Author: d.k.tornstrom

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SingleLife: The Importance of Relationship

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The Set Up

A couple weeks ago a good friend told me that she wanted to hear what I had to say, not just links to other people’s writing and or thoughts. She was right, I have not been sharing as much as I ought, or as often as I might like. So I am trying to fix this.

What does that have to do with relationships?

Everything. If I don’t foster and maintain relationships with other people, single or not, I am not heading in a healthy direction. Me guided solely by me is a frightening thought, and I have been there, done that, and never want to again.

Because we have a solid foundation of friendship as the basis of our relationship, my friend is comfortable enough to call my bluff. And I am comfortable enough to swallow my pride and listen to what she has to say. Not just because she is right, but because our relationship matters to me. It makes me better, and, I trust, makes her better as well.

Friendship and Relationship

I don’t have any ground-breaking elucidation to share about the difference between friendship and relationship except to say that the terms do convey different things. Often relationship implies something more intimate while friendship implies something more platonic, and intimate does not necessarily mean romantic.

Before David was King of Israel, he was a soldier and servant of King Saul. Saul had a son, Jonathan, who we are told loved David as himself:

After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself. From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return home to his family. And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. Jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic, and even his sword, his bow and his belt. 1 Samuel 18:1-4

When David hears of Jonathan’s death, he writes a lament, saying:

I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother;
you were very dear to me.
Your love for me was wonderful,
more wonderful than that of women. (2 Samuel 1:26)

Love is part of relationship, and should be differentiated from our modern romanticized concept of love (a very limited concept, at that).

David’s lament tells us two things:
1. Love is bigger than romance, sex and marriage
2. A relationship grounded in Love is more fulfilling than any other, romantic or not

David and Jonathan did not love each other romantically – that theory is simply juvenile when you take context into account and understand the character of each man. The beautiful part of this story is that it portrays the power of healthy intimacy in friendship and relationship, and eschews the concept that intimacy is not macho. Both David and Jonathan were fierce warriors, undaunted by fear, confident in their faith in God.

Maybe their relationship was a model for the relationship God wants to have with us.

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SingleLife: Better than Sons and Daughters

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SingleLife Logo While doing research for the book I am writing on living the single life, God revealed passages in Isaiah that I had never understood before.

For thus says the Lord:
“To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
who choose the things that please me
and hold fast my covenant,
I will give in my house and within my walls
a monument and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that shall not be cut off.”
Isaiah 56:4-5

Those of us who are single, whether by circumstance or choice, can pursue a rich spiritual life on this earth, spreading the gospel and sharing our faith in Christ with others, gaining for Christ and ourselves, the spiritual sons and daughters promised in Isaiah.

A few weeks ago I was overjoyed to discover a chapter of a book by one of my favorite authors, John Piper’s This Momentary Marriage: a Parable of Permanence was titled Single in Christ: A Name Better than Sons and Daughters. If Piper made this connection I knew I was on the right track.

Today in researching further on Piper’s website Desiring God I discovered a wonderful sermon on this very topic by John Piper himself. Please check out this sermon online here.

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Letting Go: Work and Parkinson’s Law

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lettingGo_WORK Letting go of work?!  Where do I sign up?

Before you get too excited, I am not suggesting you give up working or that work is bad.

I am suggesting that we tend to let work take over our lives in unhealthy and unproductive ways.

 

Let me start with Parkinson’s Law (click here for a helpful article).

Parkinson’s Law – Work expands to fill the time available for its completion.

 

Did you catch that? It’s our fault that we work too much. We assign more time for tasks than is necessary to accomplish them, and often create more stress and worry by allowing ourselves more time to think about something we should have already been able to complete.

 Imagine you are at work, and the boss gives you an assignment Tuesday morning with a due date of Friday morning:

Your brain subconsciously does the math (T-W-T-F = 4 days), counting Friday as a whole day even though the assignment is due that morning, and you automatically assign the project a 4-day time value for completion.

