Intention

What Version of You are you living?

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Everything matures. Some with intention. Some by nature.

Two examples of intentional maturity: running shoes and cell phones.

This Saucony running shoe image is the Kinvara line. I have a pair of 13s. 15s are due out soon. They pump out a new version of shoes quite often. Some better. Some not.

We’ve seen the lines of cell phone consumers waiting to get their hands on the latest upgrade. They put it out. We’ve got to have it.

Humans certainly mature both by nature and intention. A simple google search reveals experts say we have anywhere from three to six stages in our developmental categories. Those categories include emotional, mental, social, physical, and spiritual maturity/development. In this moment, we are in various stages in each category. You could call that your 2024 version.

In the last 24 months, this topic has surfaced occasionally. Since it came up this week over coffee (and hot chocolate), I took a look at my journals to recall other thoughts and conversations how my friends and I categorize ourselves. 

One of those entries came as a result of this quote by Charles Taylor printed on the page of my Full Focus Journal: “We are in fact all acting, thinking, and feeling out of backgrounds and frameworks which we do not fully understand.” My journal entry was this:

I don’t know who Charles Taylor is, but this statement is very true. I’ve decided this about my adult life:

20s – full of myself (judging, complaining, criticizing)

30s – questioning just about everything

40s – settling down and finding balance

50s – listening at a whole new level

Some move through these things faster/better. The reality is we do the best on the journey we’ve been given. God’s grace meets each one of us in the moment, waits for us to see the light, declares, “You are mine. Always will be.”

12/29/21

A year later there’s an entry simply headed “5.0”. I remember that coming from separate conversations with two friends, one who said they viewed themselves as being in 2.0 mode. We looked at it differently; my view was by time to determine I’m in 5.0 mode. So I wrote a journal entry describing what 5.0 John could entail. Intention over nature.

I share this because one hope I have for myself and those I engage is that we live intentionally rather than by nature alone. I believe most of us share this hope. It’s on us to put action to that hope. 

Here’s to a hopeful and intentional 2024 version of us all.

Photo by Rod Long on Unsplash

Wound’s Intentions

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Just finished listening to the final episode of season 6 of the Being Known Podcast. Never disappoints.

Curt said something about the story of Adam and Eve that probably only a psychiatrist would come up with. It had to do with wounds. Here’s the quote:

The intention of God wounding Adam in Genesis 2 is for creating beauty and goodness. The intention of the serpent’s wound to Eve in Genesis 3 was to destroy her.

Dr. Curt Thompson

We wound others. Others wound us. Sometimes we intend beauty and goodness; sometimes we intend destruction. So many things could be said about these truths. But I want to take a different direction. However, here’s an interesting question now in my head about emotional wounds: What were the intentions?

It’s Easter weekend. Yesterday I kept a ritual of watching Mel Gibson’s The Passion. So much realistic wounding in that film.

True to form, Jesus’ enemies, both human and spirit, were after destruction.

True to form, Jesus was after beauty and goodness.

Be encouraged. It’s normal for wounds to take time to heal. It’s normal to hate the wait, to wish the pain away, or to rush happiness. But without the waiting and the pain, the healing isn’t complete.

Jesus, thank you for turning intended destruction into eternal goodness…for the beauty of your wounds…for completing your intentions.

Photo by David Clode on Unsplash

Souls in the Washing Machine

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Unintentionally, I managed to declutter a tiny portion of my life. My wallet.

I left a load of clothes in the washer overnight; dried them the following morning. The first item to fall out of the dryer when I opened the door, to my surprise, was my wallet. Never did that before.

So, I removed all the plastic cards and then paper items like car insurance information, put what I needed for the day in my shirt pocket and took off, leaving the rest to dry on the kitchen counter.

The leather wallet took more than 24 hours to fully air out, so I had a new norm for 2 days. Well, now it’s turn into a new norm period.

What I’ve discovered is I was carrying cards in my wallet that I simply don’t need on a daily basis-some, not really at all. After the washing and drying of the wallet and removing of cards I don’t really need, it’s as if I don’t even feel my wallet in my pocket anymore. I’m lighter, you might say.

When I pulled it out this morning at the gas pump, an analogy struck me. This is very similar to what happens in other areas of our lives. Things pile up, clutter, burden, weigh us down, and we don’t even realize it. We pick the load up every day as if we don’t have a choice, clueless we are desperately in need of decluttering, finding rest in our soul, space in our heart, margin in our spirit.

Recently I heard someone quote these verses from Matthew 11 where Jesus said,

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

We are in need of putting our souls intentionally in the washing machine. We need to surrender to the cleansing that only comes through God’s work. He gives rest. He offers freedom. He makes you lighter.