A danger exists in completing the routine tasks you have to do…

• Routine assignments at work…
• Routines in relationships…
• Routines in physical activities…
• Routines in daily quiet times…
• Routines in weekly calendaring…

I call it the danger of the mundane…

The things we always do, things that we do everyday, as good as those things may be, can become so routine that they begin to be seen as more of a drag than a pleasure. If one is not careful, the routine becomes the only. our whole world becomes scheduled and predictable. I see couples struggle with this in their marriage and individuals in their careers. It’s common…even routine.

Some of the dangers of the mundane include:

• You stifle creativity
• You get bored
• You remain unchallenged
• You leave the best things undiscovered
• You take blessings and other people for granted

Here are some ways you can fight the danger of the mundane:

• Discipline time to dream
• Find new ways to do old things
• Rotate the schedule of when you do routine things
• Delegate routine tasks if possible
• Trade routine tasks with others…cross train for another position…
• Be willing to try something new…
• Always try to have some change in your life…

Have you ever faced the danger of the mundane? How did you fight this danger?

For further reading, you can see one way my wife and I addressed this danger in our marriage HERE.

We moved downtown…

After we became empty-nesters, Cheryl and I sold the house where we raised our boys and purchased a condominium in the downtown area of our city. We have a river view. It’s an open floor plan. Everything we do is on one level, plus we have an upstairs living space for the boys when they come home. We walk downtown almost every night. When we can, we eat downtown too. On Saturdays, we visit with the downtown street festivals. We love it!

It was hard leaving our home with so many memories of raising our family and move from the safe and quiet neighborhood, but we sensed it was time for a change in our life. Here is something we have learned from experience: Sometimes people need intentional change in order to keep life interesting and protect or grow a marriage. I shared before about “Couple Dreaming“. Cheryl and I had always dreamed of living downtown, so rather than keeping it a dream, we took steps to accomplish that dream.

Working with many couples and individuals in counseling I have learned that becoming bored in a relationship can be dangerous. We don’t intend to let that happen! As we entered into a new chapter of our lives as empty-nesters, we decided to make some intentional changes in our life. We have a few more dreams in our future…we’ll see what happens next with them. It’s keeping our marriage and lives exciting!

It doesn’t have to be a move, but sometimes a change of pace will ignite new excitement in marriage. The same can be true of a career or a personal life. Change can bring about renewed energy and motivation. Cheryl and I were not bored in our marriage. We would have been fine had we stayed in the house, but change made us even closer in our marriage, because it forced us out of our routines and into new avenues in our relationship. It’s an exciting time.

What intentional change have you made or do you need to make in your life?

Motivate us: Share an experience of when you made an intentional change in your life!

I love to surround myself with leaders. Often, when we think of leaders, we consider those with great experience in the field in which he or she is leading. They are the experts, they have experience, they’ve been tested, and they are ready to lead followers. Of course, those are not bad characteristics for a leader, but there is one trait that I look for in a young leader even before knowledge or experience.

Thats because I believe:

A teachable heart trumps expertise

I’d much rather have a developing leader than one who thinks they have all the answers but has stopped learning.

How about you?

What is one trait you think is essential in a new leader?

I’ve seen so many potentially great leaders waste opportunities because they wait for the perfect scenario before to develop as a leader…

Here’s a word to those who need to hear it…

You may not enjoy where you are currently in life or work…

You may not yet be in your dream job…

You may not respect the leader you are supposed to follow…

You may not plan to stay in your current work location…

You may not enjoy the people with whom you work…

You may be waiting for the right opportunity before you give your best effort…before you learn all you can…

What a mistake!

There’s no guarantee your next location will be any healthier…

Or that you will like it any more…

It may end up being a worse opportunity…

Remember, the grass is always greener on the other side…

Take advantage of where you are now…

Learn all you can now…

Grow where you are now…

Give your best now…

Develop where you are now…

It will build your character…

It will make you better prepared when you reach the job you love…

And, it’s the right thing to do…

Just curious, do you see yourself in your current position five years from now?

Are you allowing this place to develop you for the next opportunity?

I consistently encounter people who are desperate for friendships. They feel completely alone. I understand. I’ve been there in several seasons of my life and, as an Introvert, I’ve often felt left on the sidelines while others enjoyed the party.

Here is my best suggestion if you feel all alone:

• If you want more friends, be a friend…
• If you want more connections, connect with someone…
• If you want to hang out with people, invite someone to hang out with you…
• If you want to feel loved, love someone…

I’m not trying to be cruel or make this seem overly simplistic. I know what it’s like to feel all alone. I really do. At some point, however, you have to take some ownership of your situation.

It seems to me that many people who complain that no one cares aren’t investing in other people. It’s not that they don’t care to invest, or that they are bad people, they just haven’t initiated the first step. If you wait for other people to move towards you they may never move. Be willing to initiate, even if it is out of your comfort zone.

Do you need this reminder?

When is the last time you tried to make a new friend?

Here is a huge leadership lid I have witnessed firsthand. In fact, it’s one that has crippled my leadership in years past. (I wrote a post about one of those times HERE).

Here’s the lid:

Your ability to respond under stress, to criticism and to failure will determine the height of leadership you can sustain or achieve.

You can make excuses all you want, but the one who claims to be the leader:

• Must keep standing when everyone else is “sitting the next one out”.
• Must keep dreaming when everyone else is satisfied with status quo.
• Must remain steadfast to a vision when critics want to derail the course.
• Must display strength during times of chaos.
• Must choose to move forward when everyone else is retreating.
• Must follow through when everyone else is stalling.

Where’s your leadership lid? Do you need to raise it a bit higher?

