By Listening to the Still Small Voice That’s in Your Heart
We’re all looking for a road map to our destiny. We want a crystal-clear plan laid out so that we know what to expect around each and every turn. Life doesn’t work that way.
One certainty is…life is uncertain.
This isn’t what we want to hear. We want all the answers before we start the journey. So…if there is no certainty, why do we bother trying to figure out our destination? How do we know which direction to start? If we let it, this uncertainty causes us to stay where we are and not move.
If you don’t move you will never get any closer to your destination.
Last week’s solution was about getting from here to there. It compared a Global Positioning System to life’s GPS, a Goal Prioritization System. This system will help you to determine what your destination is and the steps to take to get there.
This system consists of four parts.
DREAMS → VISIONS → GOALS → ACTIONS
Knowing where your ‘there’ (destination or purpose) is starts with your dream. This consists of thoughts, ideas, images, sensations, emotions, that occur involuntarily in your subconscious. They are a part of you that comes from someplace outside of you. This is God’s way of communicating your ‘there’ (destination or purpose) to you.
In 1 Kings 19, Elijah was feeling overwhelmed and alone in his task. He was sure he had been doing ‘the thing’ he was called to do, but things didn’t seem to be going as planned. God spoke to Elijah in a still small voice and reassured him that he was headed in the right direction.
God is speaking to us. It may be a small inaudible voice, or it may be a smack in the head. We make the destination search more complicated than it is. We tend to over-think this process. The important thing is to listen and to hear what He says.
We need to do more than just listen with our ears we need to hear with our hearts.
How do we hear with our hearts? We take inventory of who we are by asking some questions.
- What things am I good at? Skills that come naturally to me.
- What things do I love to do? Things that I must force myself to take breaks from doing and would do for free.
- What situations and life lessons have I learned? My unique experiences and situations are unique to me.
- Different personalities work better in different vocations. What things fit with my personality?
These are examples of questions to ask ourselves. After answering these and similar ones we will know our destination. When we feel our destination, it is an amazing thing.
Now that I know where my ‘THERE’ is…. how do I get there?
At this point the destination is determined, but still a little fuzzy. How do we put an address to it so we can enter it into life’s GPS? This is done by turning that dream into a vision.
Next week we’ll turn the dream into a vision and give it an address.
