Where do I go from here?

I’ve been told and read over and over that goal setting is key for a person like myself to keep focused, not only for the long term, but also for short term. More mundane, everyday tasks that everyone seems to – for me, the mundane, everyday tasks are as hard as a fourth grader completing a physics equation.

I’ve been reading a book that has been equally both enlightening and terrifying. Change Your Brain, Change Your Life is a book for those who struggle with things like depression, ADD, anger, obsessive-compulsive behavior – to which (if I can be transparent) these things are not foreign.

Through this book, I am beginning to see, for the first time in my life, why I think the way I do, and perhaps even why I struggle in the areas that hold me back from achieving my potential.

I’ve been thinking a lot about my potential – what am I going to do in six months, a year, five years down the road. My pastor, and personal hero Erwin McManus always says,  “the decisions you make today, affect your future tomorrow, what type of future are you creating for yourself?” I’ve been asking myself that very same question. What future am I creating for myself?

Lately as I begin to look forward into the future through the lens of my past choices, I have become sobered by the reality that eventually, at some point I am going to have to deal with some of the issues that I have been burring in the deepest caverns of my soul.

I am writing this from the old Fort Myers Army Base in San Francisco, California. I am on a cold cement rest area that over looks the bay.

From here I can see old army barracks where the paint is fading, a third of the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz, the infamous prison island that was created to be the most secure penitentiary in the country.

It’s almost ironic that from the outside all of these things are interesting places to see. Tourists with fanny packs and moms with strollers come here by the millions every year and yet below the shallow surface of tourism all these things have a past, a dark past that don’t look very good in the three by five.

This army base, the very base where I am at right now, trained the soldiers to assonate Japanese during World War II. The Golden Gate Bridge, as magnificent as it is, is the very sport where dozens of people every year come to in their deepest moments of despair to step into one final act of passion to end their life.  Alcatraz Island harbored some the most dangerous criminals in the area, the place where no one could escape, the place where dreams and hopes and futures faded away and human lives were reduced to the life of a caged rat – kept alive by food and water – but the soul was executed a little bit more everyday.

Just as to look at these attractions and not fully understand the history that surrounds the stone and steal that make up such extraordinary structures – I believe it’s hard for people to understand who I am based upon my outward appearance alone. We all have a past, a struggle, passions, and a uniquely shaped worldview that is a catalyst to how we not only observe the world around us, but also how we engage it.

I would also go as far to say not only how we engage the world, but also how we engage our own self-worth even our own future. If it’s the choices that affect our future, I would say that our worldview is how we arrive at our choices.

If all this is true – if it is possible to shape our own future by the choices in the now, then that leads me to believe that I am not bound and enslaved to the mistakes and faulty worldview of my distant and even not-so distant past.

What if I just decided to start over? What if I decided to try and escape the pattern of choices that I find myself in? What if I step into a life where I can achieve my potential – the potential that I believe God is calling towards? To accomplish such a thing would require a radical and unbelievable step in a new direction.

The book that I keep coming back to in my thoughts are a book that I mentioned in a previous blog. The Shack, by William P. Young is probably, by far the single most thought-provoking book I have ever read. Not only is it an amazing piece of literature that has raised the bar for modern Christian narrative, but it has ministered and will continue to minister to my soul in unbelievable ways.

Right now, as I step into a new season, a transformation in my life, I find myself in The Shack. I am finding myself having to face fears; struggles examine my own choices and think about my relationship not only with God, but also with other people.

I have to come to grips that I am an extremely selfish person that demands that Christian’s must think and act like I do in order for me to respect them. I am dealing with my own insecurity, pride and apathy. I have lied, manipulated and deceived.

Some of you might not have known that I have struggled in such areas, some of you know all to well. I guess I am at the point now where I am placing all my chips on the table and totally trusting God to see me through this.

My favorite question when people (especially Christians) say things like this is “Okay, well what does that mean exactly?”

The past month or so I’ve been really trying to reflect and process what I want to accomplish over the next year. These aren’t small, insignificant decisions that won’t require much effort.

Last week, while in Arizona my coworker and I decided to go camping near the Grand Canyon National Park. The first morning I was there, I grabbed a yellow legal pad and a pen and before the sun had risen I snuck off west down a two lane windy road towards the canyon. Under the cover of the moon, I made my way to the park entrance and parked at the first look out. There was an older couple; they looked my way as I approached – then returned their gaze to the dark abyss. I walked a little further and found a rock that extended beyond the cliff about four feet or so. I walked out and sat Indian style on the cold, damp rock. The condensation from the desert night rock sent shivers up my spine as I pulled my dark grey Cornerstone hoodie up and put my hands inside of my sleeves.

