Sustainable Pure Vocation

I've often found action that comes from a pure place is tough to sustain.  When I find something pure I enjoy doing that excites me, I want to keep doing it and turn it into a living.  Equally so, I've found that monetizing something pure I enjoyed doing takes the joy out of it, rendering is unsustainable.  I think we can love our work, it just needs to be work that can work for us.  I loved filming skateboarding as a kid, and thought I was meant to do that for a living, but it involved me living 2 states from home and frankly wasn't very enjoyable once it became a real business.  That work, at the end of the day, just didn't work for me.

My new policy is- like your job as much as it will let you love your life... Love what you do; without over doing it, and protect what is pure, always.

Good right, err

A couple close friends have recently told me they think I am a good writer... which, don't worry, was a compliment that would be lucky to make it to my toes, let alone my head. 

I started thinking about what a good writer looks like; do they often times spell words twice twice on accident, and write things no one else can comprehend, and use spell check and thesauruses and dictionaries?  Are they afraid to write due to what others may think?  Is their mission ambiguous, and do they change the sub-title of their blog more than once a week?

If so, then maybe I am a good writer... like your Mom thinks your good at sports.  Either way, I think my tactic to being a "good writer", is simply subjecting myself to the process of: right?  err...  Which is to say, my thoughts are formed like a blind man collecting rocks.  I'm inquisitive of my conscientious self as I record the meanderings of my mind; like, "errr", should I change that, again?  right?  err...

Delivery

A new habit I've been working on is hand written letters.   One of my goals this year is to mail 3 per week.  A lost art I value, I'm hoping these unexpected notes of simplicity will somehow bring simple blessing to others.  A question I often find myself asking myself while walking to the mail box, especially if I am walking passed the persons house I am mailing the letter to, is why not save the stamp and hand it to them?  The answer of coarse, is that the cheapest delivery, is not always the best.  Especially when it comes to art.

"The Blessed Life" = Toilet flusher

A friend recently lent me a copy of this book, and although the subject matter interested me, the delivery felt like a sham.  An entire tract on obligatory giving, rules, and regulations.  My 10% isn't good enough if I pay my cell phone bill first?  Wait, it's not the heart anymore?  It's literally the order that the world views our actions in which we're judged?  And we're supposed to give with the idea that financial blessings are guaranteed back to us?  Give me a break.

God knows the first fruits of our heart, and there's no such thing as a fruitful giver whom has expectation on his return.  Giving isn't an investment, it's an acknowledgment of our position before God.  Some people may be able to benefit from this book if the goodness of giving is a hurdle for them.  It all felt like an unnecessary anecdote to me, though.  It's a pretty slippery subject for one as potentially biased as a pastor to write on.  I doubt his motives were impure, I just know Jesus said, "it is better to give than to receive", and that's enough said, in my book.