I’ve been practicing gratitude lately. I was told if you are feeling negative, just focus on gratitude. Resentment and gratitude cannot coexist.
I started attending church, praying, praising God in worship, reading the Bible, and fellowshipping with others and God has been changing my heart to let go of some of my desires and focusing more on purpose and love.
What does it mean to be content?
I struggled with the idea of contentment. I once believed that contentment is a myth in a consumer driven world. I conflated contentment with complacency and complacency with laziness.
I saw contentment as a hinderance to progress. How do you even make goals to become better if you are content with where you are?
How do you motivate yourself to work harder if you are happy with everything that you have?
These thoughts were leading me to a road of unhappiness.
I placed value in work and production. I accomplished achievement over achievement. Once I achieved my goal, I was on to the next goal. If I didn’t achieve my goal, I saw myself as a failure. It made me sad, bitter, and lost.
I was driven to seek acceptance and approval of others, inflate my perceived status or admiration. This stems from a place of hurt and feeling unworthy and unloved. I learned in time that these views are not only toxic but wrong.
I know now that the opposite is true. I am accepted and loved by God. I am accepted and loved by my wife, by my family, and by my friends.
Knowing that God loves me helped me let go of chasing things.
I am loved. God’s love is more than enough. God provides my every need. I have a lot to be thankful for.
Before, I equated my achievement and accomplishments with my self worth. Now I see me how God sees me.
Your net worth is not the same as your self-worth.
It’s true.
We are all valued and loved by God even though the world measures success differently.
The world exploits our feelings of insufficiency, while God says we are enough.
I have issues with insecurities and fear of rejection. At times I have an inferiority complex and overcompensate with pride.
It affects how I work, how I communicate to others, how I spend my money and present myself, and most importantly how I view myself.
There was no peace or joy in that. I was unhappy and not satisfied.That sense of entitlement of wanting more than I have comes from pride.
Pride tells me it’s not enough because I think I am not given what I deserve. Gratitude tells me that God loves us and everything I have is a gift.
Knowing that I am loved helps me with my issues with insecurity and fear of being rejected, unloved, or abandoned.
Knowing that I am loved helps me feel grateful for everything because I know that God provides everything I need and for a purpose.
God provides our home. We live in Vegas for a purpose. We live in our neighborhood for a purpose.
God provides our business. We are entrusted with our business for a purpose.
God provides beyond our needs. We are entrusted with those provisions.
When I complain about my home, my business, my income and provisions, I am disrespecting God who provides them. I am forgetting everything is a gift.
More importantly I am forgetting the giver, the Creator of the universe and master of my life, Lord of all.
When I forget that it is God who provides, I look at his provisions as mine, not His.
I now am mindful that it is God’s provisions. I now pray more and read more and listen.
The Bible says to give generously, generosity and kindness is one of the fruits of the Spirits.
If not achievement or things, what motivates us to work and grow?
Purpose and God’s calling in our lives.
God’s calling in our lives is to love our neighbors and show God’s love and that Jesus is Lord and works through us.
This applies to all areas of our lives. My family. My personal life. My business life.
This has shifted the way I view my business. How do I love and serve others better in my business?
More importantly, how will people see God working through my business so that they may see that Jesus is Lord.
That’s my prayer.
Sometimes I still desire of material things like houses, cars, travel, and other luxuries,
but the more I am in the Word, the more that I am in prayer, the more that I am fellowshipping, the more that I am worshipping God,
the less I desire them.
I am able to experience peace and joy in contentment and focusing less on myself and focusing on how I can love and serve God and others that God has placed in our lives.
This has greatly helped my mental state and have a new outlook in life.
Dear Heavenly father, thank you for everything. Continue to work on me and focus on you Lord. Continue to guide me and show me what to do. Thank you. I praise you. I love you. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.