Swim Out of the Corner

Welcome to another episode of Vivid Grace. I’m your host Wes. Join me as we strive to be intentional in developing lives that are fulfilled, balanced, and authentic. Let’s work together to make our passions lived out and our Visions come true.

Welcome back. I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas. We are rapidly approaching the end of 2021 and stepping into a brand new year. In this podcast series we’ve spent time considering Values and Vision and looking at ways to make them practically come alive. There is so much more then I want to say, but we’re going to cap this conversation off by looking at Jonah.

As I mentioned last week, Jonah is not who you think he is. This is not the man who was swallowed up by a large fish, but he is, in fact, a fish. I can’t help but wonder if there wasn’t some irony in the selection of his name. For you see, Jonah wasn’t any old fish he was a brightly colored goldfish. One day his owner, wanting to clean out his bowl, filled the bath tub and placed Jonah in it. It took Jonah’s owner about an hour to finish cleaning the bowl. When he returned to place Jonah in his usual home he discovered something that made him grin.

Though the entirety of the bath tub had been filled, Jonah was instead swimming in tightly-looped circles in one corner of the tub. About the same dimensions as the bowl in which he usually resided. Jonah had the entire tub to swim free, but he still believed he had only that small space of his bowl to exist in.

I’d wager to say there are a lot more Jonah’s out there than that single goldfish. It’s mildly humorous to hear when in regards to a small fish, but how many of us live our lives swimming in one small corner? We have the entire tub available. We could swim and dive and twirl and experience something that we never have before. Instead we stick to what we know or what we think we know. As the old adage goes, there’s comfort in what we know. There’s comfort in continuing a relationship with someone who really doesn’t have our best interests at heart, but we know them. There’s comfort in remaining in the same area where you grew up even though everything you want in life could be found elsewhere. There’s comfort in sticking to the same routine without ever deciding to step outside of it.

As we approach the start of the new year there are many who will evaluate the past year and come up with a list of goals that want to accomplish in the following. They want change to be brought about. They desire it. But why then do so few people ever follow through with their committed goals? Let’s consider a few points.

Firstly, at the risk of sounding cliché: people don’t set realistic goals. You’re not going to lose twenty pounds in ten days. And if you do please see a doctor immediately. I always ask people if they think their commitments to work towards between the end of one session and the start of the next are realistic. (A little pro tip, if you ask someone to measure how likely they are to follow through from 1-10 and they answer 7 or lower they’re probably not going to follow through.) So as you step into the new year if you have things you want to achieve there’s nothing wrong with dreaming big. Give yourself a plateau to reach, but understand you’ll need to implement several smaller, manageable goals as you work towards to creating change.

Second, people attempt to make change alone. It’s so difficult to follow through with any commitment alone. AA strongly pushes that any who enter recovery have a sober support network and a sponsor. Why, is it because they want to micromanage someone’s recovery? No, because whether we want to admit it or not we’re shaped by those we’re around. Around active people, you’ll be more likely to be active to. Around people who like watching Youtube constantly you’ll find you time spent watching Youtube goes up as well. And when we share our commitments with others we have a greater chance of follow through because we get the value of another’s feedback and support. Making a change for a day is easy, bringing about lasting change is not. Don’t let pride or stubbornness get in the way. We all need help. No one whoever accomplished anything great did it alone – they just happened to be the one who got the credit for the achievement.

Thirdly, a lot of people attempt to make change, but they create goals that never really takes them out of the corner of the tub. It’s true any progress, no matter how small, is worthy of celebration, but often we make goals that on the surface sound like they’re making change, but aren’t. Let me give a personal example.

I’ve always enjoyed video games as a form of relaxation. In fact, I will almost always choose them over watching a movie or a TV show. But as with anything, too much is a problem. Recognizing this, I decided that I would limit my time to two hours a day. That sounds like a realistic goal – something very attainable that can be followed through. Here’s the problem, a critical fact that most overlook. Change isn’t just about rewriting the behavior it’s about retraining the mind. You see, several days I would decide to play my two hour time at the start of the day. And about 50 percent of the time I’d stick to the two hour mark. Often times it went over for one reason or another. But the issue wasn’t so much the success vs fail rate, the issue was once I played I allocated processing power in my brain to only video games.

Until I worked at BestBuy, I didn’t understand the differences between storage space on a computer and RAM or memory. Storage space is how much a computer can hold. The greater the space the more programs, documents, and images it can store. Memory measures how much information can be handled at one time. It was explained to me like lanes on a highway. The more lanes the easier the flow of traffic. Our brains aren’t much different. Your brain and my brain only has so much memory space. So when I start my day whatever I started with has priority memory space allotted to it. If I start my morning in God’s Word I’m more likely to think about what I had read and less likely to have that space filled by other things. So when I started in the morning with video games, regardless of whether I adhered to the two hour limit or not, video games were on my mind for the rest of the day.

So though my goal to limit to two hours seemed like a good one, it actually wasn’t going to bring me out of the corner. I had to change it to: I don’t play until after 7pm. You hear alot of programs urge its participants to do their workout first thing, get it out of the way. Is that really the best attitude for change? Get it out of the way. To me, that sounds more like a nuisance than a goal to be reached.

If there are things in your life don't just look at replacing one thing for another or limiting time, consider how much memory space is allotted to it. If your brain has four lanes what are you going to put into each lane? Try to cram more and it's going to get backed up and turn into a nightmare. You'll feel overwhelmed and discouraged and probably toss in the towel. Want to exercise more? Than more memory space needs to be given over to prioritizing exercise. Want to be a more loving and patient person? Than more memory space needs to be given to choosing your words and biting your tongue.

It will be hard at first. Most habits take about thirty days to form or break. But know that if you're not given any space on the road to the change you desire it's not going to happen. It's hard to pull into a three car garage when there's already six cars in it.

With 2022 coming right up I’m guessing there will be many who have plans and changes they want to make. Go for it, give it your best shot. But don’t do it alone. Don’t come up with goals you can’t complete. And consider whether your goals are really going to steer your out of the corner into the rest of the tub or keep you anchored to where you are.

I want to end this post with a prayer of blessing. If you wish to join me, I invite you to bow your head.

“Dear Heavenly father, I thank you for this blog, for its idea, the equipment, and the ever-expanding ability to do it well. I pray that you would continue to guide my efforts to have an impact and influence over my environment. Help me to honor you in all that I say and do. Bless each person who reads this. I ask that you will help them live out their values and pull back the curtain over their vision.

Be with all of us as we step into 2022. Give us wisdom to know when we are in the corner and when we need to make change. Help us to live a life fuller and more abundant. Restore each of us this year. Restore our nation. Restore its soul. Help us in this next year to begin swimming in the entire tub. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.”

Thank you everyone for listening today. Please feel free to share these blogposts with friends and family. I can’t do this alone and you’ll be the deciding factor in whether this practice grows or not.

I look forward to next Wednesday. Until then, let’s all be intentional to step into a fulfilled, balanced, and authentic life.