“Many frustrated people try to live their lives as others have defined them.”

A thought by Henry Cloud, from his book, Changes That Heal (p. 124). Zondervan. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)

And we don’t want to be frustrated, do we?

Henry says, “God has given each of us certain talents and abilities, and he holds us responsible for developing them. Many times, people do not explore their own talents. They accept others’ definitions of them, without seeing if these definitions fit. Sometimes they will deny their own gifts and live vicariously through the gifts of others.

He continues, “I remember one extremely artistic and creative teenager whose parents, both physicians, decided that he would continue the medical tradition. He tried to fight this label to little avail; he could not perceive his talents apart from his parents’ wishes for him. He tried to be a doctor, but his medical school education was fraught with difficulty because he did not have the talent. He finally finished school but was in serious trouble in his residency.

“It was only after he failed as a resident that he finally became separate enough from his parents to figure out where his real gifts lay. He could own his own talents and forsake the feeling that he ‘should’ have the talents his parents wanted him to have. He carved out a satisfying career in the creative arts. But he had to go through the arduous task of ‘finding himself’ apart from the ones he loved.

“We lose our true self when we so conform to others that we lose our own separateness and identity.’

Henry later says, “We are separate people with separate identities, and we must not be conformed into someone else’s wishes that may conflict with what God has designed for us. We must own what is our true self and develop it with God’s grace and truth.

“Peter says it like this, ‘Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms’ (1 Peter 4:10). Jesus stated it like this, ‘To one he gave five bags of gold, to another two bags, and to another one bag, each according to his ability’ (Matt. 25:15). God has made each of us different, and we are responsible for discovering our gifts and developing them.”

Let’s live our lives as God has defined it.  Okay? 

Yes, yes