“Your faults are more forgivable, and your attributes are more exceptional. Believing that you’re less responsible for your misgivings and that you’re more exceptionally skilled at your strengths is the mindset to which many people default, but it ultimately just keeps you small. If you don’t acknowledge the magnitude of the poor choices you’ve made, you’re bound to justify doing them again; if you live and act as though you can slide by because you’re ever so slightly better than everyone else, you’ll never actually try.” Brianna Wiest
It’s Not Mistakes That Define Us
Neither can we exempt ourselves from overstepping, minimizing, or ignoring altogether. Inasmuch as they are inevitable, how we quickly respond to them can delay or significantly diminish the degree of their impact.
In a world where laurels are given to feats of accomplishments, those lonely hours of building worth, your sleepless nights, dealing with imposter syndrome — never get acknowledged first. No wonder it’s easy to rest on our laurels.
Once we display a moment of weakness, our flaws made bare before men; sometimes trapped feeling undeserving of the graces we receive; self-disappointment and crushed dreams; constant worry of “I should have done better” — let’s call it guilt and shame. We know that the world likes to come for such folks.
The world can discredit a lifetime’s work by talking about how unmotivated you are, or you were lucky in the past, or you didn’t want it bad enough — when you fail to perform when the limelight falls on you. Hasn’t that also turned into our own negative self-talk?
This really is a problem we all have — whether internally or outwardly — we always want to associate ourselves with good things. Positive attributes.
Who would wish to get into a relationship by showing how they have a difficult time loving themselves? They would think you aren’t in a capacity to give love that you yourself don’t have.
Who would want to show how they have a short fuse and are having it burdensome to communicate their anger non-violently and reasonably? They might freak out. You’d rather show how you can do all kinds of acts of service, get them the best gifts, or drown them with humor that everyone commends you for.
Why Is It Difficult To Stay True To Ourselves?
We have guilty pleasures that we need not anymore convincing how bad they are for us — those secret addictions that give you a dopamine surge and quickly fall below the norm into despair and emptiness.
It could be your difficulty in staying loyal to your ambitions and scheduled tasks. You know exactly where you want to go and what will get you there, but committing is dreadful. Not that you can’t sit in one place or have undivided attention, it’s just that you have a pile-up of things you wished to do the day or week, or even months before.
You are now dealing with anxiety paralysis.
How can I start my day well when I’m so far behind? I had so much free time weeks back, but I folded. Now, today with this limited time, can I still achieve what I wanted? My spiritual life is on a downward spiral. I don’t even feel like praying or reading my Bible. I’ll still fumble tomorrow!
The truth is you suck. Terribly. You really do, and it’s making you anxiously sick. You’ve been gambling with your time, going all-in even when the odds are one in a thousand. Stick long enough doing this, and things will end up not working out. All your lofty ambitions will be reduced to nothing, and the magnitude of your misgivings will be massive.
There. I said it. That’s the truth. It’s awful. But it’s the truth.
This is better than praising you for what you’re already good at. It gets boring. That’s why you have set more challenging goals for the future. And you’re blowing them away.
Even if you act like you really don’t care by numbing yourself with mindless distractions, or reducing the size of your ambitions, you can’t ignore that feeling that comes when you lay your head at the end of a lousy day feeling something is missing — and certainly waking up unmotivated, dragging yourself out of bed like it’s another blue Monday.
Purposeless and wiped out. Ungrateful. Mundanely routine. No energy. Messed up sleep.
You Are Responsible For Your Shortcomings
You are responsible for piling up tasks as if an extraterrestrial being were to appear and whisk them away. You are responsible for the lack of boundaries you didn’t put in place, which got you into relationships you are deeply regretting about. You can’t even simply come out of them because you feel like the world will swallow you whole.
You are responsible for your lack of productivity. Your failure to see that some tasks may be important but not urgent, despite the fact that you devote the majority of your time to them, rather than scheduling them for later. (Eisenhower Matrix)
Give this up in your 20s.
Make it OK to call out yourself for being lazy — not unmotivated. You want your motivation to come from a YouTube video?
Call yourself out for being selfish when you destroy relationships with your questionable attitude, behavior, or giving others grounds to use you. Prideful when you think you can cruise this wicked world alone with no friends and your Savior. Lustful for your sexual daydreams and fantasies.
Ignorant when rising up on the “mount of stupid” (cue Dunning-Kruger), confidently engaging in debates on complex topics you’ve never spent time thinking critically about, with the sole purpose of winning an argument.
When you wake up feeling purposeless, speak with guys in your circle of trust. When you’re unsure about life. When you hoped to be 5 years ahead, but realize you are not the person you expected to be. When you’re experiencing a losing streak. It sucks. I know.
It’s Time To Pick Yourself Up
If you’re already working on it, maybe you can do it better. You might miss out on so many things that could have been done yesterday, but that page has closed. You could have been a couple of steps ahead today because of that.
But what do you have now? Unfinished projects. Deadlines. Definitely. But you still have, today, once again. A couple of hours remaining, or even minutes. It doesn’t matter.
When Christ was chilling on the mountainside near the Sea of Galilee, dropping bangers on how to be a chill guy in this crazy world, He gave you and me some encouragement today.
We recreated this scenario with my boy Mazula, grounding on top of a tiny hill on campus immediately after lunch, with all its weirdness — two Black guys with no shoes laughing out loud over Matthew 6. Just follow through.
We picked up a fallen bird’s nest under these weird Chinese trees that have blankets wrapped around them to prevent branching down the trunk, and surrounded with tree stakes. Unexpectedly, that’s where today’s encouragement, in its simplicity, lies.
Notice how they build compact warm nests that endure the cold winter. They worry not of the failure to find the right materials the day before, or whether the tree on which they are building their nest will be cut down tomorrow. What they have in total control is what we have too.
Today. And today they put their best wing forward.
You Might Not Get The Greatest Outcomes You Expected
You may not experience that level of satisfaction. Of completeness. Not of achieving the goal, but pursuing what you find meaningful and exceedingly rewarding. The destination. The pain throughout the exercise.
You might not fix a relationship directly by scheduling time to talk. You might not score the highest mark on your next presentation or test. You may not pray your heart out or feel closer to God.
You got out of your lousy bed. And made it at least. Beautifully. That should mean something.
Another step, like the “birds of the air… neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns… the lilies of the field… neither toil nor spin… If God so clothes the grass of the field, which is today, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?” Matthew 6:26–30
Your Father in Heaven knows of your messes and frustrations. He really needs your willingness to cooperate with Him. And He will “restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten…” Joel 2:25
Are you ready to continue taking responsibility for your misgivings? Do acknowledge your strengths by all means. Let’s normalize keeping them alongside your shortcomings. Often.
You Guy My Guy
I hope this encourages you to make the most of the few hours of the day remaining. If it did, you might want to bookmark it and come back to it later when you need a reminder.
Or, if you have a friend who needs to hear this—or you’re past your 20s and would like to encourage your mentee, son, or daughter with it—go ahead and drop this link in their inbox. You never know how much a few honest words can do.
For any further thoughts, the comment section is yours. Come, let’s Rest Awhile.
