To Finish Well We Have to Return To The Beginning

"If we put God in the background, everything else moves to the front."

-Ross Johnston

When I get stuck, my initial gut instinct is to overcomplicate matters by attempting to do something different, which nearly always requires lots of learning or excessive and fruitless work. “If I just do it THIS way or try THAT, then it'll get better,” I find myself thinking. So I add on new courses, try different ideas, bring in more bells, whistles, trinkets…anything and everything other than what I need to do—which I see now is to return to the beginning.

This morning, I read an email from a favorite artist instructor who created simple circles of colors on individual pieces of paper, “I wanted to reacquaint myself with my paint,” she said.

Many years ago, I listened as a sports celebrity, a master in his sport (I think it was an interview with Larry Bird), who said that those who are the best in their field are the ones who master the basics—and keep practicing the basics over and over.

Earlier today, again, I listened to an interview with a group of people who are working to bring awareness of our roots as a nation, to the prayers and proclamations of those who First Landed and eventually founded Jamestown. They said they wanted to return to the beginning and remember who we are.

Resource: Visit the 1607 Project website

The last few days have been filled with hearing people talk about returning to the beginning. Even as I shared with the Unveiled community earlier this week, I have been feeling the nudge to remember who I am within this business and why I even desired to start what was first a blog but then quickly transformed into a magazine.

It takes humility to return to the beginning.

In order to finish well, one must go back to the beginning. Yet, after time, we are tempted to think we're beyond the basics. Observation over the decades has taught me it is quite the opposite. However, I have a tendency to forget this.

Slow fades are hard to detect. Similarly, drifting off course can be imperceptible until one day you look around and wonder where you are. Obviously, this applies to every aspect of being: relationships, spirituality, business, personal matters, etc.

As I mentioned at the beginning, my initial instinct is to grasp at shiny new strategies, opportunities, or whatever else, until I reach the point of being at the end of myself. It's from there that I pause long enough to scope my surroundings to become aware of where I am and my trajectory.

I want to stay familiar with my roots and get good at the basics: knowing myself better and remembering how and why I got started and what it was I was searching for.

I want to master the basics where I am, to "reacquaint myself with the paint."

I do that by returning to the beginning, to find my place of remembrance. It's from here that I recall those first fears, can see how much God has guided me and been faithful, though it may not feel like it at the moment, and it provides stability to help me move forward. Otherwise, I will either become stuck and frustrated or find myself in a place I never intended. Even worse (as I've experienced) we can lose sight of who we are.