"How can I prepare myself for a fulfilling life?"
I am me. In all the world, there is no one else exactly like me. There are people who have some parts like me but noone adds up exactly like me. Therefore, everything that comes out of me is authentically mine because I alone choose it.
I own everything about me - my body, including
everything it does; my mind, including all my
thoughts and ideas; my eyes, including the images of all they behold; my feelings, whatever they might be - anger, joy, frustration, love, disappointment, excitement; my mouth and all the words that come out of it - polite, sweet and rough, correct or
incorrect; my voice, loud and soft; all my actions,
whether they be to others or myself.
I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my
fears. I own all my triumphs and successes, all my
failures and mistakes. Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me in all my parts. I can love me and be friendly with me in all my parts. I can then make it possible for all of me to work in my best interests.
I know there are aspects about myself that
puzzle me, and other aspects that I do not know. But as long as I am friendly and loving to myself, I can courageously and hopefully look for the solutions to the puzzles and for ways to find out more about me.
However I look and sound, whatever I say and do,
and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time is me.
This is authentic and represents where I am at that
moment in time. When I review later how I looked and sounded, what I said and did, and how I thought and felt, some parts may turn out to be unfitting. I can discard that which is unfitting and keep that which proved fitting, and invent something new for that which I discarded.
I can see, hear, feel, think, say and do. I have
the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be
productive, to make sense and order out of the world of people and things outside of me.
I own me and therefore I can engineer me.
I am me and I am okay.
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"How can I prepare myself for a fulfilling life?"
The God of the universe, the Holy Trinity, IS, and He created me. I am fearfully and wonderfully made; there are people who have some parts like me but no one adds up exactly like me; all of us are unique creatures of, and special to, the God who IS.
I have a desperate problem though. This God is Holy, and I am not. This God is Righteous, and I am not. This God is Perfect, and I am not. I am a sinner. Everything that comes out of me that falls short of the Glory of God is authentically sinful, and my fault, and I alone choose it, and I have no hope of approaching this God who IS, in and of myself. But there is HOPE. This God, Holy, Perfect, Righteous, came into the world in the Person of His Son, took all of my authentic sin and faults upon Himself, and now offers me the free gift of relationship with Him; the only thing in the universe that can give me fulfillment. He made a way where there was no way; to the praise of His glorious Grace.
God, since He IS GOD, owns everything about me, and is Sovereign over me - my body, including everything it does; my mind, including all my thoughts and ideas; my eyes, including the images of all they behold; my feelings, whatever they might be - anger, joy, frustration, love, disappointment, excitement; my mouth and all the words that come out of it - polite, sweet and rough, correct or incorrect; my voice, loud and soft; all my actions, whether they be to others or myself.
God owns everything; I own nothing; and I pray to receive all things with an open hand. I am responsible for bringing my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears, in line with the will of God.
When I am triumphant and successful, it is all by the power of God's Grace working in me, and therefore all to the glory of God and His Grace, and when I fail and make mistakes, it is that same Grace that upholds me, lest I be consumed.
Because God owns all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with Him, and others, and I am now able to realize in an ultimate and purposeful sense who I am and what my purpose in life is. I can love others, and myself, because He, being the very essence of love, has shed His love abroad in my heart.
Since God IS GOD, and is completely Sovereign, I have no power to work anything outside of His ordained will. Yet, He has promised to work all things together for the good to them that love Him and are called according to His purpose. In other words, He works in my best interests, and what I think are my best interests are not necessarily what He thinks my best interests should be.
Outside of Christ, I am ultimately unable to know any aspects about myself that puzzle me, nor am I ever able to realize anything whatsoever about myself. But as long as I abide in Christ, I can courageously discover the solutions to the puzzles, and find out more about who I am in Him, and who He wants me to be.
I pray that however I look and sound, whatever I say and do, and whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time exalts my Lord and Savior, Christ Jesus, a brings Him glory and honor, not disgrace.
Since God IS reality; reality being that which is absolute, unchangeable, actual and true, and truth is genuine and authentic, then all that I am; if I am to realize anything at all about myself at any given moment in time; is necessarily determined by what THAT reality has decreed about me with regard to my actions. Where I am at any moment in time is not based on what I think, but on how that corresponds to the revealed will of the God who IS.
When I review later how I looked and sounded, what I said and did, and how I thought and felt, I will find that ALL parts will turn out to be unfitting. Only God can discard that which is unfitting. And since there is nothing in me which proved fitting, having the unfitting discarded is necessitated upon me having submitted to His revealed will to receive His forgiveness, and "fittingness" in and through the Person of His Son. Once I do that, God makes me a new creature; He discards the unfitting, and makes me fitting in Christ, to the praise of His glorious Grace.
It is only by the Grace of God that I can see, hear, feel, think, say and do. It is only in Christ that I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive in those things that really matter for eternity, and to make sense and order out of the world of people and things outside of me.
God owns me, therefore He conforms me to the image of Christ. God created me, He loves me, He died for me, He rose for me, and in Him, and by His Grace alone, I am okay. In Him, and Him alone, do I find my fulfillment, and may He always work in me to do what He created me to do: Glorify and exalt Him.