10 Year Text

"Speak what you think now in hard words, and tomorrow speak what tomorrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said today". 

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Day 28 Assignment: 10-year Text by Tia Singh

Imagine your future self, ie, you 10 years from now. If he/she were to send you a tweet or text message, 1) what would it say and 2) how would that transform your life or change something you’re doing, thinking, believing or saying today?

OK, I have to confess. This is not Day 28 of the #Trust30 Challenge. It is actually day 29. But, then, I have also taken a 3-week break in participating. You see, the 30-Day Challenge morphed into something else and is continuing. Well... I wasn't looking for a forever commitment, I was looking for a 30-day commitment to get myself into the habit of writing, every day. 

I thought the #Trust30 Challenge was perfect, because when you are writing off the top of your head, you don't always know what you want to write about. With the challenge, I was supplied with a topic every day. Some were easier to write on than others. Some I plain didn't like. Some seemed incredibly repetitive. Fear was a common theme. In fact, the real Day 28 was about fear... again. 

I'm tired of writing about fear. So, I skipped that assignment and chose to do the next. You may be wondering why I'm resuming this exercise after a 24-day break. Well, I made a commitment to do this. And, while it may be true that part of that commitment was writing every day (which I obviously haven 't done), the other part of the commitment was to write on 30 prompts.  I have 3 more to go. At this point I'm doing this just because I want to be complete this. 

The fun thing is, now that the challenge is continuing, I get to chose what topics I want to write on for the last three. So, for today's offering (I know, this has been a very long-winded intro!), what would my future self text or tweet to the me of the present?

"What's important? Focus on that. 
The rest really doesn't matter. 

Live with no regrets. Laugh, love and serve more. 

Live life abundantly."

I know, I'm back to the issue of focus... a common theme for me. But this time, with this "tweet" or "text" from the future, added to focus is the idea of perspective. 

In order to determine what's really important, we have to look at the "big picture". Most of us spend our time doing what's urgent, instead of what's important.  What does that mean? We spend our lives putting out fires when those fires could have been avoided in the first place if we had spent our time doing what was important.

There are a lot of areas in our lives where this can be easily illustrated. 

Take your children, for example. If you don't spend the time doing the important things when they are young - spending quality time with them, playing with them, talking with them, reading with them, teaching them about live - you will end up putting out fires when your child is a rebellious teenager with whom you have no relationship.

Diet and exercise: If you are too busy to eat right, get enough exercise and rest, your body WILL wear out, or you will get sick. Our bodies can only take so much abuse before they are affected by our poor choices. Suddenly you are putting out the fire of a health crisis.

Finances: If you throw your mail into a box or drawer and don't open your mail, it's likely that you will come home one day and have to put out a fire because your water or electricity has been turned off. If, instead, you open your mail and pay your bills on time, you avert this crisis.

Faith: My pastor, Tom Underhill, frequently says the time to get healing is when you are well. What does this mean? It means that before you have any symptoms of illness or disease, you read scriptures on Divine Health, you claim Divine Health for your body. If you wait until you are facing a health crisis, it's a lot more difficult to develop your faith and receive your healing. 

I don't know about you, but I find that I'm often too busy. I'm rushing around doing one thing or another. It seems I always have too much on my plate. I stay up far too late most nights, and then have trouble getting up early enough to accomplish all I would like to in the morning.

So, what really matters? 

"I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly."~John 10:10

To me, here's what really matters:  Time and relationship with God, time and relationship with family, time and relationship with friends... Don't put things off until tomorrow, because that leads to living a life of regret. Don't take on too much, because that doesn't give you time to live in between your work. We are happiest when we are serving others.

Pray everyday. 

Laugh everyday. 

Give thanks for your blessings everyday. 

#Trust30 Day Twenty Eight