Taking Inventory

A New Year.

Full of promise. of hopes and dreams. of goals attained and unattained.

Full of opportunity..for good, for bad, for indifference.

It's customary at this time of year to take inventory, and it struck me this morning how little I do this with my life.  Inventory.  What do I have an excess of? What am I running low on?  Am I where I wanted to be? Am I where I could be?

It can be so easy to take inventory of others...how are they treating me? I wouldn't do that. I like how they are like this...but sometimes, we need to shift the focus of our appraisal inward. (The speck and the plank in the eye, and all that good stuff).  

This morning I started thinking about my own life.  I am very happy with where I am.  A college graduate, a prospective medical student, a wife with a loving husband, a daughter and a sister with a supportive family, a friend, a believer in Jesus Christ and His power and love.  But I also realized how little effort I sometimes put into these roles, these responsibilities towards those closest to me in life.  How often do I settle for a comfortable interaction or a selfish existence, rather than straining my own time, energy, and budget for those I love?  I'm not saying I always do these things, but there is so much MORE I could do...and in the end, will I be satisfied with a life that is lived 50/50...or shouldn't I give all that I possibly can to make my friends feel appreciated, to help my husband's dreams and aspirations come to fruition, to give an abundance of love to my family?!  I am doing these things now, but if I am honest with myself (which I am truly trying to be), they are not close to the center of my existence. Far more often than I consider these things, I consider what I want, how things affect me.  But that is simply no way to truly live.  And so, my New Years Resolution is not so much for myself this year.  I resolve to pour myself out for the people I love.  I want to give recklessly, to love unconditionally, to care without reservation.  I want to be more about my Father's business and the people He has placed in my life, and much less about my own business.

What do you resolve to do this year?  Taking inventory of your life, your actions and inactions, your motivations and aspirations...what would you like to see polished and brought into the light?  Or discarded in favor of a new and greater thing?  It is such a beautiful thing to be honest with oneself, and to find that though we are all broken, all clumsily searching our way through this life, there is hope for restoration, hope that a better way does exist and that we can become the person we planned to be all along!