Negotiation

I navigate through a myriad of negotiations throughout the course of my day. No, I am not a high-powered, albeit currently deflated Wall Street tycoon. Nor am I a smooth-talking, sweet-selling commercial real estate investor. My negotiations are much more run of the mill, day-to-day, and in a practical vein. My negotiations begin with a ringing alarm clock, "Okay, I'll stop pressing snooze and get up, but I am NOT going to shower". Nice. I got ya on that one. Take that, alarm clock! I negotiate with traffic on the way to work, "I'll stay here until the next exit and then I am ditching this mess and taking a different route". Haha. Thought you had me stuck here huh, Buster? I negotiate with my calorie intake. "Absolutely, I'll come with the lunch crew to Carbone's because later Lifetime Fitness awaits." In your face guilt! And even in my working out, "Sure I'll sweat it out on cardio machine X, but I am going to relax in the steam room and get a smoothie on my way out". Oh, geez. I am so good.

I am master of my own world. Everything is laid out as to best serve me, or at least I make it seem that way with my incessant negotiating.

How often do I negotiate with God? "Sure, I'll trust you on this one, but I am just going to rush it along a bit." He doesn't mind. That was going a little too slow. God helps those who help themselves, right? Negotiating my way through a relationship with God inevitably turns out to be unfruitful, frustrating, and just plain silly. The negotiations prevent me from actually seeing what God has for me. I'm so stinkin' blind sometimes and I am too focused on what I want to happen AND I think that because God loves me, He does too.

So, maybe I'll leave my negotiations to the alarm clock and try to stay in the places God has me. The lessons are learned in the mending. The hope happens when you're feeling stuck. Growth is in the tension of having the vision of what you want to be and feeling dissatisfied with where you're at.