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A mentor of mine once told me that no one benefits from a lie. The place where that happens the most is deep down inside our very own hearts. Many of us know many things in our gut but have been conditioned to dismiss those instincts. Yet it is the truth that sets us free.
How do I know this? Failure. I had lied to myself.
I was several years past twenty-nine, but few words triggered me on a neurobiological level more than “You’re not going to succeed.”
But I knew my calling was from God Himself, and I knew it wasn’t going to simply disappear into thin air. At the end of what I referred to then as a “labor-intensive sowing season,” in which I worked 20 hour days and developed an eating disorder, I had to admit I was falling apart.
My physical, mental, emotional, and relational health had been sacrificed on the altar of striving, and the carnage was widespread and undeniable. I was on a mission to save the world, but at the age of thirty-six, I was the one who needed saving. Let me tell you something.
All the success in the world doesn't mean much when you are laying your very body, mind, and soul on the altar of achievement to secure it.
The idol of man’s approval had granted me a critically acclaimed album, but the private fallout was disastrous. I was suffering from the worst case of burnout possible. My marriage, my body, my mind, and my soul were barely surviving.
I needed a full stop.
I needed to heal.
I needed to mine the meaning of how I had let myself get to this breaking point.
It’s the truth that sets us free—if we have the courage to face it.
- I learned that if we’re not careful, workaholism can become a god that can bind us to a mindset of striving. This mindset can deplete us spiritually, mentally, physically, emotionally, and relationally while enslaving us to a life rooted in the idolatry of achievement, self-sufficiency, and thenapproval of man.
- I learned that succumbing to perfectionism is not the same as offering excellence. Excellence is simply about receiving what God gives us and responding to Him with faithful stewardship. Excellence is about working with a proper fear of the Lord, an awe and amazement of Him. I learned that working from God’s pleasure within us is vastly different than working for God’s pleasure.
- I learned that God was already pleased with me through Jesus, His Son, and my attempts at earning anything more than what He had already given was a false gospel rooted in transactionalism. Failure was the great teacher because pain was the great motivator that led me to ask transformational questions and to have the courage to answer those questions with nothing less than the truth.
- I discovered that when you reach your own professed “Promised Land” the wrong way, the milk and honey don’t taste so sweet.
Transformation began with new practices.
Sabbath, a twenty-four-hour period of rest and delight, became an important norm. I began to see this practice as an act of trusting God with all the people, things, dreams, and projects I couldn’t control. Contemplative prayer followed.
Sleep. Rest. Margin. Wonder.
These all became new spiritual practices that yielded life, inspiration, renewal, joy, and a closer awareness of God’s activity and the Spirit’s leading and Movement.
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