Thursday, February 18, 2016

Do Hard Things

At the end of last year, a friend challenged me with words that have stuck with me ever since she jokingly said: "Not everything in life can just be easy for you, Kelsey."

I love easy. Easy is easy. It doesn't require anything of me. And for the majority of my life, I've been able to get by with only doing easy things. But for 2016, I made it a goal to do hard things.

Why? One, because Jesus did the hardest thing for me, and I want to live in honour of that.

Two, because when I'm 42 I want to have achieved and experienced a whole lot more than now at 22, and easy won't get me there.

Three, because I don't live in a vacuum, and my actions have an impact on the people around me. Perhaps by doing hard things I can challenge and encourage and strengthen and inspire.

And four, because I know that we all have so much more potential than we even dare to dream about. I want to grow into all I was made to be, not just what the world says is acceptable for me to be.

I've been inspired by some winner quotes in a book by Brett and Alex Harris called Do Hard Things:

  • We aren't called to be successful all the time. We're called to be faithful, to take those first difficult steps— and leave the results up to God. 
  • All effort—even failed effort—builds muscle.
  • If you measure success only by other people's standards of what is acceptable, you will never reach your true potential. 
  • Do what's hard for YOU. 
  • We fall short of our true potential because we aimed only to be bigger than the next fish in our small pond. 
  • Sometimes you have to take a stand for the sake of someone else. 
  • The attitude with which you take a stand says just as much as the stand itself. 

The hard things I do this year will be different to the hard things you have to do this year. But I encourage you, let's do whatever we do to the best of our abilities and with smiles on our faces. Let's put ourselves in situations where we can grow and learn and become stronger and more like Jesus. Let's do hard things!


2 comments:

  1. Reminds of a very smart (and physically gifted) colleague that I once asked "Is there anything you have ever tried, that you have not been able to do?" And his reply was swift and short "No."

    At first that was very depressing; but later I thought how sad that was that he had not found (or looked for) anything that had challenged him to his breaking point.

    If I can encourage you at all Kelsey, it would be with the obvious things; that you have oodles of talents and abilities and not spending those extravagantly would really be a waste. And if I can challenge you, it would be to push yourself to the point of taking of impossible things. If you succeed, what amazing things you will have achieved - and if you fail, you will learn so much about yourself, others and God.

    ReplyDelete