The Principle of the Path: Chapter 3

The Great Disconnect. In your life what is it for you? What is the greatest void between your intentions and where you are? Where in your life are you dissatisfied, broken, hungry, confused? When we look back at our lives in these areas we can see where we go wrong right? Certainly if we can't see it in our lives we can see it in the lives of other's around us. This is where Stanley starts to let the rubber meet the road when, towards the end of the chapter, he says "We should break the habit of drawing a circle around individual decisions and events and dismissing them as isolated occurrences."

I know I easily will look at a single event and excuse it as something that is completely isolated. The sad truth is, that over time these "isolated" events compound and hopefully we realize that we're on a path. Stanley has a good point earlier in the chapter about being lost. It's that we're typically lost before we realize we're lost. We're on a road that is leading to an undesirable destination.

I don't really know what questions to ask of this chapter. I think the best exercise would be to look back at where you were a few years ago and ask yourself if where you are now is where you wanted to be. In some areas of our lives we'll be happy with where we are. Some areas we won't be. For me, I'm totally in love with my wife and I'm happy to say l love being married to her. She's amazing! On the flip side, my relationship with God could be better. I'd wanted to be a better guitar player by now. The list goes on.

The Principle of the Path: Chapter 2

Chapter 2 is called Why Bad Things Happen to Smart People and I'm sure that many of us have whispered this question under our breath before. Andy Stanley has an amazing ability to make the very simple very profound. He also allows the reader to bring the obvious to light in a way that no one else can and these traits are displayed very well in this chapter. "There is no fix for being lost" is the first statement of the chapter that really grabs my attention (especially since I'm going to be watching Lost later tonight). When we're lost the only thing that's going to get us to where we want to be is to know the path and change our direction. Stanley goes on to point out that, like being lost, most of our human problems cannot be fixed, but a change in direction is needed to resolve the issue.

Eventually we arrive at the principle of the path, which is "Direction--not intention--determines our destination." I've known this to be true, and I'm sure that you did too, but I'm not sure that we've grasped the potential of this statement. I know I haven't. Our intentions mean nothing...take a deep breath with me and say it out loud. Our intentions mean nothing. I get so wrapped up with what I would like to do, skills I would like to have, relationships I would like to be deeper that I end up not getting anywhere. If everything is a step toward somewhere don't we have to know where somewhere is? If we don't know where somewhere is, then we're not getting anywhere.

Stanley points out that any principle, this one included, can be leveraged to our advantage (and our disadvantage). I have a feeling that as I get deeper in this book I'm going to find that discipline is going to become a trait I wish I had more of. I already know a specific area in my life that I think this book is speaking to me about and it's difficult to look back and notice how small decisions spread over a large span of time have crippled me in this area. The encouraging thing is that with time I can turn around on the path and head in the direction of where I want to land. So can you.

I think if each of us takes a deeper look at our lives we'll see how our direction, our decisions, have landed us in a destination that we didn't want to be in. I'm sure there are areas of our lives that we are very comfortable with and we can do the same with those. As Andy puts it "To get from where we don't want to be to where we do want to be requires two things: time and a change of direction. There isn't a quick fix."

The Principle of the Path

So tonight I sat down and started to read a book. Not something I do very often, but something I should do. Perhaps you've heard of the phrase "Leaders are readers," and being the leader of a student ministry I figured it was a good time to start reading. I was given the book The Principle of the Path by Andy Stanley about a year ago from my wife. I'm not sure what was going through her head when she picked it out, but I'm guessing she was thinking I was lost and I needed help finding my way.

Tonight I've made my way through the introduction and the first chapter and he's laid the framework for what a principle is. It is not a law because it cannot be broken. It is something that exists that applies to all of us. He used the example of Archimedes' principle or the principle of the harvest. Stanley goes as far as to say that this principle, the principle of the path, will spare us regret without explaining or detailing the principle itself. A life without regret is something that I would think all of us would like.

After recounting a story about traveling down a dangerous road that ended in a swamp, Stanley declares "that's where the road led and that was the road we chose." My guess is that this statement is going to be critical to the principle of the path. So tonight I'm left to wonder "what road am I on and where is it going? Did I choose it? Did I choose it by not choosing another?