Yesterday I wrote about what happens when we lose our passion and promised that today I would share some passion killers and how to get past them. You’ve fallen prey to one of the passion killers of life. I want you to use this as a checklist and ask, “Why have I got the blahs? Why have I lost my zest? Why am I not passionate like I used to be? Where have my expectations and enthusiasm gone for the Lord and everything else?” Chances are it’s one or more of these passion killers.
UNCLEAR VISION
Living without a Life Changing Vision is the most common reason people lack passion. Without a vision for life, why bother? Why put forth the effort? Why get out of bed in the morning? If you have no reason for using energy, why expend it? Why not just check in and say, “Been there, done that!”
The longer you go through adult life without clarifying what is God’s vision for your life, the less passion you’ll have. Because passion and vision go together. Without vision, life is passionless and there’s no reason for enthusiasm over the long haul. Life seems futile. You may feel like Isaiah “I have labored to no purpose. I have spent my strength in vain and for nothing.” Have you ever felt like that? Without purpose, you have no passion. On the other hand, a clear vision creates passion.
[callout]Helpful tip: Sign up to download Crafting Your Personal Vision Statement[/callout]
UNUSED TALENT
God has given you certain gifts, certain talents, certain abilities and He put them in you to live out the vision He has for you. If you are stuck in a job or a career that ignores your talent, minimizes your talent, it’s no wonder you’re going to lose your passion for life. Because there’s a boredom factor. Studies have shown that up to seventy percent of all Americans are in the wrong job. They’re in jobs that they’re not shaped for, that do not use their potential and their talent.
You will never find a job or career than uses one hundred percent of your talents because God never meant for you to find total fulfillment just in your career. That’s why you need to have a ministry where you’re doing something outside of your career, using talents that you’re not using at work in ways that can be used to bless others and help the world and make it a better place. You do it just out of the sheer joy of using your talents.
[callout]Tip: Start doing things, one a time to learn where your talent lies and then run with it![/callout]
UNSCHEDULED CALENDAR
Some people are always giving out. There’s always someone to help. There’s always someone to serve. There’s always someone to share with. They’re always care giving. But they’re never taking in, never taking the time to recharge. You have what’s called compassion fatigue. Eventually what happens, if you’re always giving out, you’ll just stop caring. Stop caring about yourself, stop caring about other people, eventually stop caring about God.
There’s a flip side to this. There are others who are always taking in – attending another seminar or going to another class or listening to another tape or learning something else or studying – but never doing anything about it. That’s one of the problems with too much Bible study. Can you have too much Bible study? Sure, you can. If you study the Bible and never do anything about it, eventually it creates a lack of compassion in your life for the Bible. The Bible is something to be done in our lives.
[callout]A couple of helpful tips here: (1) Learn how to say NO! (2) Use all of that technology you have in your pocket and on your desktop to keep a sane schedule.[/callout]
UNCONFESSED SIN
There are few things that rob our joy more quickly, that rob our passion faster, than an unconfessed sin and the guilt that comes from that. What many of us do is rationalize it subconsciously. We don't think about it consciously but we push it down and subconsciously it's affecting our lives.
Some of you are in the middle of a personal system crash. You’re trying to be enthusiastic about life but there’s this guilt there that is crashing your joy. This sounds like it would be the most difficult problem to solve. How can I solve the problem of guilt? Fortunately, it’s one of the easiest problems to solve when it comes to passion in our lives. 1 John 1:9 says “If we confess our sins, God can be trusted to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” All I have to do is take it to God, tell Him the truth about who I am and ask Him to forgive me. Ask Him to start me living a new way again.
[callout]Tip - As soon as I know there’s something wrong, I immediately go to God with it, confess it and get back to living life again.[/callout]
