Today I start a series of blogs to help you determine what really matters most in life.
A few days ago, our adopted son, Eli, posted something on his Facebook page a few days ago that really got Holly and my attention. He said, “I miss what matters most.”
That got me thinking about life and what really matters most. In other words what is really most important in your life?
There are many things that seem to be important but when you step away from them and analyze them they really aren’t what matters most in life.
In our day we are inundated on a daily basis with advertisements and commercials of products that someone has determined we need and can’t live without. Many times without even thinking we plop down our hard earned money for things advertisers tell us will make our life better. In most cases the only ones whose lives are better off because of these products, are the ones that are doing the selling, because of the profits they made at our expense.
Most of the things we think we must to have in order to live a fulfilling life can be done without.
There are things that matter much more than a new car, a large house, the latest computer or smart phone. While these things may be nice to have, when it’s all said and done does it really matter what kind of car you drive, computer you use, or smart phone you possess?
Jesus made a powerful statement one day. He said, “A man’s life does not consist of the abundance of things which he possesses.” Some of the most miserable people you will ever meet have all kinds of stuff, but when it comes down to possessing what matters most they don’t. Howard Hughes had everything anyone would ever desire, yet he lived the last years of his life as a recluse, and died an unhappy man.
A big part of success in life is our ability to differentiate between what is really important and what isn’t. Every day we are faced with many situations and circumstances screaming for our attention. We are faced with choices of things that demand our responding or not responding.
In order to determine what matters most to us, and what we give our attention to, we need to ask ourselves some questions.
- Does this matter in terms of my values and my goals?
- Is it worth my time and effort to deal with what I’m presented with?
- Does this lead me closer to living my purpose or further from it?
- Could it be that this is a distraction from what matters most in my life?
Asking yourself these questions, and being honest in your answers to them, gives you clarity and helps you avoid the things that get you off track from what matters most in your life.
As believers, our priorities - what matters most to us – are many times at odds with the way the rest of the world thinks. Living for the moment, life is a party, doing the minimal, instant gratification, you only live once, get all you can, are all catch phrases of our society. In their search for happiness and fulfillment they seek after and pursue things that in the end to not produce true happiness and fulfillment because they really don’t matter most to living a fulfilled life.
Over the next few blogs, I will be sharing my thoughts as to what I have personally discovered to matter most in life. Things such as
- Your relationship with God
- Your relationship with your spouse
- Your relationship with your family
- Your thought life
- Your habits
- Your divine design
- Your dream and vision
- Your career
- Your health
- Your finances
In my next blog I will be sharing more about what matters most in life, especially when it comes to our relationship with God.
