Donald Miller's Blog, page 22

Could Your Next Step Be Easier Than You Think?

A couple of summers ago my husband and I were canoeing for the afternoon during a time when I was just getting ready to finish graduate school and looking ahead to whatever would be next.

My husband, kindly prodding me (albeit in a small boat on a quiet river from which there was nowhere to go to not have this conversation), asked what I thought I might want to do after school was finished.

Photo Credit: Chris Goldberg, Creative Commons

In what I thought counted as a great answer, I promptly started listing all the legitimate reasons it was “so hard” to figure out what to do from here.

“Well in order to do this, I’d have to do this first, but before I can do that I really need to finish up this, and this only makes sense once that is in line,” and so on and so on.

Ta-da! Question answered:

I’m just one of those super special people for whom it is just actually impossible to piece together what’s next.

Each time I was asked, “but, what do you want to do?” or “what do you think could be next?” I just described the various insurmountable steps that existed between me and any real motion.

Thanks to that conversation in the canoe, I identified a thought-habit I’m prone to lean on when I’m unsure or when I’m stuck. It’s easy for me to invent extra hoops for myself to jump through, or exaggerate the ones that are already there, so that I can put off the real responsibility of moving forward.

In short, I make things more difficult than they sometimes need to be.

In a subtle and subconscious way, I confuse the catalog of these small hurdles with an actual decision or a reason something can or cannot be done.

If I’m focused on all the tasks and to-dos that separate me from even being in a position to accomplish A, B, and/or C, then how could I possibly be bothered with the details of what it would actually mean to set out to accomplish it?

This isn’t to say that once we set our minds to something, a lovely lady with a pretty wand shows up and paves us a yellow brick road to our next destination. It is to say that, for me, it’s easy to use the tough thinking about what’s next as an excuse for why I can’t actually act.

What is Keeping You From Loving Yourself?

Love yourself. Love yourself. Love yourself.

I used to not put much value on the above words. I suppose the idea seemed kind of selfish. I just thought loving others well was all that mattered. But if we do not value and love ourselves, that lack shows up, everywhere.

What’s Getting In the Way of Building Something Awesome

I was pretty proud of myself when I made a picture frame once. The reason I was so proud is that I had to overcome so many obstacles to build it.

First, it took me a while to find just the right wood.

Then I went to the store and bought an expensive circular saw to make a couple mitered cuts. Then I had to buy some expensive wood glue and then even more expensive clamps to hold the pieces I cut together. After a couple days and a whole bunch of money, I stood with a pile of tools behind me holding the crooked frame I’d built.

Let me tell you about a couple guys who moved from San Diego and from the Pacific Northwest to Gulu, Uganda last year.

They built an entire school campus—out of dirt!

They figured out, with my law partner and some friends in Gig Harbor, how to compress the clay in the dirt, with a little cement, into blocks and are making state of the art buildings out in the bush—with nothing!

You won’t believe what these guys are doing to build a school for the 250 kids and 30 teachers at the Restore Academy in Northern Uganda.

It reminds me of the creation story in Genesis, but it’s even cooler in a way, because I know these guys.

They’re just like me and you, actually.

And they had a lot of questions, probably like the disciples did.

They asked me what construction materials we had to work with and I told them—“dirt!” They asked if there was water and I told them there wasn’t, so they dug a well with friends at Water4.

They asked how much money they had to spend and I told them—“not much”. They asked how many trained construction people they would have to help them out and I told them—“none”. Then they asked who would train the workers if they could find some and I said—“you”.

So they asked when they had to finish the school construction by and I told them—“Next February”

They looked at each other, looked back at me, crossed their arms at the same time and said with one voice:

“We’re in.”

Someday you’ve got to see what these secretly incredible guys from the Restore Academy in Uganda have done.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned as I’ve tried to follow Jesus, it’s that the people who do stuff, often don’t know what an obstacle is anymore.

What Happens When We Assume The Best About Others?

A little over a year ago, my wife and I locked our keys in the car during church, with the car running. We didn’t realize it until about two hours later as we were about to head to lunch.

Photo Credit: Via Tsuji, Creative Commons

So we did the only thing we knew to do.

We called a locksmith, who arrived about 30 minutes later.

