“Why am I where I am?” Have you ever asked yourself that? I have, more times than I can count.
The question might pertain to life or career or your place in a club or organization.
On my way to church I came up with four possibilities, although there are more.
Lack of effort
Not giving your best, putting in the reps and doing your homework are all signs pointing to either entitlement or arrogance. Nothing, in this life, just comes to you, you have to go get it.
Lack of education
This is not about degrees, this is about a willingness to learn and listen. Reading books, watching YT videos, finding a mentor and actually experimenting, doing the thing, and failing because failure is one of the best ways to get an education.
Lack of creativity
Have you tried this? Have you tried that? Maybe you’ve not allowed your mind to wander beyond the practical and into the outrageous, the improbable or the “that’s so crazy it might just work”.
Lack of curiosity
Maybe you don’t care what’s beyond the horizon, what’s over the mountain. You have settled for what your senses have given to you and that’s enough. You’ve settled for what is and stifle any urge to think of what could be.
The dead end answer is, “God put me here”.
I call this a dead end answer because it is the least challenging and it could be wrong. This answer also absolves us all responsibility, “If God put me, who am I to question it?” We should question it, pray about it and test the waters to find out if where we are is where we’re supposed to be.
Certainly, God putting you in a place can be true but how do you know unless you’ve asked, unless it has been tested? God gave us a brain as well as a heart and we should use it to question, to explore, to challenge where we are in life, otherwise we may find ourselves disappointed both in God and ourselves.
In the end, if I was supposed to be somewhere else, I guess I would be, but even that reasoning is not satisfying.
I’ll keep trying, testing and questioning, but in the end, faith in what God is doing, both in me and around me, will have preeminence. I trust myself partially, but God, fully.