Quit Something on Thursday

We had a phenomenal guest speaker yesterday at church. He's a man by the name of Bob Goff. His book, Love Does, just hit the NYTimes Best Sellers List. He is a Christian man with a heart for doing God's will in his life. He is a lawyer and has felt like his purpose in life is justice, and specifically justice for children. He "invited himself" to start trying cases in Uganda (of all places). He is a TOTAL loon! And I say that in the most endearing way! He was possibly one of the best speakers I've ever heard...ever...because he's just so excitable. He's all over the place and animated. He was entertaining, but the root of his message was put in such a unique way that it really hit home. If our church posts his talk online, I'll post it. But in the meantime, I wanted to share something I learned...it was the smallest little section of his talk and by no means the meat and potatoes, but I really loved it.

Quit something on Thursday.

That was one little piece of advice in the midst of his whole talk, but is resonated with me.

"I quit something every Thursday," he said with excitement and a chuckle.

This initially sounds a little silly if you didn't hear the context. He was talking about how we are all "hoarders" with commitments in our lives. We just pack them so full that none of us have the time to do what we were really made to do. We all do a lot that we are just ok or even good at, but they're not what we were created to do. We commit and commit and commit to things to be nice. But then when something arises that is actually aligned with what God wants us to do, we say no because we say we have no time for it...and that's true, we don't! But by our own doing. We are all stressed. We all fill our desks, our social calendars, our lives way too full. So his advice, "quit something." Is he a total loser who does nothing because he just quits everything? Not at all. Hearing his story makes me wonder how in the world he has lived long enough to accomplish all that he has. I mean, every 60 days the dude flies to Uganda. He's a lawyer. He runs a non profit. He has freed hundreds of wrongfully imprisoned youth from the jails in Uganda. He's the Consul for Uganda to the US. He is accomplished and busy. He just commits to things that are actually appropriate for him to be doing based on God's will for his life.

EPIC!

I can't tell you how busy we are. We agree to this, that and the other thing all the time that we don't want to do, that we are only mildly good at, and that just stresses us out. Why? I have no clue! Ha. It was so funny to hear him put it so simply. Obviously there are times when I just can't quit something. Most the time I can't get an assignment at work and say, "Nope. Not doing it. Not gonna happen." But I can definitely not agree to go to 10 Christmas parties, cookie exchanges, ugly sweater parties, etc....although I do love me some cookies!!

We all have such limited time on this earth to do what we are really meant to do. Life is so fleeting. Days are too short. Years too limited. Hearing Bob Goff so simply say, "quit," was eye opening. So hey, who wants to quit some stuff on Thursday with me?