On being decisive

As part of our girls' night entertainment, some of my friends and I took a personality test recently. It was something about “true colors” and it turns out I’m a green, followed by blue. I also took the myers briggs test a couple of years ago, and I retook it this weekend just to see if anything had changed (by the way, here’s that link I told some of you I’d post: free MB test) I’m still an infp (introverted-intuitive-feeling-perceiving), although I’m just barely on the feeling and perceiving side now, which means I’ve better balanced my thinking/feeling and judging/perceiving.

None of these labels can really completely define a person (and maybe it’s my personality type to not like labels), but it can be interesting to read about. My most recent roommates and I used to joke about our myers-briggs types because they were both judgers, whereas I’m a perceiver. They both like being judgers, too, which is quite the judger thing to do. Ha. I generally appreciate my perceiver quality, but sometimes it makes it really hard for me to make a final decision about certain things. This is where prayer tends to help – I don’t always trust my own judgment, but I do trust God’s. The only hitch is that, when I pray for guidance to follow God’s will, I ask for the guidance to be very clear so I don’t misinterpret it. And usually it is quite clear, once I pay attention, so I know I can trust that decision once it’s made.

So, anyway, a couple of months ago I had to make a very difficult decision. I’m not going to go into great detail here, being that this is a blog and all, but it turned out that I had two very good options to choose from, which actually made the choice much harder for me. I prayed about it a lot and, when I had to make a decision (this wasn’t something that could be put off very long), I felt confident that I had the proper guidance behind it. Even though I didn’t know exactly why, I had to trust that the path I chose was where I needed to be right now, for various reasons.

Well, something happened this past week that made me seriously question whether I made the right choice. I didn’t question God, really, I just questioned my own interpretation of God’s guidance: Maybe I was wrong? Maybe I misunderstood? Being in the middle of something makes it hard to see how and why this was what I needed to be doing. I started to wonder if the other path would have been better and safer for me. I started the “what if” mind game that rarely ever helps in situations like these. I tend to question everything, anyhow. So, does this signify a lack of faith on my part, or a healthy self-questioning? It’s hard to tell sometimes.

This particular trepidation lasted for about a half a day. I was able to put things into perspective, and a good nights’ sleep helped, although I’ve still had the occasional moments of doubt since then. Some good did result from this, however. It gave me the reality-check I needed that nothing on this earth is guaranteed to be permanent or secure. And, also, that what is meant to be a means-to-an-end for me can easily slip into becoming the end itself if I’m not careful and start to get too comfortable with the status quo. I don’t mean to sound cryptic here, but that’s about all the detail I can offer via this medium.

Anyhow, I know there’s something I’m called to be doing right now, yet I’ve been dragging my heels with it. I kind of feel like the lazy servant in the parable of the talents, if I were to take the interpretation that the servant who buried his talents (or didn’t fully invest them, if you will) was not being responsible with what he was given. So, what happened this past week gave me a little kick in the butt to get me moving with writing the B-word. No more “perceiving” if this is really something I need to be doing with my life, or if I’m really qualified to do such a thing, or if I’m just being delusional in thinking that I might actually be able to pull it off, or if I really want to make myself feel that vulnerable by writing to strangers about the most important and personal thing in my life (which is, of course, my faith…I’ve decided a pseudonym might be a good solution for this, but future-Liz can figure that out). I could come up with countless excuses to keep putting it off, but really there is no good excuse not to at least try. I’m no longer allowing myself to be lazy and, even more than that, doubtful and fearful…at least not when it comes to this.