Live Your Life

For the last few weeks, I have not posted as much as usual here at the Burnsland website. I have been inundated with calls and emails saying, “Hey Steve, why haven’t you been posting as much as usual?” Okay, so actually, I have not heard from anyone, but that’s okay. Because like me, I am guessing that everyone else is busy living their lives. I hope that is the case, actually.

These days, it seems there is so much pressure to do certain things. Maybe that is due to everyone wanting to feel accepted by being like everyone else. Maybe it is due to that fear of missing out (I am not quite cool enough to just type FOMO). Or maybe it is just that we have so much to choose from now and we want it all.

Some people feel pressure to post Instagram photos every day, and for those Instagram photos to look perfect, whatever your definition of perfect is. And those photos have to be taken at just the right place, too. If you look at Instagram enough, you will start to see similar photos taken at the same few places. That is the pressure of wanting to be like everyone else.

Whenever a theme park opens a big, new ride, that new ride will have a line that is a mile long, and you have to wait for hours in that long line. That would not be so bad if they had a restroom and a concession stand in the line. But when I see a line that long, I start to think about all of the other things I could be doing in that same amount of time. Others will wait, as is obvious from the fact that there is indeed a line that long. That is that fear of missing out.

Many people are the same way with new movies. You need to see it on the first weekend, when everyone else is seeing it, too. If you don’t, you are missing out on something major. Not to mention that someone else will spoil it for you by telling you what happens in the movie.

And then there are all the other things that are competing for your time and attention. And money. People will tell you that you need to do them, too. Or maybe you tell yourself that you need to do them, like make a bunch of posts on your website.

Do Your Things

Instead of doing all of those things that others tell you that you need to do, just do your own things. Live your life. Make your own choices.

There are certain things that you do actually need to do. Eat. Sleep. Take care of yourself and your family. Work. Those things are definitely important, and you should have those as priorities. I would say that your spiritual health should come even before your physical health. Those two are actually more related than you might think.

But after those necessary things, do what you want to do. Live your life. Don’t let what you do be dictated by others. When you do something, you don’t even have to post about it on social media, believe it or not. The whole world does not necessarily need to know when you go to the grocery store or cut your toenails.

Don’t get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with doing things that everyone else is doing. But only if you choose to do them because you want to do them, not just because everyone else is doing them. Even if everyone else pours a bucket of ice water on themselves, you don’t have to do it. I still have not, and I have been going through life just fine. And warm.

So go live your life, as long as it is the life you are choosing for you. And if it keeps you from making blog posts or social media posts, then that is just fine, too.

Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” - James 4:13-15