5 habits to help you live your best life

Simple ways you can make sure you're focused on what really matters.

On a daily basis, you and I need to intentionally and diligently keep our hearts from distorting reality or losing perspective.

That’s why I’m deeply grateful that I’ve been able to take a sabbatical with my family at Hume Lake in California this fall. It has been a wonderful time to disconnect from the demands of my life “down the hill” and refocus my easily unfocused heart.

To accomplish this, I have had to work hard at resisting my incessant need to feel like I’m being productive. This means I’m usually trying to accomplish some kind of input to make me a better man, or output to be a blessing to others. God wants us to be growing, and investing in others, but he wants us to do those things with our eyes fixed on what really matters. I have sought to do these five things in my quest to refocus on what really matters:

1. Rest

We are finite creatures that work best when we realize that and make room in our lives for naps, and sitting by a Lake, or a camp fire—just looking around.

2. Remember

When you read the Bible, there is nothing more obvious about human nature than that we are forgetful, and that we need constant reminders about who God is and what really matters from his perspective. Lingering in his word, spending time with people who point me to Christ, and God centered worship, are indispensable for an eternal perspective.

3. Reflect

It’s not enough to intellectually know facts about God and his ways, we need to mediate on them, and mull them over, so as the Spirit works, they sink more deeply into our hearts.

4. Recreate

Using our bodies to play games, hike, ride bikes, swim, climb trees, and just get out in God’s beautiful creation reminds that God is great and we are his children who are created to play in the world he made for us to enjoy.

5. Repent

When I see the ways my priorities, perspective, or motives have become distorted, distracted, or idolatrous, I have asked God to give me a new resolve and the grace to turn away from that way of living and walk in a manner worth of the gospel.

My ultimate prayer and goal is to refocus and fix my eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith.

Written by K. Erik Thoennes from Biola University. Originally published on the Good Book Blog.