Starting is the one immutable requisite to finishing. I sometimes make life so difficult, so complicated. I have a need to plot, to plan, to figure everything out, but nothing ever happens until I start.
I love to write. I used to sit and stare at the screen waiting for an epiphany. Needing inspiration, a direction, a divine deposit of intervention. I still do sometimes. Writing is about starting. When you start to write words they meander at first, but then they find a path. This might be a divine intervention, it might be a canvassing of the forest for a path, and we follow the path once it is found.
Life is like that. Sometimes I don’t know what to do. I am not sure where I’m going. I want a clear path, but I don’t see one. When I start with the thing I do know, the thing that is clear, or even when I just pick a direction and start walking, it is a supernatural phenomenon how I come across paths, good paths, fulfilling paths to follow.
If I sit in the middle of the forest crying because I do not have a clear path, I will not find a path. I have to start. You have to start. Sometimes the starting is not even looking, it’s just walking, exploring, because there’s nothing else to do but start.
I have to start every single morning. I sit and I look at a blank page. If I don’t start nothing comes. I think the same is true of prayer. We have to start before the presence fills the room, we have to start before we feel a connection. We feel we have to have some routine, some formula, some feeling before we can pray. Actually, we just start and the wind will faithfully take us into the place of secret revelation.
Starting is like hoisting the sail on a boat and waiting for the wind. Sharpening the pencils is not starting, putting words on paper is starting. Pushing the boat into the water is not enough, you have to hoist the sail.
[shareable]Pushing the boat into the water is not enough, you have to hoist the sail.[/shareable]
Something has to move before it is directed. If I’m writing words I can shape them, if I’m sailing a boat I can steer it only if its moving. I am almost persuaded that God’s shaping and steering only comes when we are moving.
[shareable]Your life can only be directed to a destination if you are moving.[/shareable]
If I want to write a book I have to start writing. If I want to go on a journey I must start walking. If I want to connect with God I must openly approach.
Starting is faith. We believe enough to look. We believe enough to start. We believe enough to search. Seek and you will find. Finishing is not possible if you don’t start.
[shareable]Finishing is not possible if you don’t start.[/shareable]
