The Surprising Power of Self Doubt & How it may relate to your Higher Calling
It’s a quiet sunny cold morning in Northern MN today. I’ve already reheated my coffee once and my hubby is off to dump off our old refrigerator at the recycling plant… kids at their grandmas and the step-kiddos at their moms and baby is napping . So … in typical fashion I start perusing on my phone, in particular, my audible wish list. I have close to 100 titles on the list and as I was scrolling, I was suddenly struck by the thought that wow! All these authors actually dared to publish something! They went out on a limb and wrote. They took a chance! That is pretty cool.
And it got me thinking that …. What if we all dared to do that? Maybe it’s not write a book but maybe it is to do something that we are being called to do (or maybe its more like a thought that persists and persists and ultimately inspires us!) but nonetheless, that we decide to simply start. To simply do. DESPITE feeling “not good enough” or not having a valuable message, a good enough story or enough experience , enough whatever to share into the world.
I recently listened to a podcast where the podcaster shared that “your job or your role isn’t necessarily your purpose” so stop putting pressure on yourself to make that fit into your “calling”, but also acknowledge that it’s pretty sweet if it does! 🙂 For me, I keep coming up with ideas I want to write about and I finally decided that I just need to actually write! I need to get back to sharing the things I learn and discover so that maybe they will also just brighten or lighten a fellow highly sensitive momma’s day and bring a tiny bit of hope, joy, peace.
SO, what if we just decided that we are all works in progress (because we are!) and despite all our doubts and feelings of inadequacy we all showed up and shared? I know in my heart all of us are made in God’s image and have our set of gifts, perspectives, life experiences! What if we just decided to help someone like us who is dealing with a similar problem as we have but we are just even a step or two ahead of them and could offer some uplifting piece of wisdom? That would be sooo wonderful for them!
So, back to my audible wish list. It caught my attention how “similar” a lot of my titles were, and yet, each of them offers a little twist and perspective. Rick Warren’s “The Purpose Driven Life” is not identical to Lysa Tyrkhuerst’s “Living Life on Purpose” in same way, Erica Layne’s “The Minimalist Way” is not identical to Joshua Becker’s “The More of Less”. Yet, although similar topics of course, each offering their own twist and helping a broader set of people through their own variation of the book. What if Oprah decided there were already too many people interviewing other people and just stopped. She would have missed the opportunity to share her gifts and missed out on inspiring sooo many.
I also am wrestling with the idea that there’s already so much content out on the internet, especially relating to the various ideas about living a more peaceful, joyful and purposeful life (as My blog title suggests haha), what else can I add to this?
However, as we all can be inspired by those before us, we also have a pretty cool life story and God given gifts to share. Let’s trust that by “doing our thing”, God will also “do His thing” and keep our lamps of inspiration burning as long as we keep trusting and keep our focus on that. He can share things through us if we are trusting and listening to our hearts and keep prayers that God will help us express what needs to be said. We all long to feel like we are living a meaningful life and that starts with acknowledging our self doubt but not letting it actually get in the way of us shining our own lights and sharing our own perspectives and stories. They have NOT been done before in this world because YOU have your OWN version to share that may help someone more than others in a similar niche or topic would have helped.
PS: There’s too much positivity in the world, said no person, ever. 😉 Wink.