Freedom of Choice?

Our culture is inundated with choices. Want a new TV? Look at how many models are available. Plasma, LCD, or LED… 19”, 60”, or anything in-between… 120 Hz, 240 Hz, 760i, 1080p, 1080i…LG, Samsung, Sharp, Toshiba, Vizio, Sony, Panasonic…and where should we buy it?

Growing up, I had 5 television channels and two of them showed the same thing. Now, I don’t even know how many channels I have. I have to set up my “favorites” on my remote… more choices. If you still need evidence that the number of options available to us has gotten excessive, just take a look at the cereal aisle the next time you go to the supermarket. To make it even more interesting, take a four year-old who has just been watching Nickelodeon.

Not only are there a seemingly infinite number of choices available, but we are daily bombarded with marketing that tells us that there is an option out there somewhere that is just right for us – one that will make us happy. So you better make the right choice, or you’ll end up regretting your decision when you find a better option down the road.

The problem with having so many options and making so many choices is that it can easily lead to analysis paralysis. We want to make the right choice, but there are so many options and we don’t want regret our decision… so we make no choice. We procrastinate.

The same dynamic exists in our careers. I read an article a while back that said the anticipated top 10 in-demand jobs in 2010 didn’t even exist 5 years ago. Think about that. As we have more choices in what to do with our lives, people are increasingly deciding to do nothing – at least nothing significant.

Here’s what I think. Instead of beating yourself up on where you will work, focus on what it is that you were created, gifted, and prepared to do. Guess what – that thing that you were created to do may have nothing to do with your current job, but that doesn’t mean you have to quit your job tomorrow. It just means you have to figure out how to incorporate your mission into your job. Or maybe, just maybe, you were meant to find significance outside of your professional career. What??? A life outside of work? Yep, the most important things you will do, the greatest significance you will find, and the most lasting legacy you leave will probably not be career-related.

 

Principle of the Path

I am facilitating a study for a group of college students in which we are going through Andy Stanley’s The Principle of the Path.  Basically stated, the principle is as follows:

Direction – not intent – determines our destination.

When we consider this in terms of navigation, it is pretty simple and straightforward.  If we choose to follow a particular road, we will go where that road leads.  Regardless of our race, color, creed, gender, education, or needs, a road leads where it leads without considering the one who is traveling it.

If we get lost, our problems do not end when we discover that we are on the wrong road.  When we stop and ask for directions, we don’t need someone to tell us that we are lost.  We need to discover which roads lead to our preferred destination.

As obvious as this principle is, we see it ignored all the time.  People who eat junk and don’t exercise end up with poor health.  People who spend more money than they earn end up in financial distress (unless they qualify for a bail out).  You get the idea.  It seems that humans have a tendency to choose paths that lead in directions that we don’t want to go.

Here’s the kicker – we’re always on a path.  Right now, you are following the path that you have chosen and you will eventually go where that path leads.  Where is you path leading you?

 

Running the Race

I had my first 5k of the season last Saturday. Based on the considerable loss of stomach contents as I battled a stomach bug earlier in the week, I wasn’t sure what to expect.

 

I started running regularly about a year ago. Back then, my main goal was simply to finish the race and not get beat by too many girls. After a couple of races, I found that I was becoming more competitive and started taking it a little more seriously. I also found out that there are some very fast girl runners and I can’t even hope to keep up with them. I finished last year with second and third place finishes in my age group. Emboldened by my improving race times, I went into Saturday’s race with two objectives:

1. Finish in under 23 minutes

2. Win 1st place in my age group

 

Although my personal best time was 23:20, I thought beating 23 minutes was a reasonable objective. The feasibility of reaching the second goal was a little more difficult to predict. You never know who will show up in your age group, so you could run your personal best and not even place. Alternatively, you could have a horrible outing but still go home with a medal if the others in your age group are competitively challenged.

 

I had a good day. I ran a new personal best at 22:40 and won my age group. As a side note, my time of 22:40 is quite respectable but don’t be too impressed – the overall winners (typically high school cross country runners) are usually below 18 minutes. By the time I cross the finish line they are already on their way to their second race of the day.

 

So… I ran a personal best and I won my group. Now what?

 

I guess I could always shoot for a faster time, but I realize that I’m not getting any younger and eventually those times will start heading the other direction. I could set a new goal of getting an overall win, but I’m not insane. I am very much a goal-oriented person, so just running for the sake of running is not an option. So what will my new goal be?

 

I realized my running is falling into the same pattern as my professional career that I wrote about in my book. My race times are taking the place of my salary and my finishing position is taking the place of my job title. It’s amazing how pervasive this addiction to success can be. While there’s nothing wrong with aspirations, when I have a goal I feel like I HAVE to accomplish it and I’m not really good with losing.

 

This got me to thinking… while I did win my age group and run below my target time, I didn’t even come close to the overall winner. In that respect, I decisively lost the race. Out there, somewhere, will always be a faster runner, a higher paid manager, a greener lawn, a cleaner house, a smarter student, or a more humble servant. Our primary goal – the one that will bring the most satisfaction – is not be the first person to finish the race. Rather, we should continually assess our lives to make sure that we “run with endurance the race set before us.” I firmly believe that if we are running someone else’s race not even victory will bring fulfillment.

 

Building a Ramp

My wife and I went to Cirque Du Soleil last weekend.  I think that’s French for “these people are out of their minds”.  You would not believe some of the acrobatics the performers pulled off.  The show was held at Atlantic Station in Atlanta.  If you’ve never been there before, Atlantic Station is sort of its own little city within the city of Atlanta.

 

The show was great.  Dinner after the show was great.  Finding our car and getting home was a nightmare.

 

Before the show, we parked in the massive labyrinth of the underground parking deck.  After being directed through a maze of cars, the parking attendants led us to the completely filled parking area where we were left to find a spot on our own.  It was here that I fully expected we would have to fight off a dragon before proceeding to the show.  We finally found a place to park and I looked up and noted our section. 

 

G-12…  got it. 

 

When we tried to find our car, I realized that there was apparently no reasoning behind how this parking deck was laid out.  We were in section G, looking for G-12, but we were nowhere near our car.

 

We wandered around with all of the other confused people who were repeatedly hitting their keyless remotes like a young child calling for their lost dog – hoping that familiar horn would honk and Lassie would come home.  Did I mention that this place is HUGE!  Oh yeah, and it was dark… and cold… and my wife was in heels.

 

We finally found our car.  Now we just had to find an exit.  We made our way out of the parking area and thought we were home free.  Wrong.  All I needed to do was get on I-85 North and Atlantic station is right next to I-85, so I thought it would be pretty simple.  Wrong again.  In order to get on I-85 north, you first have to go south on connector streets, get on a ferry, cross the Florida state line, click your heals together three times, and say “there’s no place like home”.  Ok, it’s not that bad, but it’s close.

 

Frustrating does not begin to describe my feelings at this point.  Here we were, right next to the road that we needed to get on.  We even drove over it a couple of times, but there was no ramp.  There was no way to get from where we were to where we wanted to be.  We just drove around hoping that we would eventually find an on-ramp.

 

This sort of thing happens to us more than we probably realize.  We know what road we want to be on, we may even be right next to it, but there doesn’t seem to be any on-ramps.  We’re driving along another road in hopes that it will eventually lead us where we need to be.  If you desire to find significance in your work and begin to live your passion, you have to do more that simply discover what road you want to be on.  You have figure out how to get there from here.  You have to build a ramp.