Giving it my all

I am scared of losing myself in something. When I find something I really like, often I latch on. It can be quite a number of things. A project at school, looking for a new car, programming a new spreadsheet, managing finances, and any number of things that spring to mind. This thing, or idea dominates my mind, filling it whenever I have a free moment so that I cannot think properly about anything else.

I have had this experience many times where I neglect anything peripheral and even some central things in the pursuit of my temporary passion. I will skip brushing my teeth so that I can check EBay one more time for that car before I have to leave for work. I will ignore my wife's desire for intimacy because I am trying to save money on a new gadget. I will ignore my spiritual life because I am trying to update my Facebook page.

Seeing these results I begin to abhor the things I am so passionate about. They have taken me away from living the rest of my life. So what do I do? I run from these things. I leave behind the things that I am passionate about so that they do not distract me from what I need to do on a daily basis. In this way my life returns to a normal state.

But have I just thrown the baby out with the bathwater? In trying to avoid all of those things which I am incredibly passionate about, have I consigned myself to a life of boredom? I think I have. There is no way I will find a calling for which I am passionate if I run from the things which I enjoy, but neither should I be giving myself to them. What I need to learn to do is not to spend all of my time seeking after something for it’s own sake, but to bring it under my other more primary callings of Christian and husband. I need my own diet of the mind, to find those things which I enjoy but be very careful of the role and position that they begin to play in my own heart.

God, please teach my how to tame the desires of my heart so that at no season of my life do lose sight of you as that which I love and serve above all else.