So this is the new Year

I was talking to a friend recently about how, when we both were younger, we thought we'd have done so much and come so far in life by the time we came to where we are now. But of course looking at our lives presently, we easily deducted that our lives and accomplishments have resembled nothing similar. Are there regrets to accompany this observation? No. Life is not what i thought it'd be by now when i was in high school, but I am glad that I have ended up where i am with the experiences i have nonetheless. Who thought things could be better than i imagined? 

It may sound either pie-in-the-sky philosophy or freethinking foolishness to say this but i will say it because i think it is something more: life has more to do with who you are than what you do. Certainly one effects the other, but I tend to think its the former which takes it effect on the latter rather than the contrary. 

This summer I met someone who asked me a question almost immediately upon our meeting. "Are you living the dream? Are you where you want to be- doing what you want to be doing- in life?"

That question might have come across as an awkward conversation opener in most settings, but in this case the friend who i've since learned is a career counselor, pastor and father was too well meaning and good humored for me to answer glibly. 

"you know what..." I answered, "I am. "

How good it felt to say that. 

There had been many times, especially in that previous year when i would have thought twice before answering a round-about no. This time I answered yes... and I think there's something significant there. 

I believe that God has made us. I believe that we are his creations whom he has chosen to extend unbelievable love to. And i think that if we see that and function as he designed us to in relationship to him that we will find ourselves "living the dream". This is what i mean when I say that who you are might president what you do. 

Simply, I think that seeing yourself as a child of God changes a lot of things. 

I don't know exactly where I'm headed in this journey... but I wouldn't ask to be elsewhere. Lately when people ask me what I'm up to, I answer, "I'm living the dream." 

Life may not always be as comfortable as it is right now, but I hope that i can, regardless of circumstances, always say that I am...

In Christ,

"living the dream."