Contentment--your issue or God's

Tonight was a sobering but uplifting night for me. I have finally taken the plunge and joined a women's bible study at my church. You never know how honest those forums will be. And I don't really have time for a group unless its spiritually earnest. But tonight I was refreshed by a sister's very honest answer to the question--How are you? She replied, " I am struggling with being content in my life. I have this vague sense of discontent that makes me wonder if I am doing enough. I feel like I'm in a rut." My heart connected to hers. I so get that.

When it comes to being discontent sometimes it can be hard to discern if we are the problem or our attitude is the problem. Sometimes we are genuinely discontent about because we aren't doing what we ought to be doing. We are the problem. Other times, our discontent stems from really being trapped in our current circumstances and we just can't get out of them. We are stuck because of things beyond our control. "Divinely confined" as my friend Brenda Smith says. So how can you tell the difference?

Well I think it begins with prayer. Ask God to show you if He has put you in these circumstances and it really is out of your control. If it is, you can take comfort that God is doing a work in this "remaining season" and you need to press into it and learn all there is to learn.

Sometimes though upon reflection I have realized that I am paralyzed by my own fear. It's not God holding me back, it's my own fear of risk and the unknown. For me in those cases, I need to ask God to show me what root of fear is holding me back and force myself to take some steps to move through that fear.

A very personal example for me is actually writing and blogging. I have felt called to do it for years but I think fear of failure (and possibly success) has held me back. This past January I was redoing my personal mission statement (via Franklin Covey's method) and I realized what was operating to keep me from achieving personal goals. So...I began to lean into my fear and write. Since that self-reflection about five months ago, I have one book I'm about to self-publish and I've been blogging regularly.

I have come to believe more and more in the past few years that there is no personal or spiritual growth without reflection. We must consider what God has done, is doing and how we are to respond to that. It means sitting still and doing some work of looking at and listening to the message in my life. It is from that place that things begin to shift. Internal shifts that can happen regardless of my circumstances; all of the sudden just like Paul and Silas, the doors of my prison swing open, and I am free. Free to stay as an opportunity or free to go. And so I pray for the eyes to see...