But when he pulled in, we got nervous. As if the idea of breaking into our car wasn’t enough of a concern, when I caught a glimpse of him, my concern grew. He pulled into the parking lot and I swore he was still in high school.

He was giving his best attempt at a beard, in an over-sized t-shirt and shorts on a relatively brisk day. Trash fell out of his car as he opened his door to greet me.

He started, “I just need you to sign this form which says I’m not liable if any damage is done to the car. After that, I’ll give it a go.”

I stood there, even more visibly nervous than I was before.

“Would you mind walking me through your process quickly?” I asked.

“We have an air bag system to pry open the door and access the lock. But if that doesn’t work, I’ll just throw a brick through the windshield,” he grinned.

I signed the form — because what else was I going to do? — and he went to work.

After about 30 seconds, we were able to get into our undamaged car and turn off the ignition.

Our locksmith finished his paperwork as I stood there, with my wife, thinking about how the last few minutes had unfolded.

The thing I kept thinking was this: Assume positive intent.

I worked for Apple Retail for a few years and we played by a set of “rules” which defined the way we did business. One of those rules was this: assume positive intent.

That meant that, no matter what a customer asked us to do, we were to assume that customer had positive intent.

We weren’t supposed to assume they were trying to cheat the system or get something for free.

We were supposed to assume the best about them.

In certain situations, assuming positive intent might be perceived as ignorance or unwarranted trust, but I’m not sure it needs a title.

Assuming the best in people is just a great approach to life.

I want my life to be filled with positive intent. Fortunately, grace allows me to try again tomorrow.

Two Things To Try If You’re Feeling A Little Depressed

Mental illness is a lot more common than you think.

1 in 5 American adults experiences a mental illness at some time in their life. Currently 1 in 10 Americans is on antidepressant medication. 42,000,000 adults live with an anxiety disorder. 20% of kids aged 13-18 live with a mental health condition.

Photo Credit: Christopher Michel, Creative Commons

The question is not will I encounter depression; the question is how I respond?

How do I best take care of myself and others who will face this?

In my many years aiming people toward freedom, I have noticed that depression often paralyzes us. It grounds us deep into the feeling and makes us feel like when can never pick up our feet to move on from it.

But I’ve also discovered two effective tactics that enable us to pull ourselves out of the quick sand of desperation and start doing something about depression.

Here they are:

1. Get Moving.

This is going to sound really basic but it works.

One study took people who suffered from major depression and had them exercise every day for about 20-30 minutes. The intensity didn’t matter, they just had to get moving, preferably outside.

After 16 weeks, 65% of the people no longer suffered from major depression. Even people who were not on any medication!

This is a strategy you can do with a friend or invite someone to join in with you.

Yoga, weight training, even just walking outside on a sunny day can lead to major improvements if done consistently. You can do that right? You don’t have to give advice, you just have to literally walk with your friend.

So get your sneakers on and take a stroll around the block. 

2. Treat the Cause, Not The Symptom

Depression is the result of something, or the culmination of things, in a life. It’s not a feeling we just wake up with someday. So if we want to be whole and healed, we have to find out what’s causing the holes and brokenness.

Glennon Doyle Melton puts it this way: “The hole got bigger and bigger till God finally fit in. When you’re all hole. God fits.” We have to move our hope back to the only One who is big enough to fill the gap. The one who can replace the holes with the holy. 

In some way, we all know what it’s like to be all hole. We know what its like to taste despair and depression and feel like nothing is left to live for. Be a rescuer by letting those moments lead you as you help others.

As you’re walking this shaky path yourself, remember the times that you have overcome the hardships. Let those hopeless days make your heart tender to the pain of others. And don’t forget that depression is a physical, emotional and spiritual thing.

There are no easy fixes. But you can start moving yourself and others closer to freedom.

So go for walks with your friends who are feeling down. Hold a hand if needed. Remind each other who we are. Listen and love well. And watch the healing of hurting hearts begin. 

I Was A Manipulator (Here’s How I Stopped)

For most of my life, I had a hard time telling the truth. 

It’s ironic because my name (Allison) means “little truthful one” but truth just never came that easily to me. Instead, my imagination would run wild with fascinating details and exaggerated facts that always seemed more interesting to me than the real ones. By the time I was in high school my parents would jokingly say they should have thought of a name that meant “little bender-of-the-truth”. 

