Salt Life

Defining Your Purposes

Last night was our monthly women's leadership training group meeting. We finished up our reading of The Disciplines of the Beautiful Woman by Anne Ortlund and our study of Elijah. Everyone left with a challenge to define their mission by identifying their circle of influence and determining what their life focus is. Here's how we equipped them to get started...

Begin with listing by name those with whom you spend the most time, broken into categories. Example - Immediate Family, Extended Family, Friends and Ministry. Once you have that nailed down, decide whether you should add or remove someone from that list. For instance, are you spending too much time in a problem-centered relationship? If so, begin limiting your time with that person. Or is there someone with which your spending too little time? Maybe a family member or close friend who is getting your leftovers. The key here is to "eliminate and concentrate" as Anne Ortlund says.

Next, decide what your responsibility is in each relationship, what God would want you to do in these relationships, and what is doable in relation to your time investment for each person. Identify specific ways you can enhance your connection to these people. For example, making phone calls weekly, writing notes or taking time to visit or enjoy an activity together.

Once you've ironed out these relationships and the investment you want to make in them, move toward defining your purpose. There are many different ways you can arrange this, but you begin with yourself and move out. For instance, I have two categories in my life purpose - Relationships and Responsibilities.

My personal Mission Statement is -
As a child of God, I purpose to be accountable to the FATHER, my FAMILY, and FRIENDS while maintaining a healthy balance of service and stewardship in all my relationships and responsibilities.

Under Relationships you'll see the following:
Father - To be accountable to my Heavenly Father in all areas of my life including healthy maintenance of my body,mind, spirit & service.
Family - To love, support and honor my immediate & extended family above all other earthly relationships, giving special attention to my marriage first and my children second.
Friends - To love, share & encourage while maintaining an appropriate relationship of accountability and joint service to our families and one another

Under Responsibilities:
Supervise - create a clean, clutter-free, comfortable home environment in which my husband and children find peace & rest in a hectic world
School - instill Godly character & academic wisdom in the hearts and minds of my children growing them into responsible, God-fearing adults
Serve - give of my time & talents in all areas of ministry service whenever called on by God to do so

That's just an example. I've seen it laid out in a variety of ways, but the key is to make it fit YOU in a way YOU can remember it. It's also important to review often, as certain areas of your life do change as you enter different life stages.

If you're at all interested in doing this for yourself, I would recommend you read 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Stephen Covey gives a lot of great insight as to why this is important as well as impressive direction in defining your goals, your circle of influence, etc. I know it may sound overwhelming, but once you walk through it and write it down, it actually is very freeing.

We learned last night that the reasons for doing this exercise are many...it brings clarification, correction and confidence to your life. The key is to realize that "the process is more important than the product" (Covey). God is a God of order and the bible is full of examples of that fact. Jesus was always intentional about how He spent His time-- I, too want to maximize my time on this earth and this is one way to help me do that!

Labels: books, ministry

posted by Kushmama @ 9:01 AM