21 Steps to Awesomeness

As I was checking out my blog stats the other day I realised that many of my most popular posts all have something in common: NUMBERS. Check it out:

• 16 Tips to Simply Your Life (And Increase Your Productivity)
• 6 Things To Stop Caring About Today
• 4 Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Do Kettlebells

And I totally get why this is. Most of us are busy people with busy lives, and so when we come across a post like “5 Ways to Fix Your Marriage”, or “12 Tips for Awesome Abs”, it grabs our attention and pulls us in. There is something attractive about a nice clean-cut formula – a simple set of principles to apply or steps we can take that will put things right.

But here’s the deal. There are no magic formulas or quick fixes in life.

I’m not saying these tips or steps aren’t helpful. I really believe in the steps I’ve written about. But the reality is that life is complex, and the idea that you can break it down or fix it all in a few steps is rather silly.

The truth is there are a million steps.

And a lot of the time we don’t even know what those steps look like. Or we may not be willing or able to take them at any given moment. And they’re probably different for you and me.

And this is not a bad thing. It’s actually a really good thing. Something that I believe can ultimately bring us closer to God.

As Donald Miller writes in his book Searching For God Knows What, “I have come to believe the sooner we find this truth (that there are a million steps) beautiful, the sooner we will fall in love with the God who keeps shaking things up, keeps changing the path, keeps rocking the boat to test our faith in Him, teaching us to not rely on easy answers, bullet points, magic mantras, or genies in lamps, but rather rely on His guidance, His existence, His mercy, and His love.”

Will I continue to write blogs with “tips” and “ways” to live better and more intentionally? Absolutely! But if you want “21 Steps to Awesomeness”, I’m afraid I can’t help you today. You’re just gonna have to go out there and be awesome all by yourself.