I tried to make a joke of it, to keep it lighthearted and fun. I insisted this is what made me a great storyteller.

Photo Credit: Giuseppe Milo, Creative Commons

But the bad habit was having a huge strain on my relationships.

So, I tried to stop.

For a long time, I thought I had stopped. I would catch myself every once and a while saying something that wasn’t true, and I would go back and correct my statement. A friend once compliment the highlights in my hair, and for some reason I was too embarrassed to admit I had been to a salon earlier that day.

So I said, “Oh, it must have just been the sun.” 

I could see pretty clearly on his face he didn’t buy my excuse, but I let it go for about three hours, until I texted him to admit what I’d done. 

I couldn’t figure it out. Why was I lying like this?

The final breaking point came when I was dating my husband long distance.

One day, during one of our morning phone conversations, he asked what I was planning to do that day, and for some reason, I completely lied. I told him I was spending the afternoon with one of my girl friends, but really I was meeting up with an ex-boyfriend who was still a friend of mine.

I really didn’t have anything to hide when it came to this guy, but I guess I was worried my then-boyfriend read more into than was necessary, so I just hid the truth.  

And, for a few weeks, I got away with it.

But eventually my husband found out, and of course, he was upset. He couldn’t understand why I had lied to him. If I didn’t have anything to hide, the dishonesty sure made it seem like I did. On top of that, if l lied on this occasion, how was he supposed to know I had been truthful about everything else? How did he know I wouldn’t lie to him again? 

This was no small deal. 

We had been talking about getting married, but he made it clear that lying was a deal-breaker for him. 

We spent hours hashing through the issue. I tried to explain why I had done what I had, although I didn’t really understand it myself. He asked a hundred questions, trying to get to the bottom of things and make sure I wasn’t lying about other stuff. The whole thing was awful. Truly, one of the worst days of my life.  

Then, we struck gold.

Suddenly, as we were going over (and over and over) the turn of events, I realized: I didn’t have a lying problem. I had a manipulation problem. 

I wasn’t lying to cover up something I didn’t want him to know. I was lying to manipulate him to respond to me in a certain way (I didn’t want him to be jealous or angry). So the thing I needed to do to quit lying wasn’t to stop giving false details necessarily, but to come to grips with the fact that it wasn’t possible, or even necessary, for me to control how someone else felt, thought, acted or responded. 

It simply wasn’t my job. 

That realization was life-changing for me.

It didn’t just help me overcome my bad habit of lying, it relieved my anxiety, lightened my emotional load and gave me the freedom to honestly express myself to others.

It simply wasn’t my responsibility to control other people or their reactions to me.

Manipulating their fear, anger, jealousy or compassion wasn’t just an affront to them, it was incredibly unnerving for me. 

In fact, in comparison to the task of “quit lying,” “quit manipulating” actually seemed easy. 

It was a huge weight off my shoulders.  

These days, honesty comes much more naturally to me. But when I feel the urge to bend the truth a little bit, I try to remind myself I’m not responsible to control the response of others. As Dr. Henry Cloud says, I can care for the hurt, anger and fear of others without taking care of it. 

How Controlling People Use Fear To Manipulate

My favorite M. Night Shyamalan movie isn’t The Sixth Sense, it’s his lesser-known movie, The Village. I like it because it reminds me the stuff most people are afraid of in life isn’t worth fearing.

Photo Credit: Berend Broerse, Creative Commons

The story starts in a rural village in a time that seems a little confusing. There are no cars, no power tools, no electricity, and everybody’s clothes are handmade. There seem to be no roads into the village and no outside communication.

As an audience, we assume the story takes place in the late 1800’s.

Regardless, we learn pretty quickly that there are creatures in the woods haunting the village. The elders in the village tell stories about the atrocities that have taken place when people have left, and indeed, some of the monsters circle around the village and scare the villagers at night.

At the end of the film we learn, though, the story isn’t taking place in the past, it’s happening in the here and now. Somebody escapes the village to find a chain-link fence and a guard tower. The monsters in the woods turned out to be elders in costume who were scaring their own in order to keep them safe from the outside world.

