How can we be satified with our lives if we don't know what we want? The end game of our twenties is to walk into thirty looking out on lives and identities we love, because they're honest and true to who we are and who we're committed to becoming. Our twenties are about learning to live our truth. What if we're still finding our identity and truth? If we watch how we live, it reveals what we believe, and where our lives are leading. Where, and with who, do you spend your time? Who do you choose to date? What do you read? How do you spend your money? How do you sign your e-mails and decorate your home? How much sleep do you get each night and what do you eat? The answers reflect our truth. Our lives reflect what we believe about ourselves, about God, and about life itself. If the way we live doesn't line up with what we say we believe, the dissonance wreaks emotional havoc. We're all guilty of allowing dissonance between what we believe and how we live. Donald Miller says it best in Blue Like Jazz: "We live what we believe. If I live what I believe, then I don't believe very many noble things. My life testifies that the first thing I believe is that I am the most important person in the world. My life testifies to this because I care more about my food and shelter and happiness than about anybody else. I am learning to believe better things. I am learning to believe that other people exist, that fashion is not truth; rather, Jesus is the most important figure in history, and the gospel is the most powerful force in the universe. I am learning not to be passionate about empty things, but to cultivate passion for justice, grace, truth, and communicate the idea that Jesus likes people and even loves them." If you're overwhelmed by the options for and the weight of your future, then you're in good company. One of my heroes, Anna Wintour, played epically by Glenn Close in The Devil Wears Prada, puts it this way: "People respond well to those that are sure of what they want." We love people who know what they want, because we desperately want exactly that. This is also known as leadership. We love good leaders. The sheer number of options for our future can lead to paralysis. This scene from The Five Year Engagement sums up this phenomenon. I watched this six times and laughed each time because it rings so true. (Disclaimer: It's slightly rated R in a spot where C doesn't stand for cookie.) The lesson here is not to waste time trying to make the absolute best decision for our life, because not making a decision is as much a decision as any. We have to choose a career, a spouse, and a city, and then choose to love the lives we create. What if we choose wrong? It turns out that natural happiness (getting what we want) vs. synthetic happiness (not getting what we want and learning to love it) are equally enduring and satisfying. Research shows that decisions and circumstances won't affect our happiness long term, and we'll ultimately believe what unfolded was the best outcome for our lives. "Freedom, the ability to make up your mind and change your mind is the friend of natural happiness, because it allows you to choose between all those delicious futures and find the one you would most enjoy. However, deliberation is the enemy of happiness because we overestimate the impact of one choice over the other. We have within us the ability to synthesize happiness, yet we think happiness is a thing to be found. Our longings and our worries are overblown because we have within us the ability to manufacture the very commodity we are constantly chasing: happiness." {Dan Gilbert, TED Talk: The Surprising Science of Happiness} Watch the TED talk, it's great, but here are the cliff notes: God graciously gave us both the freedom to choose, and the ability to manufacture happiness with the decisions we make and the circumstances that manifest themselves in our lives. Another words, our decisions have very little impact on our happiness. How is this possible? We are the product of our decisions, right? I thought Dan Gilbert was crazy until he nailed my exact predicament and showed it had no impact on long term happiness with this slide. For the last six months, I've been weighing LA against Denver, and the deliberation slammed me into a depression. When I stumbled upon this video, it made me laugh at my overly dramatic self, and confirmed my suspicion that deliberation is crazy-making. If it's true the decisions we make won't affect our long term happiness, and we're struggling to get out from under the weight of our futures, then this spells relief. Hear me right, smoking cigarettes has a very real long term impact on quality of life, as does our work and who we choose to marry. On the flip side, whether I live in Denver or California, continue climbing the corporate ladder or marry and have children, it won't impact my long term happiness. We can't control the outcomes of our decisions, but we can walk in truth by making the decisions that are true to who we are and what we want for our lives. The first step to living our truth is to be honest with ourselves and with others about what we want in life, trusting that the right people will come into our lives, and stay. I'll go first, here's what I want in life: 1. A home that is a sanctuary, in a place where I can put down roots and invest in my community. I'm deeply grateful God faithfully handed me both a home and a community to share it with, and three years later the grace of it still overwhelms me. 2. A career that lines up with my purpose, and uses the gifts God gave me, to know Him and make Him known. To be a writer you have to write. The words on this screen is me chasing after my calling. 3. A marriage that demonstrates God's love for us and gives others hope and belief in a love that wins. Feel free to toss up a prayer here, I'm trusting God's got this one but the years of singleness are tough, amen? There are many roads that can potentially lead us to the lives we dream of living, which is where the confusion and deliberation starts. The options are infinite, but if we don't know the how, the where, or the who yet, living our truth is always a step in the right direction. If there is distance between the life we want, and the life we're living, then it's time to start taking steps in the direction of our truth. Here's some simple steps for living truth: If you're lost, think of the story you most want your life to tell, and make the decisions that line up with that story. "Jesus said to his disciples, 'Do not worry about your life. Do not be afraid, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.'" {Luke 12:22, 32, NIV} Live your truth, and don't give up on your story. How are you living your truth? Please share in the comments. Love wins, Lisamarie Original article and pictures take http://www.paperandglam.com/blog/2013/06/twenty-seven-on-satisfaction-ambiguity-freedom.html site
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