Just Continue That Thought...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 1228). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) This sounds great. A Mustard Tree Bob says, “Jesus told His friends nothing less. He talked about mustard seeds and said they were the smallest kind of seed. The fact is, they’re not. Because I’m a lawyer, I checked. The smallest seed in the world is a Peruvian orchid. It weighs less than one twenty-four millionths of an ounce. The story isn’t about the seed though; it’s about the tree it grows into and the rest it gives to those who need it most. I’ve done a couple of big things but a lot more small ones. You have too. God can use both, I suppose, but I think He delights in the small stuff a lot more. “Other than my kidneys being permanently shot, I’m just fine after getting malaria. I’ve crossed kidneys off of my donor card. They’re just no good anymore. I’m trying to grow a strong heart to make ...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 1184). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) It really can! Bob says, “I try to find reminders about the power we can experience together everywhere. When we’re in Canada, we see thousands of sea otters drifting along on the top of the water in the inlet. They’re everywhere—kind of like Priuses. Did you know sea otters hold hands while they’re floating? It looks a lot like they’re going out on dates with each other. After seeing so many sea otter couples drifting two by two through the water, I figured there had to be some reason for the hand holding. I dug a little deeper and it turns out the answer is simple: they don’t want anyone to drift away. He goes on, “As you pursue your ambitions, you’re going to need some hands to hold and some friends to love so you don’t drift off into the open waters. In other words, you’re going to need a community...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 1128-1129). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) He didn’t and He still doesn’t even during this time that we are in. Bog says, “He didn’t have any middlemen, and perhaps you shouldn’t either. Sure, He spent time alone, but it wasn’t long before everyone showed up. He didn’t have someone vetting everyone who came His way either. I have a couple of friends who put loads of barriers between themselves and everyone else under the banner of efficiency. That’s fine, I suppose, if that is the messaging you want to release into the world. But what is efficient isn’t always effective. The people you spend time with will play the largest part in the ambitions you achieve, not the minutes you saved each day by avoiding them. Be available. Talk to everyone. Become their student, not their teacher. Love’s goal isn’t ever efficiency; it’s presence.” He goes o...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 1030-1031). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) That is a part of the process of pursuing. Bob says, “The truth is, you’re probably going to need to make a couple of easy things uncomfortable. If you’re going to live fully awake and full of anticipation, you need to spot those areas in your current life where you’ve slipped into numbing routines that are putting you to sleep. “Perhaps the routines that once brought some positive rhythms to your day have become a bland, enslaving drumbeat. Here are some telltale signs. Maybe you have become generally dissatisfied and listless. Perhaps you’re short with the people you love or respond to small inconveniences with disproportionate annoyance. If this is you, you’ve got three choices: wake up, chill out, or get a puppy. You can have ours. If you want to press through the resistance you’re facing, you...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 1015). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) Fantastic! Bob says, “One of my personal practices is to memorize each of them. Try it sometime. It will bring tremendous focus to your day and meaning to your interactions, and it will amplify your faith. Here’s how to do it. Almost everyone knows the first miracle Jesus did, right? There was a wedding celebration and they ran out of wine. Jesus took some jars of water, turned them into wine, and the party kept going. What I’ve been looking at aren’t just the miracles, but what was happening around the miracles. At the wedding, Mary leaned over to the host after he spoke to Jesus and whispered, ‘Do whatever he tells you.’ This is my hope for you as you pursue your ambitions. Whether faith is important to you or not, whether you talk to Jesus all the time or almost never, I hope you will take the ideas in t...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 1007-1008). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) Could that be you and me? Bob goes on, “Actually, it’s more sinister than that. It’s not stopping you on the way to the starting line; it’s keeping you from even getting your jersey and running shoes on. The fix is as simple as it is hard. We need to wake up. This is going to take more than just smelling the coffee. It means getting out of bed, planting some coffee trees, having some patience, picking the beans, doing the roasting, and grinding them into something more useful.” He then says, “Take the next step. Don’t just look awake; come alive to who God has made you to be. Practice walking around fully awake to yourself. Take notes, sing songs, laugh a lot, smell the flowers, roll on the grass, write the letter, take the class, make the call. You’re not doing this just for fun; it’s one of your f...