Fight

There was once a little boy, too small to fit in a suit of mens armor, who stood in front of a giant of a man who soared over 9 feet tall. Armed with nothing more than a sling and a handful of smooth stones he carried in a satchel, this boy stood in front of an army too scared to fight the giant, because he volunteered to fight.

When the giant saw the little boy approaching him, he jeered:

“Am I a dog – that you come at me with sticks? Come here, and I’ll give your flesh to the birds and wild animals to feast on!”

As the giant moved closer, the boy responded:

“You come at me with a sword and javelin, but I come at you in the name of the LORD almighty, the God of the people of Israel, who you have defiled. This day, the LORD will deliver you into my hands and I will strike you down and cut off your head.”

As he spoke, he ran toward the giant, who stood towering over him with his shield bearer walking in front of him.

I’d like to pause here and reflect on the circumstances of the above situation. Even if I were armed with my AR-15, I’d be hesitant to run toward somebody who stood over 9 feet tall and had a shield carried in front of him by another man…logic would tell me to stand my ground and take my shot from a distance.

That’s not what the boy did. He ran. Fearlessly.

As he rushed toward the giant, he put a stone in his sling and got it up to speed; twirling it around his head before releasing it into the air.

The stone landed in the middle of the giant’s forehead. He dropped to the ground in a pool of his own blood.

The boy continued his run toward the giant and took the giant’s sword out of his hand, before cutting his head off and raising it into the air – as both armies watched in utter astonishment.

Perhaps you know the story – David and Goliath. Perhaps it’s unknown to you. In either case, it’s a true story and it goes down in history as one of the most famous fights of all time.

For nearly a decade, I’ve been in a fight of my own; one that I haven’t felt I’ve been winning. I haven’t been facing a giant; rather, I’ve been fighting myself. I’ve walked around masking my own pain, while shamefully being aware that I haven’t been living to my fullest potential.

Now, to the casual onlooker, a snapshot at my life would reveal somebody that has a great life. However, I believe there are different measures you can look at your life with and only the individual living their life knows which life they’re living.

The good life.

The great life.

The best life.

I’ve had a good, even great life for many years. However, I haven’t had the best life possible because I haven’t truly pushed myself to live each day like it was the fight of my life. In most cases, I accepted status quo and simply accepted each day as it came, while reminding myself I should be thankful for a good/great life.

Years ago, I sat in front of a room full of high school students who gathered each week as I taught a weekly bible study. That week, I shocked the entire room as I started the lesson.

I pulled a $20 bill ouf of my wallet and tore it to pieces. Each of the students gasped as they watched the bill fall into little pieces on the table.

“Why did you gasp?” I asked them.

“Because you could have BOUGHT something with that money” they replied.

“I can get another $20. What I can’t get back is time.”

Instantly, they understood the lesson. Money is cheap. Time is priceless.

I’ve thought a lot about that lesson over the years, and ultimately realized that the lesson was for me, just as much as it was for my ‘kids’ in the room that night.

On my right arm is a tattoo of an hourglass – nearly full or neary empty, depending on how you look at it. If you look to the right side of this screen as you scroll down the blog entry, you’ll also see an hourglass behind the words, which empties as you scroll down and read my words.

“Make the most of your time, for the days are evil”

Over the years, the biggest criticism I’ve had for myself is the fact that I have wasted tremendous amounts of time. This week, I decided to do something about it.

I deleted Youtube. I deleted Facebook, which I used for marketplace shopping. Those two actions will give me at least 10 hours of my life back each week.

Last night, I reached out to a friend of mine who just started a 90-day personal transformation program for clients in the Highland Village area. Why? Because something convicted me to write him a message and let him know that I needed help tuning up my life. With a little over 90 days until my 39th birthday, I wanted to give myself a push to become more than who I am today.

So, he met with me this morning. For nearly two hours, he interviewed me and gave me a candid assessment about my life, as well as a plan to follow that operated off of three core principles; mind, body and spirit.

The plan to follow isn’t dramatic or complex. Rather, it’s developed around following a consistent habit of checking five items off a list every single day, spending at least 30min exercising and giving myself a ‘spiritual bath’ every day where I spend time in God’s presence.

He asked me what my goal was. I told him “To rediscover my JOY, and live each day as the man God created me to be.”

Today was day one, and the start of a 90-day fight. On the other side of these 90 days is the potential to become a different me.

In my last blog, I highlighted that much of my inner pain feels akin to a little boy that feels lost and without hope. Today, that little boy is rushing toward the giant with one goal in mind:

Victory.