Move Forward, Not Out

Published on Feb 29, 2012
![Move Forward, Not Out](/blog/cloud-filled-sky.jpg) Lately, I've been contemplating about giving up, because I find little to no solace in my job, or even in the direction my life has been going in the past few months. I do most of my thinking while alone in the car, the radio turned off, and the hum of the engine to keep my mind moving along. Today, on my short drive, I realized that I'm not angry or despondent about the direction my life is going, or even in the job I have. Rather, it's the view that I've been seeing my life. The simple things that I used to brush under the rug have become a huge stopping point simply because I cannot see beyond my circumstances. Naturally I'm a sarcastic person. I get that from my grandfather (on my mother's side), but it gets much worse when you couple that with long work days and a hopeless mindset of worthlessness. The other night as I finished the final touches on a few new sites that I was going to launch, my manager stopped by my office and asked, "How you doing?" I honestly froze. I wanted to unload, but I held back and responded by shrugging my shoulders. The words I kept lodged in my throat. He took one look at me and waved me back to his office. He encouraged me to start looking at the things that I wanted to achieve. Whether that was a new job, a new hobby, or something I was itching to learn, he told me to go for it. There are no ways I can describe that moment, but in a heartbeat I saw everything clearly. The clouds parted and I was staring back at my own life with a new perspective, and it was provided by a fellow brother in Christ who had already seen through it all. It has probably been the first time that I noticed a real mind change in both my attitude and my tired heart. ## Directions There are moments when complete despair can overtake you, but like all things you need to find your niche and move forward. The key is remember that there's still hope despite the circumstances staring you in the face. A moment of pain is a moment of pain, nothing more. We must find new hope in the areas that are tearing us down, and most importantly realize that all things in this world have been overcome. > I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world." > (John 16:33 ESV) Even though this is a complete stretch I will use the analogy of how this site came into existence. One night about ten years ago I sat at a computer and wondered where I wanted to go with my writing. I wanted to be a writer. Articles, stories, poems, books--the whole gambit, because my passion, then and now, was to write. It brought me a stress relief, and a calming feeling whenever I sat down to create a new story, or write a new poem. The site you see now was spawned from that initial thought about wanting to share what I had been keeping locked away. A few years later I started getting heavy into web design, and coding new sites from the ground up. I learned so much about the web that a different passion moved to the forefront. I still wrote often, but I spent time working and reworking a design to make it perfect, so I retooled my site into Drupal, and marketed my work as a web designer from that point forward. And like all dreams that one changed again, however, this time I moved back to a central focus on writing. Directions change often, but the goal and passion remain the same. One passion can see you through a thousand pains. No matter the hurt in your life, or the suffering you are going through right now I urge you not to give up. The hope you seek has already been found, and the pain/suffering of your life has been overcome. Jesus came into this world to free you from the bonds of this life, and to give you the purpose you were meant to have. He is knocking at the door to your heart, and all you have to do is open the door. ## The Undiluted Passion Have you wondered why your job doesn't hold joy in your life? Or why your relationships aren't working? Well, I could say you are doing it all wrong, but I'm not. There is no perfect solution to your issue. I can't rub a lamp and solve the world's problems, and neither can you. We each walk into and out of life with a different mindset and direction. We see the world through slight and different colored glasses, and the only way to see clearly is to take them off. How do you take off those glasses? You can't do it alone. The glasses are the flesh and its passions blinding us from what truly matters, which is God. When we accept Christ into our hearts we're removing those glasses and seeing the world for the first time unhindered. > But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. > (Galatians 5:16, 17 ESV) The battle is on, and the things we put before our lives are blinding us from doing what we were truly meant to do. In the flesh we desire more money, more sex, more comfort, and more of everything. Though to be content we must cast off those passions and take hold of the helping hand. I can't say it much better, nor do I want to beat the concept into you, so I will say this: Go and find Jesus.
Justin Hough author picture
Justin Hough

Chief Development Officer at Hounder. He is a Christian, husband, father, writer, developer, designer, and a digital carpenter crafting amazing web experience. Also, created the Centurion Framework many moons ago.