I don’t know what my next move is but I know I need to make it. I don’t have a plan but I know I need to fulfill it. What do I do next?
Currently, you may be: living at home, jobless, carless or license-less, directionless, pennyless, the list goes on. After a while, it becomes your norm. You make a couple of to-do lists, and a bubble map, google a few job opportunities, and maybe watch a “goal setting and accomplishing” video on YouTube. But then it’s just crickets. Now you’re stuck with this guilt and shame because you aren’t doing what you know you could and should do.
It’s not just about accomplishing great things, having money or being popular. It’s this feeling deep down that I know it’s time for me to change my life. It’s time for me to submit to the whispers of God.
This time last year I was living on my own, working two and three jobs, enrolled in school full time- the picture of independent. This doesn’t mean I was happy all the time, I didn’t get depressed, or that it was always easy, but it gave me security and confidence.
No matter how you got to where you are now- whether you consider it a downgrade or a fall from grace, a moment of enlightenment to your purpose, a recent dissatisfaction with your current circumstance, it all comes back to this:
I don’t know what my next move is, but I know I need to make it. I don’t know how to get what I want, but I’ll die or be miserable without. I don’t know how to get what is in my head and heart out into the real world.
Why haven’t you made it yet? Here are some common reasons:
- You are fearful– of change, rejection, failure, success, or inadequacy.
- Nothing you do is turning out right! You have given it a shot and it flopped. You tried to change your lifestyle but you reverted backwards. You don’t feel as equipped, talented, special, or chosen right now. You feel like it must be someone else’s job to be great because you obviously don’t have it in you.
- You are lazy or simply passive. Up to this point have enjoyed the natural flow of life or the ease of aiming not low but not high either.
- You enjoy predictability. This goes back to fear of change, however it may not be fear of change, but a preference for sameness and dependability
- You have doubting eyes staring at you. The people are around have always and continue to make you self conscious and silly for wanting more out of life.
- You genuinely have no idea where you should start. As of now there is a call but no answer.
So what do I do next? What do I do if all these very valid reasons continue to excuse me from moving forward?
Don’t let them excuse you. Don’t let yourself off of the hook. Any therapist would probably say take it easy on yourself, deal with your feelings first and the situation later.
But I say this:
- It’s easy for people to tell you love your body when they don’t have to look at it everyday and hate it.
- It’s easy for people to say you are enough when you know you have more in the tank.
- It’s easy for people to tell you not to take risks when deep down you’re a gambler and they’re not.
Whatever choices we choose to make affect us. And just the same, whatever choices we choose NOT to make affect us- sometimes even more.
Only YOU know what you are capable of. It’s not for anybody else to recognize, acknowledge, understand, or care about.
Our destiny is our business.
I don’t know what is next for me- at all. However, I know that it’s time for my life to change.
Here are some symptons and signs it’s time for change:
- Your appetite for leisure and fun leaves your tongue. When there is a shift within, your interest in trivial things decreases drastically. I would rather eat a denim bookbag with stainless steel zippers than go to a distant friend’s birthday dinner KNOWING that I have writing and work to do. There is a great distaste you will grow for unneccary spending and relaxing.
- Procrastination begins to make you sick. At this point, NOT working until there is sweat dripping for your brow sickens me. I get this heaviness in my abdomen, I lose my appetite and my eyes get blurry. I lie to you not! It is the physical repurcussions of not doing God’s will.
- Growing an intense hatred for your situation. This should speak for itself. It’s never bothered you, atleast this much, that you have no car, or that your job is unfulfilling. But now it’s kills you.
- You’re beginning to look at things spiritually. Suddenly, purpose, destiny, God and true desire (versus pleasure) are the lens you see everything through now.
Consider you journey like a pregnacy. Those are just a few of the symptoms listed above.
Understand this- and I am planting a seed here. Despite what everyone is telling you, this isn’t the universe calling you. It is God. The universe does not make calls. The universe is a machine. It just exist and operates. God has written His words on the hearts of all humans so that somehow we will always find him.
Desire and need for purpose are usually the first symptoms of God calling us. It is a honor, indeed. But a daunting task, still.
So, now that we’ve confirmed that we’re pregnant, what do we do now?
I know you’ve probably attempted to make this grand gesture before. You’ve bought a white board and hung it in your room. You’ve made a Pinterest board full of ideas and quotes to encourage you. Perhaps you’ve shared some ideas with your friend. But you keep ending up at square one.
Our journey is part of the calling. It will never be linear. You will have a clear understanding of your next step one day, and the next day you’ll be crying in bed with no confidence, questioning your very existence. Consider this pregnancy pains. The baby is kicking, alive and well. Or perhaps you’re farther along, and the baby wants to come out.
You have two options:
Push the baby out. Or abort. If you abort God will find another to do His work. Either way the baby has to come out.
So, if I’ve decided to keep the baby- if I’ve decided I accept the challenge, if I’m willing to rise to the occassion or respond to the call, what do I do next?
Whether you have a plan, a hunch, an idea, an inkling or not, do this:
- Pray to God. Ask God to make it PLAIN to you what you should do next. It’ll come to you. It always does. If you ask God for knowledge, you will get it. I have asked God many times for a sign, a hint, a clue, a push, confirmation, and I always get it. However:
- You will have to be more spiritually in tune now than ever. Open that bible, fast, pray, and triple your quiet time. The answers are going to come out of you. Even if someone tells you word for word what to do next, you won’t fully understand or be able to discern it if you are not aligned. The baby will keep kicking, you must feed it and comfort it.
- Take a step- any step. If you stand still nothing happens. If you take a step SOMETHING happens. Buy the inventory, make the page, make the cover of the book even if you haven’t written it, reach out and begin mending relationships even if your feelings are still hurt.
- Protect your momentum, protect your innocence, protect your heart. Maintain your confidence and sureness that something is next. This is a very fragile space to be find yourself in, it leaves you vulnerable. Be keen and aware of anything that may leave you hopeless, drained or discouraged.
- Get a routine! I can’t tell you what you bubbling up inside you, but I desperately wish I could. But you’re going to have to put your hands on it every single day. If you make a post everyday, create a mood board every day, watch a video about it, try that back flip just ONCE a day- anything! You have to touch it everyday. When women are pregnant they touch their stomach everyday. It never fails. We must do the same.
I have a storm inside me right now. It’s very uncomfortable. Something is just OFF! My writing isn’t the same, my thinking isn’t the same, and my being isn’t the same. Perhaps, I’m about to give birth and don’t know it. The more I see it as a baby, a fetus, a seed, however you refer to it, the more I understand the role I have to play.
If there aren’t alarms going off in your head by now, you need to draw closer to God. Sometimes we just need confirmation that our misery isn’t for nothing. It isn’t just dissatisfaction. It is an indication that you’re up a bat.