Only You

We thought we had escaped it, honestly.  

Being in public or meeting new people, we would affirm that yes, we had three boys, and their eyes would widen.  “Must be rough at your house!  What with all the wrestling and fighting and boy stuff?”  And I would smile sweetly [I would only later come to understand this as naive], and I would say, “They actually get along really well!  They are the best of friends.  I guess we should be grateful, but they really don’t fight at all.” 

Until they did.  Somehow, overnight, everything changed.  And while no one is on an all out death mission over here, there is an evident increase in testosterone running through the Cuccio Man Cave.  Big Brother proving his strength, Middle Brother giving way to his temper, Little Brother making up for his size.  

And so it was that I was in the kitchen one afternoon and suddenly I began to hear yelling and fussing and fighting.  I walked into the chaos to find Little Brother swinging and jabbing and pummeling Big Brother because he had not brushed his teeth as he’d been told.  Nevermind Little Brother hadn’t brushed his own teeth; he was mad as a hornet that Big Brother had not followed the instructions.  

Before I even gave it much thought, I said, “Worry about your own self!  Have you done what you have been told?  Focus on what you need to do, and do it.  Stop worrying about the person next to you or what they are doing.  Do what YOU are supposed to do.”  

And I smugly walked away and into a proverbial brick wall of irony.  

Because man, do those words sting.

I’ve got a list that is far too long of things I have been planning to do someday.  

It’s been decades since I’ve known with certainty what my true calling is.  

I have made plans to enact ideas that have been quietly tucked away for years.  

And I can chalk it all up to worry.  I worry about those around me.

I worry about what they will think, I worry about their success or their achievements or their journey.  I worry that they are more talented than me or better suited than me or that I will have nothing unique to bring to the table.  I’ve not worried about my own self because I have been far too busy worrying about everyone else around me. 

All the while, I’ve been busy punching the life out of my dreams.  And I bet I am not alone.  I bet you’ve been looking to the right and left more than you’d like to admit, haven’t you?

Maybe it’s time we look ahead.  Maybe it’s time we focus on our own lane.  Maybe it’s time we stopped with all the worry and became the warriors of our stories.  

A long time ago, someone told me, “God has a job for you that no one else can do.”  It seems sort of odd if you think about it that way, but listen to the freedom in that.  There is no one on this earth who can do the thing you were set here to do.  No one can reach that person.  No one can touch that life.  No one can fulfill that purpose.  Only you, friend.  Only you.  

I think I slipped to a place in my life where I began to think that sharing my gifts was somehow selfish.  I’m starting to realize that it is probably more selfish to keep them to myself.  Because it’s not about you or me at all.  It’s about the purposes God placed inside of us because He has been weaving all of the parts of our stories together since the beginning of time.  

There is only one you. 

Somewhere, someone is waiting on YOU to show up.    

To be who you were called to be.

To do what you were called to do. 

To find freedom in who you are. 

So get out there, and set the world around you on fire… Focus on you, friend.  Only you.