Only, the assignment could probably be completed in the next hour before you go to lunch.

For the next 2 1/2 days you use this looming assignment deadline as an excuse to miss meetings, stay late at the office, and generally give the appearance of being exceedingly busy on a BIG assignment.

Truth is, Thursday 4pm rolls around and you haven’t even started the project yet, and now you reallize that you don’t have a fourth day to complete it, and you have to get it done tonight!

You panic a bit, go for a coffee, and proceed to make the assignment as big as you indicated to everyone all week long, staying until 9pm to get it done.

The fact that most of us work in an environment that expects us to show up by 9am for 8 or 9 hours, 5 or 6 days a week, leaves us with the unpleasant task of figuring out how to fill the time so that we appear to be busy.

For this reason I suggest that the proverbial 40-hour workweek (for many it is more like 50-60 or higher) is doing many of us, and our employers, a great disservice by wasting valuable time and resources. The following practices might increase overall productivity as well as improve work/life balance:

Employees

  • Challenge yourself with shorter deadlines for each new task
  • Reward yourself by using some of the time saved to work on some of your own initiatives (which could lead to promotion, etc.)
  • Set a goal to leave the office by __pm everyday, communicate this with your boss, then show them how much more productive you are

Employers

  • Establish clear rewards for completing assignments early, like leaving an hour early, or inclusion on a cool new project team
  • Give deadlines for assignments that clearly indicate the time it should take to complete
  • Help your employees by prioritizing assignments when multiple assignments overlap

 

Referenced Link:  How to use Parkinson’s Law to Your Advantage, www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/how-to-use-parkinsons-law-to-your-advantage.html

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Letting Go: The Need for Control

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lettingGo_Control

Control

Sometimes I feel like I am in control and other times not so much.

The times I feel out of control are often the times I feel the need to control things the most.

Conversely, the times I feel most in control are often the times I am most free from a need to control anything.

Thus, if you try letting go of the need for control, you may find yourself more free of control (whether it is the need to control something or something that is controlling you).

Giving up Control

The best decision I ever made was to give up control over my life to God, but like Jacob, I am constantly trying to wrestle it back. The wonderful thing is that God gives me grace to wrestle with this issue of control, and little by little by little I begin to grasp what he meant when he said:

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. (Matthew 11:28)

I don’t think Christ was talking about physical labor or work, but rather the labor of our spirit’s attempt to be in control of our lives apart from God.

Letting Go of Control is not Abandoning all Control

Of course I am not saying to abandon all control and thus remain children, “tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes,” but rather let go of our need to control our lives and “speaking the truth in love…grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ.”

We can only do this if we learn to let go. And it’s okay to wrestle a bit, just keep in mind with whom you are wrestling.

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SingleLife: One Worth Living

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singleLife-OneWorthLiving-20Many people struggle with the idea of being single – running constantly into a barrage of inane commentary and advice such as:

        • it’s just a phase you’re going through
        • you just haven’t found the right one yet
        • God has someone for you, just be patient
        • you must not be trying hard enough
        • you’re just too picky

All of the above is crap – for the most part.  The state of being single is not purgatory, it’s not simply a way-station of suffering you must endure as an incomplete person before finally finding that someone who will make you whole (think Jerry McGuire’s defining moment when he says, “You complete me”).

You are a Whole Person

You are a whole person just as you are.  Yes, God said it was not good for Adam (man) to be alone, and created Eve and established marriage as two joining together and becoming one.  Two become one.  1+1=1.  Not 1/2 + 1/2 = 1.  It was two single whole individuals joining together to become a new combined whole.

If we continue with the math analogy, two wholes must give up something in order to become a new whole.  As we all know in math, 1+1=2, so in order for 1+1 to equal 1, something must be subtracted from each.  I’ll simply state this as what we all accept as putting the other’s needs before our own, such as:

  • finances are no longer separate but combined
  • decisions on how to spend your time are no longer autonomous
  • you may have to do things you don’t like, simply because your spouse needs you to do them

So, in mathematical terms, married people are theoretically less whole than single people.

