Finding Your Five Things

Five Things is very counter cultural. When everything around you is saying buy more, have more, be more; I offer you the path of less. The path of less stress, less guilt, and less keeping up with others will lead to the more we are actually looking for – more peace in our lives.

My goal is to help you to find and start living out your five things.

So often we are taught overtly or implicitly that life has to be hard and there’s something inside that feels like if it’s hard it must be the right thing. Something you’ll hear frequently around my house is that feelings aren’t truth. Often times feelings are based on experiences and not facts.

When we start living what we love, and living out what we were created for, then even the mundane tasks aren’t so brutal anymore. When we make time to do the things that we love and make us come alive then doing other necessary tasks isn’t so soul crushing anymore, especially if our paradigm shift allows us to view those as contributing to our core life goals in some way.

We can not give what we don’t have. If we are not living in peace than we don’t have it to give away.

Some core foundations to Five Things are found in these three truths.

1. We were created by God.
2. We are ridiculously and lavishly loved by God.
3. We are valuable and worthy of love.

When we know and understand these truths, we know that we were created with a  purpose. We were created with unique gifts and talents because the world needs what we have. Living with the understanding that we were created drives us to the fact that God loves us so much that He wanted to make us, and then Jesus paid the price so that He could have a relationship with us. If Jesus would pay such a high price for us, then we need to live in the understanding and reality that we are valuable and learn to love ourselves the way that He does.

Having these truths in our understanding allows us to work from love rather than for love and sets the ground work for Five Things.

When we live knowing we were created with a purpose it is important to find out what it is, or we’ll end up looking around at what other people are doing and thinking that is what we are supposed to be doing. That is where the idiom “Keeping up with the Joneses” stems from. Trying to keep up with what other people are doing when it’s not something we were made for is a sure recipe for jealousy and burn out.

Finding your Five

So you might be wondering, “How do I find my five things?” and that is a great question. There was a study done which found that of all we do, there is only about 5% that only we can do. The other 95% someone else could do. So the first step is to look at your life and figure out, of all the things are you doing, what is that 5% for you? For me, I am the only person who can be the wife of my husband and the mother to my children so doing a good job in those roles is high on my list of five things.

Next, take a look at what makes your heart happy. What is something that you look forward to doing? I understand this might be a tough process. I’ve met people who I’m quite sure have invested nothing in their own happiness in years! Dig deep if you have to and think about the last thing that made your heart come alive and write that down.

We were created because the world needs us. What is something that you can do to help others or make a difference around you? It is important to include this in our list of five things.

This process is meant to be freeing, not something to put more restrictions on us. Your things can be as broad or as particular as you need, and just as seasons change, it is okay for them to change as well.

Just as we are figuring out what we want more of in our life it is also good to take a hard look at what you don’t need to be doing and to give ourselves the grace and freedom to cut them out. Learning is a process and I’m not joking when I say I had to learn how to say no and not feel guilty.

 

I’m so excited to hear from you and all about what you were created for! If you’ve been around here a while, and have found and been living your five things, I’d love for you to write a review on the Facebook page about your experience! Thanks so much!