When You Love Your Lifestyle But Hate Your Life

Mature women everywhere…REJOICE!

I bet you never thought somebody would say that, did you?

But here’s what I love about getting older. Standard of living usually—(and I mean USUALLY)—increases as age increases.

And that’s pretty awesome: those larger paychecks make the “big” house, the boat, multiple vacations a year, and the fancy car possible.

But I’ve also discovered something disturbing:

A lot of people I know love their lifestyle and hate their life.

Impossible, but true.

And the thing is: I don’t even think they’re going to do anything about it!

When you’ve been around as long as I have, it’s easy to put things on autopilot. You tell yourself that the pension you’re going to get when you retire is worth the misery you’re experiencing now. I have a friend who’s committed to working twelve more years in a government job she finds boring and tedious. Twelve years! To turn her back now on that kind of future financial promise is a leap she just can’t make.

But is it worth it?

My husband is getting ready to leave his comfortable job to venture out on his own after 15 years working in a church. It’s a huge leap of faith, and I’m so proud of him because when he tells our friends about his hopes and dreams for his new career, I see the longing in their eyes. They wish they were the ones embarking on a new adventure!

I hear our friends say things like:

I’m too old to change careers.
Who’s going to hire me now?
What if I have to take a pay cut to do the thing I really want?
What will my family do without the consistency of a steady paycheck?

But can you afford not to?

If I were ask you what makes a fulfilling life, my guess is that almost all your answers would be things that are free or almost free. When you create more space and time in your life, you not only discover new opportunities waiting for you but also you find that you are more open and willing to accept them for what they are: not lucky circumstances, but real possibilities.

Love and relationships matter more than money and things.

We know this intrinsically, but we are afraid of the risk. As we get older, we’re not just responsible for ourselves. We have spouses and children who depend on us. We have mortgages and college tuition to pay. Some of us may even be caring for aging parents. The risks are real and anything but trivial.

And the reality is we like the house and the car and the vacations.

Our status symbols have become our status quo.

Depression is the leading cause of disability in the United States among people ages 15-44. It ranks among the top three workplace issues, along with family crisis and stress. (source) According to Fast Company Magazine, nearly 50% of six-figure salaried workers are plotting a job change this year. People are asking themselves, “What do I really want…for my family, from my job, in my life? The answer to those questions will have a direct impact on our future psychological and spiritual well-being.

My husband knew that the time was right to make a change. “If not now,” he said, “then when?” Even though we have two kids in college, five cars (because—teenagers!), a mortgage to pay, and kids in private school, we couldn’t keep putting off the decision. If we waited for the perfect time, we knew we would never make the leap. There would always be something tying us to where we are. He’s making the change because everything he’s done up until now has been preparing him for THIS. VERY. MOMENT.

You can have everything you’ve ever wanted and still feel empty.

What has God been preparing you to do?

Here are 5 things to consider as you ponder what’s next for you:

1) Often other people recognize our aptitudes before we do. Ask the people closest to you what gifts they see in you. Their answers might surprise you.

2) You don’t have to have your entire life journey planned out. Few people do. Life is organic, not linear. Be willing to explore new possibilities and the next right step will reveal itself.

3) Find a community that shares your values and inspires your ideas. I used to be a part of a cohort of entrepreneurs through an organization called Plywood People. I count the five years I spent with those women among the most growth-orienting years of my life. What I learned from them could not be replicated anywhere else.

4) Kids need their parents to model purpose and meaning, not privilege and entitlement. They can sense your restlessness. They know when you’re stressed. Show them what matters by doing work that counts.

5) Work on building wisdom, not a resume. There’s so much more to life than the work you do. No experience is ever wasted. Even if your job no longer challenges you in a way that makes you feel alive, you can still find ways to engage with the world.

In our family, we like to say that when the pain of staying is worse than the fear of change, it’s time to do something different. Sometimes you know what you have to do and you just do it. Sometimes, you need to take a breath and pray about it for a season. Sometimes, even with the best intentions in mind, it just doesn’t make sense to take that leap. And that’s okay. But if you’re being called to STAY, give your work the enthusiasm it craves and give your family the attention they deserve.

