If you’re anything like me, you have thousands of paths you wish to take in your life and are afraid you won’t take the right one, or that you will fail in the midst of the journey.
Some days I wake up and I want to drop everything and be a writer all day every day. Other days I wake up and want to pour my life into medical research to help people. And then sometimes, (I’d say usually Tuesdays and Thursdays) I want to start six different companies that I’ve had ideas for.
I fully believe in chasing your dreams and developing well-rounded passions, but I’ve realized that my broad interests have caused me to place a lot of pressure on myself. I feel that if I’m slipping in becoming any of these things, I’m not meeting my own personal expectations or that I’m letting my future self down.
The biggest source of the pressure I put on myself is from people who have told me “I know you’ll do amazing things” or “I’ll be telling my kids how I knew you”. What does one do with these statements? Like dang it, now I have to live up to that. I take people's expectations and capitalize on them by placing even higher expectations on myself.
I’m scared I’m majoring in the wrong thing, I’m scared I won’t end up doing what God wants me to do, and I’m scared I won’t measure up to my potential.
Where does all this pressure come from? I’d say internally. If I slip in my work ethic or don’t get the results I had foreseen, I’m miserable. I feel like I’m letting everyone down, but more than that, I feel like I’m letting myself down.
This internal pressure has caused me to panic, and shows that I’m truly not putting my trust in God. It’s something I’ve dealt with for as long I can remember, and I’ve decided to find some truth to diminish this internal pressure.
Proverbs 1:33 says this about the “internal pressure” we feel:
“But whoever listens to me will dwell secure and will be at ease, without dread of disaster.”
God doesn’t want us to be succumbed by this pressure we place on ourselves, He wants us to be at ease. He wants us to listen to His truth, not the lies we tell ourselves. I've realized my loyalty lies in the gifts God has given me rather than to God Himself. This has resulted in my many moments of uncertainty and questioning.
Although I have no idea where my life is taking me, I know that everything (even failure) is exactly what God has in store for me. This internal pressure is a mountain I need to tackle, but the good thing is that what seems like a mountain to me, is an ant hill for God.
