Horizons: Own Your Journey–An Abridged Version
Rebekah Bollen
We at Curate believe your sky is ablaze with color: blues, yellows, oranges and pinks that deepen when you pay attention to your story. Your story isn’t just happening to you. Your decisions, your opportunities, have already and will continue to shape who you are.
How many beautiful sunsets have you glossed over because something else had your attention? The colors in our horizon are the same. They become richer when we pay attention.
Much of what I will share is wisdom from others and my own experiences—the questions, mis-steps, and aha moments—as I’ve wrestled to make sense of my life story up to this point.
FIRST CHALLENGE: Be attentive.
How can we own our journey if we don’t first pay attention to the terrain, conditions, resources, ourselves, and our fellow travelers?
My husband is currently preparing to live out a life-long dream of going on a through-hike. He’s read endless accounts of other’s experiences and we’ve watched what feels like hundreds of YouTube videos. As I’ve watched this preparation, I’ve been struck by the careful eye and intensity with which he asks questions and the simplest details he’s noticed. The more he looks, the more he sees.
The more we practice being observant, the sharper our sense of observation becomes.
Several years ago I was challenged through Psalm 119:105. It reads “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Consider this; how much does a lamp or flashlight light your path? God’s word is a lamp. I don’t need to spend all of my energy in the “not yet” moments. I need to look at what God has illuminated. He hasn’t given us all the information, but he gives us enough to take the next step.
You can sharpen your observational skills through prayer, journaling, silence and solitude, personality assessments like Clifton Strengths (it’s free in Career Services!), reading biographies, devotional life, goal setting, and conversations with a mentor.
Asking good questions also sharpens observation skills. Questions like: What brings me joy? What comes naturally? How do I like to form and grow relationships? When have I felt the most at peace? What makes me anxious? Do I avoid or embrace challenge?
For me one of the most difficult things is my willingness to see what is and not what I want to see. In fact, here are a few dangers that can be very real barriers to clarity of vision.
Perfectionism. A badge of honor many of us wear but often is a burden that creates stress and strain in our lives. It can also be a lens we look through that alters what we see and experience.
In her book, The Gifts of Imperfection, Brene Brown says this: “Perfectionism is not the same thing as striving to be your best. Perfectionism is not about healthy achievement and growth. Healthy striving is self-focused—How can I improve? Perfectionism is other-focused—What will they think?”
Think about the small but powerful shift. How can I improve? vs. What will they think?
Comparison. Another person’s horizon, their journey, becomes the lens through which we look at our life. Comparison can distract from your ability to see your story and calling unfold.
Pay attention to others’ stories but be discerning. Ask yourself what is helpful, challenging, or inspiring. Look for ways to be inspired and challenged without falling into perfection and comparison.
While one extreme is to be completely consumed with what others think, its opposite is to be so self absorbed that we crumble under the weight.
One of the prominent messages from society is learning to love ourselves. This seems good. Be comfortable with yourself. Appreciate how you’re made. Be grateful and proud of the body God has given you. But the reality is this can manifest in different, less productive ways. It becomes an invitation to focus entirely on yourself, your needs, and your happiness. If you struggle to love or accept yourself, then it becomes yet another failure.
When I was a Hillsdale student my father said the college years are a great gift because it is perhaps the only time, where your calling and work is to focus primarily on yourself—your intellectual, social, and emotional growth. He then said that this gift can also be the problem. We can become self-absorbed and our needs can crowd out our responsibility to and respect for others. We can believe the world orbits around our own desires, preferences and dreams. My journey is important. But not more important than another’s.
SECOND CHALLENGE: Own your story.
Your story isn’t just happening to you. Your decisions and actions have and will shape your horizon lines. Opportunities pursued or turned down will direct your path. Relationships formed and lost will shape the way you interact with those you meet along the way.
What we do matters and we should get excited about this! We are active participants in the opportunities and outcomes in our lives. If what we do, the decisions we make, the words we speak, matter, then we have hope that we can navigate and grow through difficulty and pain and we can genuinely and eagerly celebrate success. We have the capacity to grow, learn, pivot and pursue the paths we set out to embrace even if the conditions aren’t ideal.
Ownership and agency are hard because we can’t avoid asking the hard questions of where and how we have contributed to the outcomes. Please hear me. You are not 100% responsible for all of the good and bad things in your life. There are many things that we have no control over. But even in those moments, we have the opportunity to own how we move forward from the pain or challenge. When we have ownership we are greeted with both hope and pain, anticipation and fear.
I once read that God is not actually concerned with the exact stops on our path, he is concerned with our heart and obedience. Not with the how but with the why. This was an unsettling idea. You mean there may be no “right” choice? What about the “one” man God has for me?!? In the same breath, this was incredibly freeing. If there isn’t always a single right choice (sometimes there is), or a clearly defined path, then my choices matter but they don’t carry the crippling weight that I may mess up my entire life with one wrong choice. Now, I’m being a bit dramatic here, but I would guess that there are a few of you in this room that may know a little about how this feels.
This realization started a slow reshaping of how I look at taking risks and making choices. Being in God’s will was not about which highlighter I chose, it was about my desire to be obedient to what he asks of me in his Word.
