#5 When to close

So far, we have been talking about how to close a chapter, but we haven’t even touched the question of when to close one. I know, I know, that should have been first, but better late than never, right? So when do you close a chapter in your life? How do you know when things are supposed to come to an end, and when you are supposed to hold on for a rebound? How do you know when to walk away from something instead of learning how to get back on your feet for another try?One way or another, I come back to this question a lot. I hear the voice of my conscience beckoning me not to quit, to build something permanent, to create a life that lasts. I’ve just always liked the idea of permanence. I know nothing truly lasts forever, but I’d like to think I could at least stop being scared of the day that things do come crashing down. But what do you do when they do? How should you react when things do come tumbling down, like someone just pulled one of the bottom blocks of your Jenga tower? 

Well, if something pulled that Jenga block out, that means it was loose, right? It means that something in your life needed to be corrected. I’m not the most organized of people. When I come home, I tend to throw stuff wherever I can find room. Eventually I run out of available surfaces, and I just can’t work properly. It’s then that I need to take everything out and reshape where it goes. And in the middle of that process, it looks like a hurricane blew through. If you were to walk in while I was cleaning, you might ask why everything is lying around. You might even go as far as saying I was better off before I started, that things were better beforehand. It’s only after things are put away that you would see the value in pulling everything out and making a mess the way I did. Only when the story is over do you see the need for the mess, and you appreciate the step backwards that I took to be able to make my way forward. 

Sometimes our lives are being built like Jenga blocks. We make assumptions that are a little faulty and build our lives on those assumptions to create a risky future. I think about it like my last car. I was living on the assumption that I would have it for the next five to ten years. Heck, I figured that thing would last forever! And because I assumed this, I didn’t save nearly as much as I could have for my next car. So when the day came that I had to replace her, I was caught unprepared. Thankfully, God caught me and brought me back from the depths of danger, but the whole experience serves as a reminder that I should be a little wiser. It can never hurt to be prepared for emergencies. 

It’s good to think about the assumptions that we are acting on, the ones that really run our lives. I’m reminded of the verse about building our house upon the rock of God. I have often wondered what that means. I think I’m starting to understand it now. Basically the bible, along with the direct revelation from God, are our guides to structuring our lives properly. The blocks are the decisions we make, and their placement is the way in which we do what we have decided to. God serves as a guide for how to build a tower that will be sturdy. The bible talks about how there is a time for everything, and I believe we can learn the time and place for everything under the sun, including when to walk away from the forest that’s on fire. I believe there is a guide to knowing when to grab the fire extinguisher, and when to dust the ashes off of your boots. 

And speaking of dust, Didn’t Jesus once tell His disciples to shake the dust off their sandals if people rejected them? Didn’t He tell them to leave people alone if they resisted change? Why, then, do we act like every situation has to be redeemed, washed clean, and purified by the light of our Chrstian-ly presence? What if the mast snapping and the hull filling up with water is a clear indicator that you need to jump off of the Titanic that’s sinking? Why do we have such a hard time believing that there is a time for quitting?

I get that part of it is simply because we don’t want to be negligent. We don’t want to be lazy, or quit too early. We want to be diligent and hard-working. We recognize that life is a battle, and that you can’t flake when things get rough. But there’s a world of difference between rough and unbearable. I say if you take a crack at changing things and no one bites, don’t force them. Be courteous enough to give people the same right to choose that you’d expect to have yourself. Even if they choose evil. Don’t hold yourself responsible for the weight of the world. Do what you can and jump ship when you can’t find your footing. And, in all things, pray for a solution, and follow the peace of Him who guides you. 

But back to the question of when to make that change, I think there are two big indicators to look for. One is when you are barely able to function. When you can’t do any good for anyone, when the life is being sucked out of you, it’s time for a change. I remember times when I have gone on vacation, worried sick for half of it because I knew the workplace that was waiting for me when I got back. I think of that like not having a place to put your shoes when you take them off. Like I said, there may be periods of time when you have to live like that. You might need to go back to school to get a better job, your friendships might be going through a trying period because of it, and I’m told the first few years with a kid are particularly wild. But when you suffer like that, you suffer for a cause and for a time period. If you don’t have either of those things, it may be time for a change. 

And I think the second indicator is similar: you have too much on your plate. Maybe you are trying to make it out to the gym when you have kids at home, a second job, along with involvement in a social group. Sometimes the Jenga blocks aren’t bad blocks, but you simply have too many of them. If you have ever played Jenga, you have probably spent some sort of downtime messing with the blocks. And everybody knows when you stack them in silly or unusual ways, they wind up toppling easier than the usual tower that’s used for the actual game. 

Having your priorities backwards, or trying to do too much is like stacking those Jenga blocks weirdly. If you chose to invest in your bodybuilding hobby instead of feeding your family, that’s weird. I believe the Bible is a manual of how to stack those blocks right. I feel like people often say it in this cliche, “blanket-statement-ey” way. It takes insight and understanding to figure out how everything was actually meant to play out. It’s not an easy-peasy thing, but I believe deep beneath the surface, there is a way that things were meant to be. 

Sometimes we need to rethink our lives, the way they are structured, and the way we have our schedules and priorities arranged. Maybe that can be done where you are in life, and maybe you need to withdraw to a temporary getaway to figure things out. I believe the last year and a half have been a time of God pulling me out of my pursuits to really patch up my ship and teach me how to do things the right way. Maybe you need to pause your current chapter to have this type of experience. Maybe things fell apart because you need this type of period. If you feel lost in a rut, upper management might be calling you to help you rearrange your life to set you back on track with a renewed passion. It might look messy for a bit, perhaps even messier than before, but I guarantee you, if you pray for insight, and don’t fight the process, you will ultimately be set up to be in a really sweet spot for the rest of your life. Of that I guarantee. 

Well, thanks for bearing with me as I rambled this one out. I pray this has been insightful, and that you have grown in your understanding of when to justify throwing in the towel. I pray for your wellbeing, and that the path you are on is mighty and wonderful. 

Until next time

May Peace be your Guide.