Never get so busy making a living that you forget to make a life.—Dolly Parton

When my friend Melanie’s dad retired from his work as a veterinarian, he gave a charge to the employees, and this is what he said—(Melanie wrote them down, and I saved them)—

What is work? Just a platform for relationships. Whatever we do, people are involved on some front. It’s that interface that matters. Work is just the bridge that makes the connection to people. (Thank you, Mr. Rickard)

Wherever we are, we can all do that.

The best of you is yet to come!

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Purposeful Parenting (Part 2): Pay Attention to Me!

This is the 2nd installment of a 5 part series on Purposeful Parenting. If you missed the first one, you can read it here:

Pay Attention to Me!

As calendars go, do you feel like yours is packed? We’re all busy, aren’t we? I don’t like seeing a lot of empty of space on my calendar, either.

High five, soul sister.  

I relish the appointments, meetings, and after-school activities. And if I’m being really honest, the dates don’t just make me feel productive; they also make me feel important.

I read somewhere that the current generation is the first one that will have a documented, chronological history of their entire lives—recorded digitally forevermore.

Confession: I’ve been a die-hard documenter of life since I was old enough to hold a crayon. And I’ve kept every agenda, date book, daytimer, and journal I’ve ever owned.

My life is in those books.

So when my husband migrated the entire family to a synchronized Google calendar a few years ago, I resisted.

I like writing things down because I like the physicality of it. I like being able to turn the pages and touch the spaces filled with notes. I like the blank canvas turned inky with my smudges, cross-outs, and fill-in-the-blanks.

As our family grew and we ended up with four kids in four different schools, the old system began to fail. I missed so many appointments that even I had to admit there must be a better way. An appointment written down in an agenda at home doesn’t do me or anybody else any good if we’re in the car and don’t have it with us and don’t know what’s next, where to go, or how to get there. I don’t care how much time you have, nobody has time for that.

Whenever we write something down—whether we’re typing on our laptop, punching in a reminder on our phone, or slapping a sticky note to the bathroom mirror—what we’re actually doing is making a future promise to ourselves.

And it’s a promise to pay attention.

I don’t have to tell you that paying attention is important because you’ve seen what happens when you don’t.

When we aren’t paying attention, the scale creeps upward.
Junk fills the basement.
Weeds multiply.
Plants die.
Marriages crumble.
And kids grow up.

In fact, when it comes to our kids paying attention might be one of the most important things you can do for them.

As littles, my kids played and pleaded “Look at me.” They’re older now, and the phrase I hear most is “Leave me alone.” But leave me alone is an invitation, too. It’s a clue to pay attention to the swirling inconsistencies going on in the complex world of adolescence.

As a mom, it’s easy to point out all the bad things. I’m the worst about nagging my kids to clean their rooms. I’m guilty of talking about grades more than feelings. I often get in the car and turn on a podcast I like before asking my kids if they want to talk. And that’s because it’s so easy to notice what’s around us and so hard to pay attention to what’s inside us.

But I’m working on it:

• When Christiana works hard at track practice, I say, ‘I’m proud of you for working so hard. You’re getting better everyday.’

• When Gavin plays with his little sister, I say, “Hey buddy, thanks for spending time with your sister. It means a lot to her–and to me.’

• When Aaron is toiling away on his next big business idea I fight back the urge to acknowledge the mess he’s making and instead admire his incredible work ethic and entrepreneurial spirit.

• When Cari Jill asks me to write her a note and leave it in our special envelope, I’ll write something heartfelt rather than hurried.

Art. Inventions. Cultural shifts. Religious movements. They all happened because somebody saw something and paid attention. Scientists and activists, preachers and teachers, took up a cause said, “I can do something about that.”

Noticers make the world a better place to live.

What if for today, in this hard season of purposeful parenting that you’re in, you focused on being a noticer, not because it would necessarily make the world better but because it would make your family better? Intentional families, after all, do make for a better world.

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