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 915). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) Let’s see what Bob says. He says, “It’s not. Hate is merely the opposite of love, but not its enemy. Hate only has as much power as we give it. Love works the same way. It’s fear that stops love in its tracks every time. If you think about it for a moment, most of what we do is motivated by either love or fear. The trick is to figure out which one is doing the talking at any particular point in time. As we’re figuring out our ambitions, we need to figure out what’s been controlling our lives.” He goes on, “That can be confusing, though, because the voices behind these competing influences of reflection and reaction sound a lot like us. Because they are us. If we take the time to listen a little closer and with some discernment, we might find out that some of the ideas holding us back didn’t actually or...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 891-892). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) He really does care! Bob says, “I didn’t grow up in the Church, and while I speak at quite a few faith gatherings, one thing I’ve found to be true is that people don’t grow where they are merely informed; they grow where they are fully accepted. Before we go any further, let me get this out on the table where we can talk about it. You are loved and accepted. One hundred percent. No qualifications. No prerequisites. You can’t be good enough, smart enough, or nice enough to be loved by God. He decided He would love you before you decided you were interested in loving Him back. Even if God is no big deal for you, your life is a big deal to Him. You are some of His most creative work ever. Pursuing your ambitions needs to start from a position of acceptance, not compliance. Compliance only lasts until you de...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 861-862). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) We do, don’t we? Bob says, “The fix is a simpler, more intentional faith, not a busier or easier one. Complicated theology isn’t bad; Jesus just never said it was a prerequisite or qualification for the unschooled, ordinary people He invited to follow Him. Certainly, learn a ton about what you believe, but don’t be like the self-identified teachers who gave educated waves to Him. You don’t need a bunch of twenty-dollar words to couple your faith to your ambitions. When your faith is anchored by the few things God said we should care about, it will be more than enough to keep you clear and focused on the road ahead.” Bob continues, “Let’s say you clear the room of everything in your faith and ask yourself, ‘If I had to add one thing back to my life, what would it be?’ It sounds like one of those mome...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 769). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) And that is a very good question, isn’t it? Bob says, “God made us to enjoy each other and to reflect Him, and He derives tremendous joy when He sees us pursuing our unique desires with the skill sets He put in our individual tool boxes. I’m not really sure where He stands on corndogs, but I know He’s inviting us into lives that are more expansive and expressive, more loving and unselfish. He wants us to reflect His character in what we want and have these desires dwarf anything else that gets in the way. I’m certain He’s not asking you to mimic someone else’s ideas, desires, and dreams. Sure, be inspired by the lives other people are living and riff on them if it helps you get clarity, but as Sweet Maria tells me all the time . . . keep your eyes on your own paper.” He goes on, “So, let me ask you agai...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 717-718). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) And there will be push back on our dreams. Bob says, “If the front door is locked, you can walk away or look for a window that’s ajar to crawl through. Some of your ambitions are going to take time or a little creativity to figure out. Don’t quit on them. Wake up to new ways to get there, then do what it takes so you’re ready when your time comes.” He goes on, “Guess what? For years you’ve already been quietly curating your life without knowing it. You know what works and what doesn’t. What lights you up and what bums you out. What lasts and what disappears. We need to figure out what you’ve come up with so far so we can figure out what to do next. Trust what you’ve learned already; let it be your Sherpa. “Once again, the best engine to drive our ambitions is a strong sense of purpose. There’s...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 650). