These last few days God has been speaking to me about the importance of obtaining a vision. In my last post I wrote about how we need to seek the Kingdom of God first so that what we come across on the way doesn't distract us but instead compels us to keep moving forward.
Since writing it i've started to think about how it can be walked out in my every day life and not just be some far off principle I claim to live by.
In my thinking I've realised that having a vision sets principles, morals and values in my life. If I was without a vision I would settle for anything and everything that came my way, I would give up easily, but having a vision restrains my options to obtain it.
Here's an example to help you understand; say you decide that you want to shed a few pounds. You set yourself a diet plan, you get yourself down the gym. A few days in and you wake up feeling like you've overused every muscle in your body. The only thing that is going to get you back to that gym is the vision of a healthier, skinnier you. Without that vision you will fall straight back into what is comfortable. You'll never get your great body by just not wanting to be fat. It is your vision that gives you the strength to reorder your life to reach your goal.
Vision gives you a standard to live by, vision gives pain a purpose, vision gives you purpose, vision gives you motivation and strength to persevere to do whatever you have to do to get it.
I've been reading a book by Kris Vallotton who says "One of the greatest decisions we have to make concerning our vision is how we envision ourselves." and I couldn't agree more. How we envision ourselves will determine our actions, our reactions, our behaviour and our attitude. I've been on a bit of an emotional rollercoaster lately and reading this has challenged me to think about how I see myself because if I had truly decided who I am then my emotions and attitude wouldn't be determind by my situation but instead they would be determind out of who I am. If we lack vision for ourselves then we begin to let others tell us who we are and we will find ourselves being whatever others need us to be and start to rely on them for our strength and self-worth.
But the great thing is, we have the choice to either live in bondage to our emotions, other people, our physical impulses and our circumstances or we can choose to live as free people because we have set a vision for our lives. We have to choose to take responsibility to know ourselves, to live with intergrity by training ourselves to live in accordance with the vision we have set.
So instead of acting out of how you feel or how others say you should feel, act out of who you envision yourself to be and let your vision for tomorrow determine your decisions today.
Since writing it i've started to think about how it can be walked out in my every day life and not just be some far off principle I claim to live by.
In my thinking I've realised that having a vision sets principles, morals and values in my life. If I was without a vision I would settle for anything and everything that came my way, I would give up easily, but having a vision restrains my options to obtain it.
Here's an example to help you understand; say you decide that you want to shed a few pounds. You set yourself a diet plan, you get yourself down the gym. A few days in and you wake up feeling like you've overused every muscle in your body. The only thing that is going to get you back to that gym is the vision of a healthier, skinnier you. Without that vision you will fall straight back into what is comfortable. You'll never get your great body by just not wanting to be fat. It is your vision that gives you the strength to reorder your life to reach your goal.
Vision gives you a standard to live by, vision gives pain a purpose, vision gives you purpose, vision gives you motivation and strength to persevere to do whatever you have to do to get it.
I've been reading a book by Kris Vallotton who says "One of the greatest decisions we have to make concerning our vision is how we envision ourselves." and I couldn't agree more. How we envision ourselves will determine our actions, our reactions, our behaviour and our attitude. I've been on a bit of an emotional rollercoaster lately and reading this has challenged me to think about how I see myself because if I had truly decided who I am then my emotions and attitude wouldn't be determind by my situation but instead they would be determind out of who I am. If we lack vision for ourselves then we begin to let others tell us who we are and we will find ourselves being whatever others need us to be and start to rely on them for our strength and self-worth.
But the great thing is, we have the choice to either live in bondage to our emotions, other people, our physical impulses and our circumstances or we can choose to live as free people because we have set a vision for our lives. We have to choose to take responsibility to know ourselves, to live with intergrity by training ourselves to live in accordance with the vision we have set.
So instead of acting out of how you feel or how others say you should feel, act out of who you envision yourself to be and let your vision for tomorrow determine your decisions today.
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