You’ve been doing a lot! At the end of each season and every year, it’s only natural to look back and notice all that’s around and behind us. We’re so often focused on the needs of the day that the very idea of reflection can feel like a luxury. And while the holiday season presents its own kind of busyness, it also affords us a few moments to pause and pay attention.
So…how did you do this year? What milestones stand out? Are there any themes emerging? What (if anything) surprised you? Were there any opportunities or people you overlooked in the moment? Did the year leave you energized, hopeful, overwhelmed, and/or depleted?
Most of us end each season with a long list of things done and undone. We take pride in our gains, highlights, and met goals. We lament our disappointments, wasted resources, and failures. We celebrate, we mourn, we rest, and we gear up for the road ahead.
In other words, we get to make use of one of life’s biggest gifts.
The Gift of Attention
As men of progress, we make a big deal about effort. But growth doesn’t begin with what we do, but where we look. You can swing an axe wildly, and with great energy, but you’ll be much more successful if you look for a tree, take aim, and then go to work.
Where we place our attention informs who we become. Consider how:
- Our attention brings awareness. We notice where we are and who we are.
- Our attention provides reflection. We take everything in.
- Our attention informs judgement. We make decisions based on what we have observed.
- Our attention gives aim. We take our next steps accordingly.
- Our attention allows our time, our efforts, our lives to have meaning. We act with purpose.
Maybe you haven’t been paying attention this year. Sometimes we find ourselves living out of habit, or in reaction to the world around us, or simply to please someone else. It might be that you have forgotten your “why” and are more than a little disoriented.
Returning to that axe metaphor, it’s not just the things we focus on that matter. If you want to be a better woodsman, you’d do well to find someone who already knows what they’re doing. Each of us has people in our lives – family, colleagues, friends, mentors, teachers, guides – that we rely on to teach us the way. We’re no stranger to following and being followed. But everything and everyone we give attention to is not enough to meet our deepest needs, or guide us when the path is long, the route is uncertain, and we’re struggling to put one foot in front of the other.
In the Biblical book of Hebrews, the writer points us in the right direction. “And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith.”
At the end of the year, when you might be all out of effort, the invitation is simple and clear. The best thing you can do for your past, your present, and your future is to put your attention on Jesus.
Fixing Our Eyes on Jesus
We envision ourselves as men in pursuit of progress. But unless we orient ourselves properly, any steps we take might easily take us in the wrong direction.
You may or may not be a Jesus follower, but either way, you’d be surprised what you might discover if you paid serious attention to him. It can look however you’d like, or however you’re able. Allow space for all that comes with your attention: awareness, reflection, judgement, aim, purpose. And in return, you just might experience his presence. And you might (re)discover something you need for what next.
Whether we believe it or not, true progress brings us closer to and more in line with Jesus. And so, wherever and however you find yourself at this very moment, allow your attention to focus on him.
He’s worth every moment you’ve got.