One Worth Living

There is so much we can do and achieve as single people that we cannot do within a marriage relationship.  I just watched the Ashton Kutcher film Jobs (about Steve Jobs, founder of Apple Computers) the other night, and was struck by the harshness with which Jobs rejects his girlfriend when she tells him she is pregnant early on in the growth of Apple Computers (he basically throws her out of the house).  While not condoning his actions or the choice he made, I believe he understood fundamentally that Apple Computers would never be what he envisioned it could be if he had to attend to the matters of being married.

In 1 Corinthians 7:32-35, the apostle Paul describes the difference between the focus of the unmarried versus married.  Take a look (I have take the liberty to divide the passage into bullets for easier dissemination):

  • I want you to be free from anxieties.
  • The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord.
  • But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided.
  • And the unmarried or betrothed woman is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit.
  • But the married woman is anxious about worldly things, how to please her husband.
  • I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.

 

Paul is not against marriage, but is concerned about things that create worldly anxiety in us and wants us to be free of them.    A married man must concern himself with how to please his wife, and thus his interests are forever divided between what pleases his wife and what pleases God, himself, his company, etc.  The same goes for the married woman.

The key here, is that Paul wishes us to remain single as he is (1 Corinthians 7:7) in order that we can secure our undivided devotion to the Lord.  Thus, choosing to live the SingleLife is a high calling, not a punishment!

The SingleLife is One Worth Living simply because it allows us the best opportunity to secure our undivided devotion to God.  So focus less on why you are single and more on devoting your life to God.  I guarantee it will be worth it.

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Single Life: A Blessing (not a curse!)

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SingleLife (TM)

I am currently writing a book on living single and the unique blessings that come to us through living the single life and that come through us to others through the way we approach and live out the single life.

As a visually-oriented person who has always been fascinated by typography and text based logos, I was playing around with different thoughts, words, phrases and fonts related to this theme of singleness, and I eventually stumbled upon the image you see here.  I am hoping that this, or some improved version, might become a badge of honor at some point for those of us who choose to boldly embrace the single life.

To describe in summary what I believe are the blessings of the single life, I have chosen to lay them out in the vein of one of my favorite movies, Fight Club, as the Rules of SingleLife:

  1. SingleLife is not LonelyLife
  2. SingleLife is about intentional community
  3. SingleLife is freedom to pursue deeper relationship with God
  4. SingleLife is freedom to take action in pursuit of justice
  5. SingleLife is accepting a unique call to do “Awesome”

Of course, there are no real rules to the single life, but I hope these serve as a guideline for starting to live a SingleLife with purpose and meaning.  These “rules” will hopefully be improved upon over time and I intend to talk about each more specifically over time (and in much more detail in the book).

There is no curse in being single – your family is wherever and with whomever you create community.  My hope is that your community not only includes other people but also a deep relationship with God that gives hope, freedom and a passion for justice.

Please leave feedback on any of this – whether you have additional “rules” to add, you love/hate the badge image, you think I’m just another crazy single person trying to compensate for [fill in the blank], etc.   I love being single, and am constantly striving to live the SingleLife the way the apostle Paul advocated (I said “striving to” – I am nowhere near there yet) in his letter to the Corinthians:

I wish that all were as I myself am.  But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another.
To the unmarried and the widows I say that it is good for them to remain single as I am.
(1 Corinthians 7:7-8)

Join me on this journey of living the SingleLife with purpose!

 

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Letting Go: My year of Simplicity (so far)

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lettingGo_logo-02Last year I read a little book titled One Word That Will Change Your Life, by Dan Britton, Jimmy Page, and Jon Gordon, which outlined the advantages of choosing just one simple word that would shape your life for a particular year.

No big new year’s resolutions, no audacious long-winded goals, just one word.

Last year my word was “focus.”  I aimed for it, but not sure I fully achieved it.

