Glancing to the left, to the right, it appears everyone is ahead of you. For a split second, you hang your head, almost defeated, downtrodden, “How can you get ahead? How can you get further in life? How can you make a bigger impact, do more, do it faster, while still staying on track to keep it meaningful, centered? But they are the same age. But you started together. How did they get so significantly in the lead?”
I am reminded of Philippians 3:13b -“…forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead.” Did you notice, as Paul is writing here, he is not telling you to look or strain to see what is going on to the left. The scripture also doesn’t say, “…straining to the right to look at your perfect friend or neighbor, June Cleaver (or Mrs. Jones).” In this scripture Paul encourages us to STRAIN FORWARD.
The other night, I caught several minutes of a girl on Periscope. She just co-authored a book, lives in South Carolina, has four kids and getting ready to go on a book tour. If you know me well, does this sound like anyone you know?? Hum…..???? Yep… me. As I listened, and of course perused to see that she had 20,000 followers on Periscope… she was getting ready to go on a book tour (which I didn’t do)…. the thoughts began flooding my mind.
I went to bed, 11:30, husband deep asleep already. I must have laid in bed thinking about it for 30 minutes, maybe an hour. I even silently prayed the Lord would give me a dream about my next steps with my book. Surely He wanted me to go on a book tour sometime?!
Though, in my quiet time, I was firmly reminded, Stay In Your Lane. I was not given her path, her plan, her life, not even her book tour plan. God gave me ONE plan, mine. I’m not called to do what others do, I am called ONLY to do what God has called me to do. Like Paul said, straining forward, not looking to the left or right or behind, but only looking ahead. STAYING IN MY OWN LANE. Though it may seem others have gotten ahead of me, are further in life, business, family, as an author, financially, a greater or bigger platform. But GOD has a very specific, He has also ordained perfect timing for each endeavor in my life!
My job? Listen to His direction for my life. Stay on MY path for my life. Not the neighbor’s path. Not the path of this new author. Not the path of the business super star, but MY path, the pathHe has designed for me!
I encourage you, seek Him out. What is the plan He has for you? He gave me the vision of a track meet, standing on the other side of the fence with the spectators. While other people run their race, I can DEFINITELY stand on the other side of that chain-linked fence and cheer for them. As my mom friend volunteers for the events at her church or signs her kids up for the several events they are in, I can CHEER HER ON! I can encourage her, I can wave signs in the air yelling, “GO FRIEND GO!” But when I am called to the starting line, it is no longer time for me to look to the left or to the right, but only to look straight ahead. When the gun goes off, time to run MY race, run MY best, look straight ahead towards the finish line, and Stay in My Lane!