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Dreaming Big

Posted on Saturday, March 7, 2020

Since Thanksgiving my wife, Sophie, and I have been fully submerged in both the rainy and holiday seasons. At home in Wisconsin during the winter time of year, life slows down but yet it always finds a way to speed up at the same time. This is not a negative thing at all, as we love all Christmas parties, family gatherings, and fun busy stretches of time. However, apart from an amazing 9-day stint with friends over New Year’s, most of each day here has been spent in preparation for the future: reading, listening, learning, studying, and getting better at simply “being”. The vast majority is Spanish, ministry and Yanesha based topics that will begin in April, but the excess of time has naturally brought to light some pretty awesome conversations and dreams. 

            I’ve always been a logical person and like to think in ways that we Northern Americans like to call “smart”, “safe”, “practical” or “in reality.” At a healthy level these are good things and my goal is to never completely toss them to the side. However, three influences have helped change this and increased my focus on words like “risk,” “uncommon,” “trust,” and “the dream”: the incredible personality of my wife Sophie, more time accompanied by less distractions, and Jesusonce again pushing me in directions I know are beyond myself. 

            Don’t worry Mom, I am not riskier now than I was during the years you watched over me, but here in Peru over the last couple months there’s been a real conviction that so many paths we take are potentially selling ourselves short. Fear, societal norms, distractions, and comfort have a strong place in the world right now. When I was a kid and answering questions like “what do you wanna be when you grow up?” I answered fluidly what job sounded the coolest without mentally paging through all the pros and cons. Now, my first thoughts can so easily turn to bills, insurance, and the option of free weekends. An image of me face to face explaining future plans to Jesus probably ends with Him giving me a pep talk. Side-note here: financial stability is important and a job that doesn’t do this isn’t a job. Also, I never want my work to be my identity anyway, but the main point here is how fairly easy I can justify reasons not to dream big in any type of way. The Bible encourages us to have a childlike faith and I want to stretch myself and put down all barriers that are potentially getting in the way of the person Christ created me to be. He won’t love me anymore than He already does right now, but I am pretty confident I’ll love the journey He’s given me a bit more!

            I mainly wrote this on here to encourage a few of you who have realized you’ve settled in your life. Taking risks and being uncommon is a whole lot more fun than the safe route, which by the way automatically includes the failures, restarts, and boring seasons that will occur. For those that fully enjoy accounting or that same piece of toast every breakfast, no judgment at all. Taking a risk definitely looks different for everyone. For me, I’ve been thinking over a couple big decisions like the career I enter into (I’ve always thought PT, which still sounds awesome and by no means is settling, but other ideas have come to mind) as well as the small things (which probably end up bigger than they seem) like the food I eat everyday or even how I spend every evening or morning (less and less on phone is a good start). I’ve been trying to live with a lot more intentionality and that’s absolutely included a lot more dreaming, with even some small steps to make those dreams “the reality.” So yeah, I’m not asking you to compare yourself to me, and I am not even one bit judging the choices you make. Rather, I challenge you to push yourselves past anything that holds you back from chasing after those crazy goals you had as a kid, and probably still do today.

Here’s one brief Peruvian example of intentional living and following through on a small goal. For basically 4 months I’ve felt a little más o menos (not so good) in the stomach compartment. It’s crazy how even through that it took me months to finally drastically improve some eating habits…us humans get stuck in patterns pretty easily. Now, and thanks to research, recipes, and grocery lists made by Sophie as well as specialty items like pro-biotic pills and homemade kombucha, I’ve got more energy and more time available outside of the restroom! I’m sure some parasites won’t care at various point within the year, but the couple weeks of following through on some goals has definitely made a difference. 

Hopefully you were encouraged and laughed a little. If you're even a little bit interested in missions through GoCorps, don't let fear stop you from potentially going to where God will do amazing things in your life!

Matt

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