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) So, where are you? Bob says, “I have a silly game I play with myself a dozen times a day when I walk into various rooms. I try to figure out where north is. Try it now: count to three, then point your arm in the direction where you think true north is. Even if you’re in an elevator or a waiting room, in a classroom, just got pulled over by a cop, or are in the dentist chair. Ready? Go. I carry a compass with me in my pocket, but you can check the compass on your phone and see how far off you were. Here’s the point: nobody has it all figured out. With the speed we’re moving, it’s easy to get a little turned around and a couple of degrees off.” He goes on, “This tees up the next question I have for you: Where are you? “At first glance, this one seems a little easier to answer. We’re in the line at Mc...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 626-627). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) And we need to do what we can to find it. Bob said, “You may not even know about these places or have taken the time to explore them. Answering the question Who are you ? requires we stop entertaining ourselves building snowmen on the surface and get under the ice cap. That’s the only way to figure out what’s really going on underneath our actions.” He goes on, “If we can learn what the core motivations behind our actions are, we can figure out where they came from and take the action necessary to make progress forward. Not a course around them but through them. It can sometimes be weird and ambiguous work to access our big ideas, and headway is often made through small openings. Yet this work is absolutely necessary if we want to make some bold moves toward those few ambitions that will be worth t...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big (Kindle Locations 586). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) Striving to understand is so very important in life especially when it is us. Bob says, “A few years ago, someone I loved had a stroke. This is a cruel medical problem because often, in addition to causing physical limitations, it robs its victims of some of what they cherish the most—their memories. The doctor explained how the brain attempts to knit itself back together and recreate the pathways and circuitry disrupted by the stroke. The doctor recommended photographs be up on the walls of the hospital room to help jog her memory as her brain reconnected with itself. She would stare long and hard at the walls and point. One by one, she figured out the photographs. ‘That’s my husband. That’s my daughter. This one is our dog.’ It took a while, but eventually she figured out every photograph—except one. It wa...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book,     Dream Big (Kindle Locations 519-520). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) No he didn’t. Bob says, “He didn’t tolerate rookies who pretended to have gone All-Pro and have it all figured out but were just faking it. Once we get real with where we actually are and our desperate need for God’s help, He’s got a person He can do something with, and He’ll drop the people you’ll need in your path to help. Your job is to find them.” He later says, “Start with acknowledging that deeper longing within you. If I had to take a guess, that’s why you’re here. You can feel it. I don’t even have to define what it is—you know exactly what I’m talking about. It is that ‘something more to life’ rumbling around in your gut, that tug drawing you toward a scary, audacious dream. It nags you when you feel stuck at a job you once wanted but have since outgrown. It fuels the late-night ...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book,     Dream Big   (Kindle Locations 449-450). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.) That is the truth, isn’t it? Bob says, “We smoke or cuss or dress or act like someone we really aren’t to gain acceptance from people we don’t really know. We’re all going to make mistakes. Some are premeditated and weirdly intended to be self-destructive. Others just arise simply because we don’t understand what is happening around us. Those are the mistakes that remind us of our humanity and help us be truthful with ourselves about the fact that we don’t have it all figured out.” Later he says, “I used to think that we had to have our act together for God to use us and for our ambitions to be attainable, but I don’t think that anymore. Here’s the incredible thing: I couldn’t even take my own temperature, but God still finds a way to use me. He’ll use you, too, if you’re will...

A thought by Bob Goff, from his book, Dream Big   (Kindle Locations 391-392). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition. (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)   That’s an important thought, isn't it? Bob says, “It’s not found in familiarity or approval or popularity either. It is discovered somewhere far deeper within us. Maria (his wife) lives her life solely and sacrificially for our family and a handful of friends. She not only helps us better understand the complex world we live in, but she also helps me get ready each day so I don’t leave the house with one pant leg tucked into my sock. “I’ll admit, it’s a lot of work to live with a guy who acts like he’s sponsored by Red Bull. They call my drink of choice at the local coffee stand ‘Goffee.’ It’s two shots of energy drink and three shots of espresso. I may die young, but I’ll be wide awake when I do. Sweet Maria likes to say I’m the balloon and she’s the string. This beautifully describes...