“Quit believing this lie: You can be and do anything if you just work hard enough.
And start answering this question: What wants to enter the world through me?
”
I will always be stirred by Parker Palmer’s question, “Is the life I am living, the same as the life that wants to live in me?”
Today I read an NPR article that said, “As pandemic life recedes in the U.S., people are leaving their jobs in search of more money, more flexibility and more happiness…It's leading to a dramatic increase in resignations — a record 4 million people quit their jobs in April alone.”
It’s no surprise that a season like this would shake things up, burn people out, and stir something up in all of us. I haven’t changed jobs – but there are plenty of other areas of my life that seem to be in transition – where I am contending with what was, what is, and what will be.
But just because we are stirred from within, doesn’t automatically mean we will continue to listen to that inner stirring as we move forward. Instead, I think what tends to be louder goes something like this:
“Pick the next shiny and exciting idea and build a brand. Take a million classes, gain certifications, PROVE you are worthy. And then, Hustle, HUSTLE, HUSTLE!”
Hustle has a way of drowning out and covering over our limitations, when limitations are exactly what we need to listen to in order to know who we truly are. We can’t know who we are if we don’t know who we’re not.
Burnout is a sign of not listening to our limitations.
“Though usually regarded as a result of trying to give too much, burnout in my experience results from trying to give what I do not possess….it does not result from giving from all I have: it merely reveals the nothingness from which I was trying to give in the first place…
When the gift I give to the other is integral to my own nature, when it comes from a place of organic reality within me, it will renew itself – and me – even as I give it away.”
– Parker Palmer
And so, when we are stirred to change. When we have hit our max. When we desire something new, something more:
It will serve us to resist the hustle, slow down, and listen to our lives - listen to our limitations, and listen for what it is that actually wants to enter the world through me.
I wonder, how would you answer the question: “What wants to enter the world through me?”