I think about that story often when I look back on my life.

I grew up in a church that taught us to be afraid of people who didn’t think the same as we did. Everybody “out there” was a monster, it seemed, from racial minorities to Catholics to liberal Democrats.

As I grew up, I left all that and discovered there wasn’t anything to fear at all. As a Republican, I served on a task force in the Obama administration and as a twenty-something spent a few years on the most “Godless college campus in America.”

I understand why my old tribe wanted me to fear the outside world. In part, they were trying to protect me. That’s sweet, I guess, but it’s still manipulative and deceptive. And I believe part of the reason they wanted us to fear was because they didn’t want us to go away.

When you’re building a tribe, you have to send the elders out to scare the village every once in a while; otherwise, you’ll lose their support and “trust.”

Sadly, that’s the exact tactic that lost my trust.

Nobody likes to be manipulated or controlled except for unhealthy people who exchange their submission for supposed protection.

But what happens when those people get healthy?

It’s not that there aren’t monsters in the world, there are. It’s just that there are just as many monsters inside the church as outside. It turns out there are deceivers and manipulators in every tribe, regardless of what that tribe believes or represents.

These days, I no longer think one group of people as healthy and another unhealthy.

In fact, my community is no longer built around common beliefs; it’s built around common character.

I want to be surrounded by the good guys, whether they are Christian, atheists, Democrats or Republicans. I don’t care. What I care about is whether or not they are true and good and humble and able to have safe, healthy relationships.

This, of course, is confusing for people who live in “the village” to understand.

They are so convinced that “other people” are unsafe they are no longer capable of reaching outside their own beliefs to establish relationships. I find this sad because they are missing out on a world of experiences and friendships and memories they could have if they only knew the truth, that there are as many monsters inside their village as outside.

I wonder what it would look like to accept people and trust them based on their character rather than the things we’ve been taught to fear?

I’m heading more and more this direction, and I like it.

How to Become A Person of Character

A friend of mine recently spent a few days in the hospital.

He’s fine now, but a few weeks ago he just started feeling dizzy out of nowhere, and kind of weird like he couldn’t see straight. He tried to shrug it off like it was no big deal, and kept working, but within a few hours he was getting worse.

Finally, by that night, he asked his wife to drive him to the hospital.

He told me later he actually thought he might be having a stroke.

The doctor admitted him immediately, and ran several tests. Within a few hours, he was diagnosed with what he described to me as a stress-induced migraine, without the headache. They kept him overnight to keep an eye on him, and released him with instructions to take better care of himself—take time to exercise and maybe take more frequent breaks from work.

He agreed, and was back at the office the next day.

Photo Credit: Kailash Gyawali, Creative Commons

I was telling the story to a mutual friend of ours, and when I got to the part where I said he was back at the office the next day, she said something I’ll never forget.

She said, “If he were a character in a book, you would know so much about him based on that single piece of information.”

I agree with her, and it has me thinking.

The tiniest piece of information can say so much about us, don’t you think?

The smallest decisions I make during my day say a lot about me. Where I choose to spend my money, how I choose to spend my time, if I bend over and pick up a piece of garbage or walk right past it, the conversation I hold with the grocery store clerk — each of these things gives me valuable information about myself if I’m willing to pay attention to it.

But sometimes I ignore these things because I don’t like what they’re telling me; I don’t like what they say about my character.

I love the fact that the word for “character” in a book, and the word we use in English to mean “the essence of who we are,” is the same. It makes so much sense. They are connected, if you ask me. A character in a book develops over the course of a story, and we develop as characters over the course of our lives too.

Our “character” isn’t some mystical or intrinsic part of us we can’t change. 

It’s simply the compilation of small actions and experiences over time.

And of course we can’t control all of our experiences, but the closer attention we pay to our “character,” the more power we have to carve it into something we can be proud of in the end.

I think most of us understand this intrinsically, and this is why we are so concerned over what pieces of information we share with others; we’re worried about what it says about our character.

Nowhere is this reality more prevalent than on social media. Thanks to Facebook,Twitter, Pinterest and Instagram, we all understand how what we eat, where we live, and what we do on the weekends says something about us.

There is an incredible pressure to perform.

