds to our selves, it becomes solely about us. Why aren’t we good enough? Why am I so unmotivated? I’m not smart, I’m not attractive, I’m not strong enough. Woe is me.

We can get stuck in either one of these places – too outwardly-focused or too inwardly focused. Or we can swing nauseatingly back and forth like a pendulum…. too much, not enough, too much, not enough…

Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “The world makes way for the person who knows where they are going.”

Sometimes when we can’t find consistency – when we fall away from the New Year’s resolutions and life’s goals that have gathered dust on the shelf – we have an opportunity for a self-check.

If we’re paying attention, our unhappiness can be like a little chime – to check in and find out what’s really going on.

All of life is this dance between things… love and fear, grief and joy, work and rest. If you are stuck or always  grasping for any one of those places, though…

Come back to

Rhythm.

Balance

Strength.

Softness.

I’m working so hard… but why am I working?

I want to lose weight… but why do I want to?

I want to become a great golfer… or entrepreneur, or teacher…

Why?

The world outside can provide us approval and love, but it cannot provide worth. We come already equipped with that.

I have sometimes connected the approval of others with my self-worth. I see this commonly. But it’s like tying your heart to a shiny red balloon and feeling the joy as it gently floats upward into the clear blue sky.

What once felt so lovely, can change in an instant when a storm comes, or the balloon pops.

Appreciate the outside world, but don’t tether yourself to it. Like a dance partner, it will move and sway and change all the time. You will move and change and sway.

Find your own rhythm.

Find your own balance.

Honor your times of strength and your times of softness.

Listen, as the Quakers say, for that still, small voice inside that has always known what you want and who you really are. Make friends with that voice because that voice is you. And YOU are the most perfect dance partner you will ever discover in this life.

When you honor that inner voice – when you befriend it, and fully become yourself, then you won’t struggle so much trying to do everything right. You won’t exhaust yourself chasing someone else’s dreams.

“I long to accomplish great and noble tasks, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. The world is moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker.” – the words of Helen Keller.

My friend, YOU are the greatest goal of all. You are the journey, and you are the destination. Be humble, be persistent in showing up for yourself, and for God’s sake, don’t forget to dance this week.

Series Navigation

<< Are You a Prisoner of Your Shame?The Secret of Our Suffering >>