Oh, sure. I’m only 36. I’m not scheduled for a midlife crisis for another 15, maybe 20 years. Well, I don’t want to wait that long, so it is time to stage one. Let me explain.

As I mentioned several days ago, I’ve been reading a compilation of work by Richard Rohr. I’m doing it all wrong. It is supposed to be a series of daily meditations. I’m reading a week’s worth at a time and stitching them together to search for greater meaning. I’ve always been an overachiever. 

On Day 26 (which I’m reading on Day 3), Rohr poses the question, “Who are you really?” He suggests that a midlife crisis is the last real chance for men to make radical changes, and that God uses a midlife crisis to “shake the tree one last time and challenge us” to stop being who we think we’re supposed to be and finally be who we really are.

In an adjacent meditation, Rohr states that most men are not able or willing to step out of their comfortable, safe, predictable lives to truly respond to God’s calling, that most of us are unlike Peter, who immediately cast his net aside and left his livelihood of fishing upon being called by Jesus. And finally, Rohr says, “Many men are no longer on a journey. They’ve accepted the easy answers before they’ve struggled with the deep questions.”

To recap: I’m hiding behind easy answers to avoid the deeper, darker places. Likely unable to obey and respond to God’s call because I’m clinging to conformity and comfort. And it will take God rocking my foundation through midlife crisis to even have me truly consider dramatic change that would get me back on a real path.  Ok, that’s a lot to process. Which is why you are supposed to read one of these a day I’m sure.

Those who have been following this blog know that I’ve been on a journey. That I’ve been trying to get to the deep questions and not settle for the easy answers. That I’ve struggled with completely surrendering to the call. That I’ve longed to better understand what the call is in the first place.

In all this time, through all this writing, I’ve not prayed to God to show me. To really show me. To let me have it. I’ve been afraid of what He might ask of me. What it might mean. Well, I’m tired of being on a journey without truly being on the journey. Tonight I am praying to see it, whatever it is, as clearly as I can see it. If it impacts my comfort, so be it. I’m unsettled. I’m nearing crisis. I don’t want to drag it out to midlife, and miss another two decades of doing what I’m supposed to be doing here.

I am still working on the book, and I’ll complete that regardless. But I don’t really feel like that is the big goal God has for me. I don’t think He’s being trying to tell me, “Write that book,” this entire time. I’ve written a lot about not being ready in the past. And I might still not be fully prepared. But I am ready. So, God, I pray, please show me who I truly am!