The problem I keep encountering is this: the pressure to perform is the one thing that keeps me from gaining great character. It is the thing that blinds me from the actions and experiences that don’t represent the character I am trying to become.

It is the one thing that keeps me living under the shadow of fear and comparison.

Fear of not “having what it takes” all because I’m comparing myself to people who are a different character, in a different story, than I am.

As I consider the takeaway from all of this, I think it’s fairly simple.

I can know a lot about myself based on my actions. Not just the actions I put on Facebook, but the ones I do in private, while no one is watching.

And if I’m honest with myself, I will see what my where my character is not exactly what I want it to be: tiny actions, over time, that eventually add up to something. I will also see, I think, the power I have to change.

The Best Way to Respond in Times of Doubt

It is a normal day, you answer the phone, and in an instant everything changes.

“There’s been an accident,”

“it’s malignant,”

“I’ve been laid off,”

“I’m sorry, the ultrasound revealed a problem,”

“she attempted suicide,”

“there was a fire,”

“your child was molested,”

“your son has been arrested.”

First comes the surreal moment when you think this is not really happening and then the landslide of reality crashes in. “Oh God, no!”

As your hands begin trembling you know it is real.

You pray. You pray hard. You pray on your knees. You cry while you pray, you plead, you bargain, and then… then your heart gets revealed.

Photo Credit: Joe St.Pierre, Creative Commons

If nothing changes or improves, we get angry, we get furious, we get depressed, we get to our grief and then we either find a way to not feel anymore, which keeps us stuck; or we grieve deeply and take our real heart questions to God: both our belief and unbelief.

That is what most of us are terrified to do and that is precisely what God wants more than anything; our hearts.

There is this disturbing and wonderful story that has helped me in such times.

In the Bible, in John chapter 11, there is a story where two sisters, Mary and Martha, had a brother named Lazarus who became very ill. They were personal friends of Jesus, who had been healing people from all kinds of illnesses.

Jesus was in another city more than a day or two away and the sisters sent a message to him saying Lazarus, “whom you love” is ill.

Their message reminds me of my prayers sometimes in a crisis.

“God, I know you love this person, please heal them.”

I remind God of how loving He is and how much this person needs healing. Then I live with the hope that something will improve and the dread that nothing will. What gets revealed about my heart at times like this is that I become angry with God when He does not do what I want with the people I love the most.

The bottom line is: I trust my love for them more than I trust God’s.

A very important statement in this story, that some Bible translations miss, is in verse 5-6. It says,

“Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when He heard that Lazarus was ill, He stayed two days longer in the place where He was.”

Jesus actually stayed away long enough for Lazarus to die instead of coming to rescue him.

Why would that be loving? How could that be loving? “God, how could you let my son or daughter or spouse or friend go through this?”

In her anger, Martha asked Jesus something very similar and because she revealed her true heart, in that moment, just as Jesus revealed Himself fully to her for the first time.

When I am vulnerable with God, I am being intimate with God.

And when that happens, I discover it is my heart being raised from the dead.

Jesus did something much more than save Lazarus’ life. He raised Lazarus from the dead, opening many people’s hearts to believe that He was the Son of God and brought life to many people.

Often I have found that when one of my children suffers it is not just about the journey they are on, but mine as well. When God does not rescue you or people you love from pain, go to Him with your anger or hurt or fear or whatever the truth of your open heart is.

You may find that God wants to do more than simply rescue this person.

God may actually do something we never thought possible, both for them and for our own doubting heart.

Three Things To Remember When You’re Walking Toward Healing

I was in college when I saw my first therapist. I vividly remember the fear and humiliation of filling out the intake forms in the front office.

Did I hear voices?
Had I tried to hurt myself or others in the past six months?
Was I avoiding social situations? Did I experience a racing heart, shortness of breath, dizziness, or tight chest?

Tears streamed down my face. Maybe I wasn’t having heart attacks after all.

I nervously answered the questions hoping no one else in the office was looking over my shoulder; hoping no one else would know how broken I was. I began to wonder how I had ended up there. I knew mental illness ran rampant in my extended family and I would have given anything not to be handed that diagnosis.

But I was ready to be made well. And healing happens when we are finally ready to be made well.