This year my word is “simplicity.”  I am learning that the idea is to use this word as a kind of laser guidance system for my choices and actions for the year, and the journey is more important than any particular destination.

So far this is what my year of simplicity has looked like:

  • I “pruned” my closet and dresser of clothes I no longer wear
  • I organized my paper files and shredded or threw out years of bills and financial records that should have been discarded years ago
  • I went through my bookshelves and weeded out the books that “served their purpose” and could be either sold or donated
  • I simplified my grocery shopping to rice, pasta, black beans, eggs, tuna and vegetables
  • I started listing furniture or gadgets on Craigslist that I don’t really need or wouldn’t want to move
  • I began packing up my CD collection for storage until I can plan a yard sale
  • I contacted a real estate agent to discuss the possibility of selling my condo
  • I started reading books on or related to simplicity, including the following
    • Simplicity: The Freedom of Letting Go, by Richard Rohr
    • Freedom of Simplicity, by Richard Foster
    • The Power of Now, by Ekhart Tolle
    • If You Want to Walk on Water, You Have to Get Out of  the Boat, by John Ortberg
  • I started sharing what I have learned through a series of Letting Go posts (a full list of past posts is at the bottom of this post).
  • I began thinking about Letting Go as a practical concept that can be taught and practiced by others (more on this to come later)

I am probably forgetting a few things, but you get the idea.  Or, more likely, you might be asking, “So what?”

Well, at the start this was tough.  I discovered I didn’t want to just “let go” of my stuff.  So I had to exert some discipline and start small.

What I ended up realizing once I got going, was that as it became easier for me to let go, I encountered a different problem:  few people wanted to buy my stuff, and even giving it away was more difficult than I had imagined.  This inspired a new thought:

If no one else wanted my stuff, then why did I want it?

This is where I am in my year of simplicity, realizing I am surrounded by stuff that I no longer want, and that very few others might want, and its continued presence in my life is a reminder of just how complicated we make our lives by consuming so much.

To be continued….

Previous posts in the Letting Go series:

Letting Go: 2 Quick Thoughts to Help Let Go

Letting Go: Plans

Letting Go: Why it’s Hard To Let Go of Clutter

Letting Go: Negative Thinking

Letting Go: Judging People

Letting Go: Fear

Letting Go: Other People’s Problems

 

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Letting Go: Other People’s Problems

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Observations of a Pattern

Over the years, talking with people about their lives and where they are versus where they thought they should be or would like to be, I’ve observed a particular pattern emerge. This pattern is not necessarily true for all instances, but was certainly significant enough to warrant some deeper reflection.

I concluded that many people are unable to reach their goals and dreams because they are too focused on fixing or dealing with the problems of other people in their lives.

For example:

  • Financially – A family member is struggling to make ends meet and get out of debt, but cannot say no to her family whenever they ask for financial help.
  • Emotionally – A friend who is having a great day, gets a call from that one friend who always seems to be going through some emotional crisis, and is unable to say no, eventually turning a great day into one of emotional stress.

This is not to say that we should not help others, we should, but within healthy boundaries, making a clear distinction between what is their problem and what is ours.

Boundaries define what is me and what is not me…we are not responsible for other people…[but] we are responsible to others and for ourselves. (Townsend, Cloud. Boundaries)

Burdens and Loads

Authors Henry Cloud and John Townsend make a distinction between burdens and loads in their excellent book Boundaries: When to Say Yes, How to Say No to Take Control of Your Life.  This terminology is taken from the following biblical passage in the book of Galatians:

Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted.  Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.  For if anyone thinks he is something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.  But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor.  For each will have to bear his own load.  (Galations 6:1-5, ESV)

This passage speaks of burdens as something to be shared, while loads are our own to carry.   Townsend and Cloud explore the original Greek words, defining burden as excess burdens – those so heavy they weigh us down, and load as cargo – the burden of daily toil.  To clarify this distinction in modern terms, the authors liken burdens to boulders, which require help to carry, and loads to knapsacks, things we are expected to carry ourselves.

