I believe God wants to partner with each of us for an exciting and impactful life. He created us to live a life that makes a difference in the world and advance the Kingdom of God. He has created each of us with a unique calling and purpose.

But there’s something that derails us, that stops us in our tracks before we even start. Fear. And fear is driven by wounding.

When we say, “I have to do this because …”, that’s a clue that we’re living in fear. We’re living in fear of the “because.” Fear’s greatest lie is: “You have no other choice.”

Fear’s Greatest Lie: “You Have No Other Choice”

Living in fear can manifest itself in different ways.

Letting Life Be Controlled by Others

Victimhood. I never get a break. The rallying cries of our life are, “If only…” and “Someday when…” When we find ourselves constantly saying these things, we’re living in victimhood, controlled by others. Our controller doesn’t even have to be a person. If we’re continually derailed by our circumstances, we are still living as a victim and being controlled.

Victimhood can also take the form of False Martyrdom. (I did this for a long time.) False martyrs live under the constant fear of, “Will my spouse/parent/coach/controller be angry?”

The controller’s rages paint them as the obvious bad guy, which makes us the good guy. What we don’t see is, on the back of our brilliant, white, “Good Guy” hat, is the word “VICTIM,” neatly stenciled in big, bold letters. We live under that victim-mantle as long as we play the martyr.

Yes, bad stuff happens. Trauma happens. Abandonment (which is trauma) happens. But those who don’t live in fear as victims, when trauma happens, do two things:

1. Pursue healing with both hands. People who refuse to be victims don’t let their trauma define them. And they do that by seeking out help and healing from qualified people they trust.
2. Take action. Their life’s rallying cry is “I am doing …” They don’t wait for “someday when.” They take action today.

Say you’re driving to pick up your kid from school, and the road is closed for construction. ”Oh well, I guess they’ll just either walk home or sleep at school,” said no parent ever. No, what do you do? You take the detour, you drive around.

Same thing in life. When bad things happen out of our control, we trust the Holy Spirit to find us an alternate route. We keep driving; we don’t park.

Living Life to Control Others

If I’m abusing a victim, I must not be one, right? Negative Controllers – bullies, abusers, and narcissists – are incredibly insecure. They create this persona around themselves of being “large and in-charge” so no one ever knows how weak, afraid, and terrified they really feel. Creating pain in others numbs pain in themselves.

But Positive Controllers are just as unhealthy. Positive Controllers look really good on the outside. They often suffer from Performance Orientation, the foundational lie that my value comes from what I do.

They can be really sweet, precious people. But you can recognize a Positive Controller because they won’t take “no” for an answer. They sweetly respond with, “Ok, but can you just…”

• “I know you said you can’t help with Vacation Bible School this year, but can you just …”
• “I know you’re too swamped to babysit for me today, and I don’t want to impose, but can you just …”
• “I know you said no to the favor I asking, but can you just sacrifice and at least do something for me so I get some benefit from your existence?”

When you have a problem, they don’t walk through it with you. They jump in the driver’s seat. They try to “fix” you. Because it’s so much easier and less threatening to work on your problem than on their own.

At the end of the day, it’s all about them, and about how your existence can serve them. When you think back, they’ve never served you.

Controlling others comes down to living in fear. We desperately try to stay in control to keep the world at a safe distance, to never let our shame sneak out. Because if people get too close, they’ll see the shameful truth about me. And that’s the lie we often unconsciously believe that keeps us stuck living in fear.

Under the Fear: Pain from Wounding

Underneath it all, living in fear is driven by something hidden. Something we desperately want to keep hidden but are secretly terrified will be exposed. Our wounding. Our shame.

We put on a persona to keep it from ever slipping out. Whether we play the victim at the mercy of others, or the controller using others, we’re trying to keep our wounding hidden.

Because if they knew the truth about me…

The reality is that it doesn’t work, at least not permanently. It may work for a while, but, out of his mercy for us, God doesn’t let it work forever. Because he wants us to address the wounding so he can bring healing.

Because he has healing for us. And a calling on the other side of that healing. It may be in the area of our wounding, or it may not. Our calling may look totally different after we’ve received healing, because we’re no longer trying to make up for our shame. Once our wounding is healed, that shame has no more power over us.

Yes, that’s possible. God wants to bring that healing into your life.

3 Mindset Shifts to Pursue Your Calling

We all have a calling, that unique contribution God’s created us to make in the world. In Biblical language, it’s the “live works” God designed for us to do before the creation of the world (Ephesians 2:10).

We might even know what our calling is – that passion in our hearts that both excites us and terrifies us when we dare to think about it.

Here are 3 foundational mindset shifts that help us get out of fear and pursue our calling in partnership with God.

1) Become more afraid of not trying than of failing. What if, when we meet Jesus face-to-face, we see all the resources Heaven had lined up to help us pursue our calling, ready to fall like dominoes just when we needed them. But it never happened because we never pushed over the first domino. I don’t want to live in eternal regret, do you?

2) Get comfortable with discomfort. Pursuing God’s calling on our lives always takes us into uncomfortable territory, into uncharted waters. Because God always calls us to something bigger than ourselves, something we can’t do without him.

3) Treat everything as an experiment. This takes all the fear of failure off the table. Because, with this mindset, you didn’t fail, you just learned what doesn’t work. Negative results are just as important. When we learn from our mistakes, we save tremendous energy by avoiding them in the future. And we make adjustments, getting that much closer to what does work.

Your Turn

So what about you? Does this resonate? Where are you on this exciting journey of finding and pursuing God’s calling on your life? Tell us your story in the comments. And please share this post if it would bless others.