Photo Credit: Christopher Michel, Creative Commons

The journey I started that day in counseling has been the most liberating, exhausting and healing path I could have chosen for myself. It gave me a chance to answer the biblical call to “choose life, that you might live.”

These are a few things I’ve learned along the way.

1. You Must Name It

As a young, naive college student who loved Jesus, I assumed that any form of mental illness or emotional imbalance could and should be healed through Christ alone. I’m not sure when the thought formed, but I grew to believe it as truth:

If I prayed hard enough, believed in faith for my healing, spent enough time in God’s presence, and served others well enough—I wouldn’t have panic attacks and I would experience full healing.

But two years after I graduated college, I was still wrestling with panic attacks, extreme ADD and mild obsessive compulsive disorder that no amount of therapy, changes in diet, working out, prayer or time spent with Jesus had taken away. In fact, I realized I had been dealing with these things since I was a little girl.

For so long everyone had written it off by saying I was “an artist” “emotional” or a “sensitive soul.” No one, including me, wanted to call it what it was: mental illness. When I finally allowed myself to name it, I was set free to address it.

Naming our broken bits is the first step to finding healing for them.

2. Sometimes Pills Heal

It wasn’t until six years into my therapy journey, after graduating college and getting married, that a therapist in her mid 70’s was brave enough to look me in the eyes and tell me the truth.

“You are sick,” she said, “Just like a diabetic. Just like a cancer patient. You need insulin. You need chemo. You need medicine or you will never fully live.” This lady who loved the Lord and walked with him deeply and intimately knew what I didn’t: sometimes pills heal.

Honestly, I knew people who took pills and I thought they were crazy.

Pridefully, I didn’t want to be like them. Once I came to grips with the fact that I had a mental illness and named it, I wanted to overcome it through my own strength, diligence and spirituality. I was afraid of medicine, afraid of side effects, of my personality changing, of becoming addicted, or someone finding out that my faith hadn’t healed me.

“Your faith,” the counselor said, “Is what will give you the courage to meet the doctors and take the medicines that can make you well.”

I stubbornly sat on her words and wrestled with them for over a year. Then, one day, I woke up and heard the still, small whisper of God’s voice saying, “It’s time.” I summoned the courage to walk into the psychiatrist’s office and take my first pill. It was the most brave decision in my healing journey and I have never been the same.

Thank God for the lady who believed that sometimes God uses pills to heal.

She taught me that going to the places you swore you would never go and taking the steps you dreaded the most are the very things that bring you in alignment with healing.

3. True Healing Requires Work.

Recently my six-year-old daughter fell and got a nasty scrape on her knee. Within a week she had a thick scab that “felt achey” and she wanted to peel it off because it was bothering her so badly.

I stopped her and told her she needed the scab because the wound was healing. She promptly responded, “Well healing hurts and I hate it!!!”

You and me both, kid.

When I was 25-years-old, I assumed my bravery for taking that first pill would be rewarded with instant healing. But here I am, ten years later, still taking medicine. Gladly.

Perhaps the most surprising part of this journey has been the realization that healing hurts and it rarely comes easily. It requires unearthing the past only to lay it to rest; experimenting with medicines until your body finds the type it can tolerate (all the while dragging your mind and body through the mud); leaning into mental, physical and spiritual disciplines that bring you one step closer to wholeness; and a daily decision to fight for your wellness.

In the same way one healthy meal, good workout or lap-band surgery will not ensure health indefinitely, one pill, counseling session or season of mental wellness will not carry a person for a lifetime. If a diabetic has to watch sugar and take insulin for the rest of their lives to manage their disease, why should I expect anything different with my disease?

Sometimes God miraculously redeems, restores and heals in divine ways that seemingly occur over night. But most of my healing hasn’t come that way. Instead, it has come over the long years as I faithfully commit to walk alongside Christ and reclaim who I was created to be in the first place.

The hard work of healing is always with me.

And I like it that way. Never ‘fully arriving’ means I am tethered to a God who keeps me, mindful of a faith that sustains me, diligent to the medicines and practices that save me and aware of my limp which beckons me to daily choose life—that I may live.

It may take you to places you never imagined, naming demons you dreaded, on a longer journey than you ever expected, but it is here in the healing places, where life abundant begins to spring forth and the broken bits are made whole.