The problems arise when we treat boulders as daily loads and refuse help, or we treat daily loads as boulders that we shouldn’t have to carry ourselves.

How do I know if I have a Boundary Problem?

For starters, we all have need of healthy boundaries, and we all likely have areas where these boundaries need work.  However, for purposes of our discussion here, Townsend and Cloud offer these three statements as a kind of litmus test for whether we are dealing with a boundary problem:

  1. Trying harder isn’t working
  2. Being nice out of fear isn’t working
  3. Taking responsibility for others isn’t working

Final Thoughts

  • If you are taking on someone else’s burdens or loads as your own, thinking that you can fix them, stop for a moment and let the following statement sink in:  You can’t fix them.
  • Now, answer this question:  Can I fix them?  (Hint:  The answer begins with “n” and ends with “o”).
  • Just like when you are on an airplane, when you are instructed in an emergency to put your oxygen mask on first before helping anyone else, you need to know your own boundaries and have them firmly established in order to most effectively help others with theirs.
  • Ask yourself, “Is this my problem, or someone else’s?” If it is yours, then get to work on it and seek some help if necessary, but if it is someone else’s problem, let it go.
  • Saying “No” to someone just might be the best way to help them

 

Disclosure of Material Connection: Some of the links in the post above are “affiliate links.” This means if you click on the link and purchase the item, I will receive an affiliate commission. Regardless, I only recommend products or services I use personally and believe will add value to my readers. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”
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Letting Go: Fear

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Fear.  It can stop us in our tracks, it can send us into hiding, or it can present an opportunity to achieve the impossible.

Take ancient Israel for example, the Israel that Moses led out of Egypt to the edge of the Red Sea.  This nation of newly freed, former slaves of Egypt, were faced with a dilemma:  the Red Sea ahead, and Pharaoh and the Egyptian army closing in behind (you know, a rock and an hard place).  Exodus 14 tells us they were terrified and cried out to the Lord.  Listen to what they said:

They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!”

I thought of this the other day when contemplating my current job search.  “Why did I ever leave my old job?  I would have been better off staying there than leaving and now facing a difficult job search.”  Maybe you’re facing a similar situation, whether it be related to career, relationships, health or something else.

Guess what happens next?  After promising deliverance, God basically tells the Israelites to quit crying to Him about it and get a move on!  It’s kind of like the swift-kick-in-the-rear my mom used to give me when I was being particularly ornery or stubborn.  God calls the Israelites “stiff-necked.”  Pretty much the same thing.

Don’t just stand there, do something!

So, when I caught myself thinking how good I had it back then, I recalled to mind why I left, and looked to the steps I needed to take forward, confident that the Lord will provide.

Contrast the Israelites with another famous Biblical character, David.  This youngest of 7 brothers and a shepherd (who is selected by the Lord to be king, but is all but forgotten or overlooked by his father when the prophet Samuel is sent to find him), is sent by his father to visit his brothers with provisions where they are encamped for battle against Goliath and the Philistines (1 Samuel 17).

David hears Goliath taunting the Israelites and the Lord, and is shocked that no one will go and fight him.  So he offers to do it himself!  Wasn’t he afraid?  Of course he likely experienced fear, but his confidence came from a past record of facing and overcoming fear, having killed lions and bears with his bare hands and his sling while protecting his herds.  Of course, David’s faith in the Lord was a factor as well, as he saw his past victories as not being his, but of the Lord.

So remember, you have faced fear before, and you will face it again.  Whether it is the same old fear (that you are holding on to) or a new fear (that will inevitably come) depends largely on whether you let it stop you in your tracks, or you let it go and tackle it head on, moving forward.

Finally, when you have faced a fear and moved forward, take a moment to register in your mind what just happened and how you feel on the other side of fear.  Recall this moment the next time you face fear, and it might just provide you the swift kick you need to get moving and let it go.