The air was cold, damp and I could faintly see my breath under the yellow glow of the moon and an orange parking lot light off in the distance. I sat quiet, while my teeth began to chatter, I began to shake as my body temperature began to decline.

I sat there a few minutes before the first glimpse of light began to peek over the horizon. The light began to paint the sides of the canyon with different hues of red and orange. Light filled the canyon like water flowing into a bucket. As the dark submitted to the majestic glow of the sun, the first chapter of Genesis came to mind.

I imagined being there at creation, when light was first created – the dark, vast emptiness of the universe gave way to light and the first colors began to surface. Shades of blues, reds, yellow began to splash across the canvas of the cosmos illumined by the dark contrast of the light-years of distance that separated the painter’s strokes of creativity.

As the sun hit my face, warmth wrapped me in its arms like a protective mother – millions of small indentations formed all over my arms and extremities. As smile washed over my face as I sat in awe of the majestic spectacle that was appearing before my eyes.

As I sat and focused my eyes on the bigness of the canyon, a sudden breeze from canyon jolted the bright yellow pad and silver pen. I picked up the pad and pen and stared at the blue parallel lines on the page. I took the cap off and placed it in my hooded sweatshirt pocket and touched the tip of the pen to the paper.

I wrote at the top in capital letters:

“MY GOALS FOR THIS YEAR.”

I looked out over the canyon, and said a prayer, asking God to guide my thoughts and my pen. I gave him this year, this list and asked him to give me the strength to accomplish everything he desires for me.

Five minutes later I had nothing. The pressure of this moment began to make me anxious. I thought about getting up and leaving but I felt a strong sense just to start writing.

“I’ve never been good at goal setting,” I wrote on the clean yellow page. “I guess I don’t have the discipline. I also think that if you don’t set goals, you don’t fail yourself either. I can think of more times than I failed then succeed in my life.”

I continued.

“Like the time when I was 11 and I asked my little league coach if I could be a pitcher. He gave me a look and said, ‘we’ll’ see. I started to practice with my dad in the back yard and I finally that day came when the coach called my name in the top of the fifth inning to pitch relief. I stepped on the mound feeling like a king, Nolan Ryan, Pedro Rodriguez – that was I. I grabbed the chalk bag, tossed it up and down then dropped it behind me. With a wad of bubble tape in my mouth, I took the stance, began my wind up and released the ball as hard as I could towards home plate. As I completed my follow through I looked up to see my first pitch of my career hit the batter right in the shoulder nearly missing his neck.”

The rest of the game wasn’t much better. I think I threw a total of five or six strikes and walked three batters.

I guess over the years I have learned that goals are away of setting yourself up for failure. When you write it down, when the ink soaks into the pulp, it becomes permanent, sure you can crinkle the page up and toss it in the garbage, but for that moment you are held accountable by the strokes of your own pen.

As I began to write out goal after goal, my insecurities came rushing in like a flood through a broken levy. Failure after failure surface in my mind as I try to convince myself that it’s in the past.

I guess in this moment looking down, staring at a list of task after task that seem so much bigger than the small letters on the yellow page. I feel like giving up, cashing in my chips and taking one final passionate leap into the vast abyss.

Where am I going? What am I doing? Why can’t my soul be satisfied in my present place? What is to say that when I step into these goals that I will find myself at the same place, wanting, wishing and hoping for more.

I was — in this blog; going to list out my goals for this year. Goals of pursuing my dreams and creating this romantic life of nomadic and creative wonder. A life of abandoning the American dream and trying to better the world in which I live. I guess though in this moment, I just want to make it through the next 7 months of my job and still have my soul intact.

The more I try to create a future for myself the more over whelming it all seems. Honestly tonight I have had thoughts of going back home to Dubuque, and getting my old job back and trying to pick up where I left off. I miss my family, friends and my church. I miss stability.

I am not sure of what I want until I get what I don’t want. And when I step into those moments where I achieve and accomplish, I doubt the goal in the first place.

So what is wrong with me? What am I lacking? Should I pray more? Read more?

There is a fire and burden deep within my bones to move forward but I have no idea where I am going. I have a thirst that is not quenched, a hunger that has not been satisfied.