“…the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.” Galatians 5:22-23
“You have taken off the old self with its practices and have put on the new self.” Colossians 3:9-10
The Blank Canvas of 2020
A new year in many ways resembles a blank canvas; you know, that piece of cloth or other surface that has nothing painted on it yet. Like the painter, we are free to choose what to paint on our blank canvas.
The term itself evokes an image of a clean slate, a fresh start, one with new opportunities to develop in different ways. And, with every new stroke on our blank canvas, we have the potential to become the best version of ourselves in our personal, our professional, and even in our spiritual lives.
Many of us have already started to paint our canvas for 2020 with SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Time-bound) Goals along with the specific Action Steps that align with those goals. Some SMART Goals on our canvas are entirely new ones reflecting perhaps a different period or phase of your life. Other SMART Goals seem to reappear on our canvas every year, reflecting the inherent difficulty of achieving some of our most cherished and deeply held goals. On a personal note, I reread my journal entry for my Top 10 SMART Goals for 1995 and there sitting at #8 was “refrain from eating ice cream and cookies late at night”. Well, guess what? I am still working on that one 25 years later and it is once again on my blank canvas as a SMART Goal for 2020. Stubborn for sure, and maybe even foolish on my part as I keep hearing myself say “just watch Jack, this year is going to be different”.
My #1 SMART Goal in 2020 — To Walk the Camino de Santiago
My most exciting and challenging SMART Goal for 2020 is to walk the Camino de Santiago or The Way of St. James in late August, my health permitting of course. I plan to do what is called the Camino Frances or French Way, a walking journey of roughly 800 kilometers that begins in Saint Jean Pied de Port, France and ends at the Cathedral de St. James in Santiago, Spain, the resting ground of St. James the Apostle.
This Pilgrimage has a long history dating back to Medieval times and it is something that has been on my bucket list for the past 6 years. My wife’s Dad and my own Mom both passed away in 2019 and so with both sets of our parents now with the Lord, there is nothing holding me back from finally pursuing this goal. Completing the Camino de Santiago will require rigorous physical training, strong mental preparation, and perhaps most importantly, exercising greater self-control than ever before. St. Paul, in his beautiful letter to the Galatians, talks about self-control as one of the nine gifts or fruits of the Spirit —i.e., the gifts of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, generosity, faithfulness, and self-control. The first eight gifts of the Spirit are virtues that many believe can help lead to a greater sense of personal fulfillment. Yet, it is that ninth gift of self-control that represents the gateway for us to receive those other 8 fruits of the Spirit.
The Serenity Prayer and the Exercise of Greater Self-Control
As I begin 2020 with my own hopes and dreams for the future and that stretch SMART Goal of walking the Camino de Santiago, I find myself focused more than ever on the timeless message embodied in the Serenity Prayer and, by extension, how to exercise greater self-control.
“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace.”
So, with the Serenity Prayer always uppermost in our mindset, let’s turn the focus inward to those things that we know we can control as we paint our canvas for 2020 and set those specific SMART Goals. Every day, each of us has the opportunity to exercise self-control or to abandon it. It is the one gift of the Spirit that we can control. For example, we can exercise self-control:
- In what we think, in what we do, and in where we go.
- In how much time we spend on the computer and the mobile phone.
- In what we say to others and in how we act towards others.
- In the way we make choices that are healthy and helpful to others, not in choices that are harmful or destructive.
- In what we put into our bodies and in making decisions on what we eat and when we eat (my own biggest challenge).
- In not burdening the people we love with our own expectations of what they should do and how they should measure success.
In a spiritual vein, how we exercise self-control can give us the strength to resist temptations that we know will lead us away from God and the person He has created each of us to be. We can exercise self-control in how we might pray, or study Scripture, or how we might choose to celebrate the sacraments, or in the way we embrace people not just of our own faith, but of all faiths and from all socioeconomic, cultural, and ethnic backgrounds.
Self-Control is the Pathway to Greater Joy and Personal Fulfillment
So, what about you? Have you begun painting your blank canvas for the year ahead? Have you laid out your specific SMART Goals for your personal and professional life? Will the exercise of greater self-control help you realize those SMART Goals and help you become that better version of yourself that you have always aspired to be? Exercising greater self-control may require you to change your playgrounds and your playmates. It may require you to reach out more frequently to old friends who will be so glad to hear from you. It will invite you to cultivate new friendships that can help you build a support network for where your blank canvas may be leading you to. And, when you fall short in your exercise of self-control and in what you are trying to achieve in 2020 or in any future year, remember that you can always start over again by painting a new blank canvas.
Yes, self-control is perhaps God’s greatest gift to each of us and yet it is the hardest gift of all to perfect and master. Like shooting those 50 foul shots every day after basketball practice, self-control needs to be practiced one moment at a time, one day at a time; it does not happen overnight! So be kind to yourself as you paint your blank canvas this year. Accept the fear of making mistakes or in falling short of your SMART goals. Mistakes and failure are a part of your own unique story and the pathway to who you are meant to be and where you are meant to go. Exercising greater self-control will unlock the door for you to enjoy the other eight fruits of the Spirit — love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, and gentleness. Good luck my friends – I know it will be worth your effort.
Buen Camino!
Wishing all of my fellow coaches, colleagues, clients, and friends a very happy, healthy, and fun-filled 2020,
Dr. K
