Why are we so tired all the time ? Why don’t we have any energy? Why are there so many energy drinks on the market ? I believe that the answer has to do with passion. Here is an excerpt from my second book in the authentic self series.
Think about being on a rubber raft in the middle of the Pacific ocean. You are the only survivor after the ship you were on capsized in a storm. You are out on the ocean and you have access to food rations and water. If you have no motor or paddle, you are just drifting and helpless. You are at the mercy of ocean currents and waves. You have no sail, no motor, no paddle, no compass, and no knowledge of how to navigate by the stars. That could be a description of how you are living your life at this very moment in time. Drifting. No guidance. No power. No direction. I’ve been there before.
Where would you start if you had the choice to acquire all of these? You may be the person in the raft who has a compass and you know the direction that you need to be headed, but you have no sail or no motor. No power. No energy. Or if you do, you can’t sustain it for very long. You paddle a little bit and you try to head in a particular direction, but you lose your drive or energy, so you give up.
You may be a dabbler. Paddle a little bit, take a break. The definition of dabble is to “take part in an activity in a casual or superficial way.” If you think about being stranded in a rubber dinghy on the ocean, if you dabble, you die. If we don’t take our passion or our purpose seriously, we will tend to dabble. You may be a dabbler. I’ve been there also.
What if we have a huge motor and plenty of power, but we have no compass or rudder? We may start off going in a one direction, but without a compass or a rudder, over time we could just be navigating in circles. We are spending huge amounts of time, energy and effort, but we aren’t really making any progress at all. I’ve been there also. I’ve had plenty of energy, but I was wasting it on activities, projects or pursuits that had very little to no value whatsoever. That is kind of like puttering around in circles, but getting nowhere.
The thing that is the most interesting or disturbing, depending on how you look at it, is that I didn’t have any idea that I was wasting my time, energy and money. That is being in the raft going in circles and being completely unaware that you are. If the power or the energy is unfocused and not heading toward any one point, that power is wasted. Not only is it wasted, but it leaves you prone to exhaustion and frustration. There is no fulfillment, no satisfaction, no peace and no joy. This is what I call the spinning phase of my life. It’s like being in a four-wheel drive truck. You have plenty of gas and a big engine. You are flooring the gas pedal but you aren’t getting anywhere. You are in very deep mud. You’re spinning your tires, but not only are you not going anywhere, you’re sinking deeper and deeper into the mud. Spinning your wheels for the sake of spinning your wheels. Lots of noise. No movement. You may be a spinner.
I believe our energy comes from passion. The thing that we were created to do. The thing that we “can’t not” do. When we combine passion with purpose, we have power, guidance, and focus. Those in combination make it much more likely that we can reach our goals and fulfill our purpose. We discover our authentic self when we are engaged in our passion moving towards completion of our purpose. We are living and striving towards the pursuits, purpose and goal that God had in mind when he thought us up and designed us. We are exactly where we are supposed to be.