The clock is ticking toward midnight at the end of the decade. You may say good riddance to the past decade, or you may reminisce with fond memories. The upcoming decade may excite you or cause anxiety, or both. Whether we are ready or not, the decade of the 20’s is coming.
This past decade was the hardest of my life by far. While struggling in the throes of grief a few years ago, I read in Healing the Heartbreak of Grief, by James Flamming, an encouragement to move through grief toward hope by dreaming about your future. This is my encouragement for you as well as we head into 2020.
This week’s challenge is to begin the process of creating a vision of who you want to become. I call this “Creating Your Future Life Vision.” The idea behind the tool I am offering this week is to dream about your future, unrestrained by what you think is possible or attainable. What would you like for life to look like at the end of 2029? It may seem impossible to imagine, but the tool will guide you through your dreaming. It may seem like a waste of time to you, but I have found that the very act of crystallizing dreams moves us toward those dreams. The other benefit is that by articulating our dreams we put words to what we value the most. Our dreams clarify our heart.
Like the Whole Life Assessment, Creating Your Future Life Vision will walk you through your dreams across 8 different categories of life. This helps round out our dreams, making sure we haven’t neglected a critical area of well-being.
The process of Preparing for a New decade that we have undertaken over the last few weeks is based on the belief that we are more malleable than we realize. I am a vastly different person than I was in 2010. The upcoming decade will grow us, or we will languish. So much of what is ahead of us is not in our control. That is true for all of us. What we do control is our perspective, our attitude, and our preparation. These three have more impact in helping us overcome the most difficult of circumstances than we may ever know.
I pray that we together may find joy and peace and increasing faith in the years ahead. I pray that we might grow into deeper relationships and greater purpose and impact in a world that desperately needs light. Even in these last few weeks of 2019, we have the opportunity to shine that light. Move toward good and move toward God today.