Get better so you can get bigger.

You may want to read THIS POST or THIS POST now.

God said something to me today!

I’ll be honest, as someone who is supposed to teach others how to have a relationship with God, and to actually hear from God, I’m always somewhat startled when He chooses to speak to me. Anyway, today He said something to me.

Let me set up the scenario for you, so you’ll understand the context.

This week I’m at the beach. My oldest son, Jeremy, is getting married and our youngest son Nate is his best man. I get to perform the ceremony. How cool is that? Anyway, this morning I went for my normal morning run. When I’m out of town I normally run further, because the scenery changes, so I ran 4 1/2 miles before I realized how long I’d been running. I decided to stop, buy a drink, and sit and look at the beach for a few minutes, before running back.

As I was sitting there, I became enchanted with the size and power of the waves. I watched a little boy running away from them, and nearly get knocked down by one. I saw a couple walking the beach get splashed unexpectedly. Mostly, however, I just saw the beach being pounded by wave after wave after wave. I have been to the beach many times and I never get tired of watching the ocean display God’s glory. In that moment, I did as I’ve done so many times before…I bragged to God about His handiwork.

I prayed, “God, this is so majestic; so powerful, and You made it all. Every wave I’m seeing today was shaped by You! You are so incredible and worthy to be praised! What a mighty God I serve!”

Have you ever had such emotions flood you when you see God’s creation? Which part of His creation brings those kind of thoughts to your mind?

Anyway, as I was praying, I sensed God say something else. It was almost as if He said, “Hold on Ron, (I always love that He knows my name) you’re talking so fast and thinking so big, you may have missed something.” I paused to listen to the God I was talking to and it seems I heard Him say:

“In the process of thinking BIG, don’t forget to think small.”

I looked down and saw the sand all around me. I was instantly reminded that God made every grain of sand. I’ve been told that no two grains are the same. My God knows each one of them and the Bible seems to indicate God may know how many grains there are…I think He does. Instantly, this passage came to my mind:

How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you. Psalm 139:17-18

I don’t know exactly all God was teaching me in that moment. I know I’m a big thinker. I always have a new dream. I don’t think He was telling me not to think big. I’ll obviously never out-think Him and He tends to stretch us towards big dreams in HIs word (…no eye has seen…no mind has conceived…what God has prepared…).

For now, I think He was simply, kindly and gently reminding me that “In the process of thinking BIG, don’t forget to think small.” I’ll continue to process that thought and how it may apply to my life in the weeks to come.

Do you have insight or thoughts for me as to what that could mean? What could that mean if you applied what God said in your own life?

BTW, If you are struggling to hear from God you may consider reading this previous post:

Hearing a Word from God

Has God been saying anything to you lately? I’d love for you to share it here.

This is a random Sunday afternoon post…

I want to encourage us to have a great week this next week…

I believe and strive for continual improvement…

In my experience, this happens best when we make intentional changes…

That’s the point of this post…

This next week, I want to encourage…challenge…even dare you to make an intentional change to improve something in your life…

I’ll go first…

This week, I plan to pray more specifically…

I frequently use a prayer list, but I seldom follow it…

This week I want that to change…

Now your turn…

It can be anything…about any subject…just so it’s an intentional change to improve your life…

What intentional change are you going to make this week to make things better in your life?

GO!

I met with a young man recently who is passionate about growing in his relationship with God, being a better husband and father, becoming more active in the church and community and excelling in his work.

He’s sensing an internal, self-induced tension to do more and be better in each area of his life.

His question to me was basically, how can he balance all the things he wants to do or feels he needs to be doing?

I certainly understood the question. It’s a pressure I’ve experienced many times in my life, especially during certain seasons. In fact, I’m sensing it again as I entered the empty-nester phase of life. I do believe in order to be successful with all the demands a person has, one has to get better personally, physically, spiritually, emotionally and relationally, before we can achieve more but, I think there may be a better answer than that.

I gave him one word of advice that has helped me during those seasons. Perhaps you need to hear this as well.

I challenged him to consider if he was asking the right question.

Instead of asking…

What should I be doing?

Maybe he should be asking…

Who do I want to be?

I have found that when I consider the person I want to be that the actions I need to take to get there become clearer. In fact, many of the actions I may have thought I needed to take, become less important, because they don’t seem to help me become who I say I want to be.

Which question are you or do you most need to be asking?

Do you seem to struggle to get where you hope to get in life? Do you watch as others accomplish their dreams, but yours never seem to materialize? Why do some people move forward after difficulties, but others stall?

In my experience, there are a few common reasons people are held back from accomplishing their dreams, even their God-given dreams and why people stall in life.

Here are 3 stumbling blocks to moving forward:

Refusing to let go of the past – When people allow failures or mistakes to define their life, they often refuse to try again. Many people continue the blame game, never getting past the injury caused by others. Instead of moving forward in spite of a painful past, many allow their past to remain their destiny.

Holding on to fear – Fear is a natural emotion and can actually keep us from making mistakes at times. The negative use of fear grips a person’s reality and clouds his or her ability to see beyond that which a person fears. When fear is allowed to be dominant over a willingness to take a risk, however, the person stalls.

Failing to take action – Let’s face it. Some people are lazy and refuse to assume their individual responsibility that is required to move forward. Many people aren’t lazy, but they stall because, for whatever reason, they fail to take a step towards their dream, either assuming a perfect timing will come or the stars will align in a certain order granting instant success. Unless action is taken, however, dreams almost always remain simply a dream, and never become reality.

Be honest with yourself. Which of these is keeping you from moving forward?

Have you seen other reasons? What would you add to my list?