Sharing Resources to Help You Grow Personally, Professionally & Financially

Sometimes it helps to get a little dose of encouragement—along with a good cup of coffee!—to start the day. Today we discuss moderation.

Hopefully the message below will help you get off to a good start for the week.  Please feel free to forward the newsletter on to others that you think would benefit from the content.

Moderation

I am 99% certain that my family has a genetic pre-disposition to do things in the extreme. In specific situations, that can be a good thing. However, in many cases it is a very bad thing.

It’s interesting to reflect on our faith, family, friend, fitness, and finances through the lens of moderation. On the surface, it would see that you ALWAYS want to be “all in” for each of these dimensions. Throw moderation out the window these are the important dimensions in life and we need to pursue them at all cost! But closer examination, often reveals that “all in” is not always “all good”:

• Do we want to focus on the relationship with our children to the point that it jeopardizes our relationship with our spouse?
• Should we prioritize time spent with our friends over time spent with our family?
• Is training three hours a day healthy to our relationships?
• Is saving an extra dollar more important than giving to those in need?

I’ve consciously avoided the topic of moderation related to faith in the above list. That’s because in the area of faith, I DO believe we need to be “all in” in regard to God. After all, He’s in charge of things, so following His rules is—in my mind—a good thing. However, even in this space I see folks come off the tracks:

• Should you spend so much time at church that you avoid spending time with your family?
• Should you focus on the rules (religion) or on loving others when they are seemingly un-lovable?
• Should you follow your “calling” or stick to the vocation that you are clearly called to/have a gift for?

Extremism is not a good thing—I’ll avoid any foray into politics at this point in time, but I hope that our current political climate has everyone in agreement on this point. Rather, we need to practice moderation in all areas of life. And, equally important, we need to extend grace to others when they stumble and end up too far down an extreme path.

That brings us to this week’s question:

• Are you practicing moderation in your life?

Thanks for sharing a bit of your time with me this Monday morning.  

Have a great week!

Blog post from this past week:

Monday Morning Motivation - Compounding