THIRD Challenge: Embrace Failure and Suffering
The final challenge is to develop a healthy relationship with failure and suffering. My own relationship with failure and suffering has been shaped by a number of examples from others.
Elisabeth Elliot was a missionary, author, and speaker. Her first husband, Jim Elliot, was killed in 1956 while attempting to make missionary contact with the Auca people of eastern Ecuador. She later spent two years as a missionary to those who killed her husband. After living in South America for many years, she wrote over twenty books, and became a widely known author and a speaker.
Elizabeth was a woman who knew suffering. She lost her first husband in the mission field and her second husband to cancer after three and a half years of marriage. Much of her life was given in service to others and the Lord. Her books don’t sugarcoat pain but instead seek to understand and illuminate the hope we have in dark times. She writes in her book, Suffering is Never for Nothing,
“The deepest things I have learned in my own life have come from the deepest suffering. And out of the deepest waters and the hottest fires have come the deepest things that I know about God, and I imagine that most of you would say the exact same. And I would add this, the greatest gifts of my life have also entailed the greatest suffering. The greatest gifts of my life, for example, have been marriage and motherhood.”
She continues on to say, “I’m convinced that there are a good many things in this life that we really can’t do anything about, but that God wants us to do something with.”
What can we do in and with our suffering? What disposition should we have toward failure?
Perhaps failure is the most important teacher.
I recently re-read The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp, an award winning choreographer. She quotes Leon Battista Alberti, a 15th century architectural theorist, who said, “Errors accumulate in the sketch and compound in the model.” Her takeaway? “Better an imperfect dome in Florence than cathedrals in the clouds.” It’s not if we make a mistake, what matters is how we respond to the mistakes that will happen.
Gretchen Rubin said, “Failure is the atmosphere of growth,” on a podcast titled Fail Better. The description of the podcast reads “To be human is to fail—period. And not just to fail once, but to fail a lot.” Why are we, and so many others, so deeply concerned by failure? And if it is something we do so often, why are we so afraid of it?
So, let’s learn together how to be women who fail better, and I would add, fail forward.
FIRST ACTION: Renew Your Mind
Where our focus goes, we follow.
In downhill skiing, we’re taught to focus on the path we want to take, not the obstacles to avoid. What happens if you focus on the tree as you go downhill or the flag if you are skiing a slalom course? You’ll hit them. We collide with the things that have our attention and focus.
Where our minds go, we go. What we bring into our minds impacts the output in our lives. In Building A Resilient Life, Rebekah Lyons writes:
“Our thoughts shape our perspective, our perspective shapes our attitude, and our attitude determines our outcomes.”
This is not a new idea. I think most of us are familiar with “I think, therefore I am.” Renee Descartes.
Scripture is also full of verses that make this point. One is Romans 12:2 where Paul challenges us to not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but transformed by the renewing of our minds.
Rebekah Lyons argues that Paul’s “assumption is that natural forces of life will steer our bodies away from sacrifice toward an oath that doesn’t lead to our flourishing but perhaps instead to our demise. The only way to fight this trajectory is to be transformed. We do this through the renewing of our minds.”
Science has also proven we can rewire and retrain our brains. This is not my wheelhouse, but trust me and Google “neuroplasticity” to dive deep into the research that supports this point.
What is filling your mind? What influences are taking your mind and thoughts captive? What are you consuming and how is it shaping your mind?
And to take these questions one step further. How is your thinking about self, others, relationships, work, goals, and accomplishments being shaped by what is filling your mind? How will you work to renew your mind after today and what action steps will you take toward that goal?
Here are a few areas of influence to consider in your own life: Music, podcasts, social media, friendship/community, conversations, money and material possessions, and hobbies.
SECOND ACTION: Create A Framework
What kind of scaffolding do you need to support your goals as you work to “own your life”. I’m talking about systems, habits and accountability.
There are three elements that make up the scaffolding that supports my life.
Regular rhythm of reflection and evaluation
Tiny habits and mini goals
Accountability
My prayer is that you approach each day with curiosity and courage, attuned to all that is happening in and around you.
The definition of the word Curate is “to select and organize or bring together.” The women who’ve been brought together here have something they are excited to share with you. They are quality role models who are passionate about growth in their own journey and yours, and are excited to engage with your questions to understand yourself and the world around you. What a gift it is to have these conversations as a community of women in all different stages of life.
I want to close with words crafted by the Curate team designed to capture the spirit of today and their hope for you going forth.
Our hope is that Curate emboldens you to pursue your horizon with faith and confidence. Our Summit speakers will challenge and encourage you to dream bigger, live bolder, and love wider. Our stories—our horizons—are ours, and the possibilities are endless. What colors will you choose? Who will you become?
Don’t waste the journey. The colors radiating from your horizon line are the beginnings of a sunrise.
Your story starts now.
Listen to Rebekah’s full talk here!
Rebekah Bollen | ‘06
Rebekah is our lovely Dean of Women. In her free time you can find her spending time with her husband, traveling, or admiring the work of her favorite artist Jaime Beck.
