June 18, 2024 • 26 mins
#008 - Ever wondered how you can navigate life’s challenges with unwavering confidence? This episode is your guide to understanding and embracing God's will in your daily life.
We'll unpack the power of living with conviction and how aligning with God's plan can diminish fear and uncertainty.
Drawing inspiration from the lives of Jesus and Mary, we see that even when faced with hardships, fulfilling God's will fortifies you with the strength to persevere.
I share practical wisdom from saints like St. Therese and insights from Bishop Barron, offering clear methods to discern His will through your vocation and life’s circumstances.
You'll learn about the demands of your vocation, the circumstances of your day, and how to create a rule of life that aligns with God's will.
Plan out your own Rule of Life with this free resource: https://www.athrivingcatholic.com/planner
Are you ready to build high-impact habits of body, mind, and soul that actually stick? Check out the Catholic Path to Excellence today to find out how you can be more consistent in your habits and excel in every aspect of your life.
Feeling "stuck" in your life? Coaching could be the solution you need to break through whatever is holding you back. Book a FREE Call with me today to find out how I can help you.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What would it feel like to know with certainty that
you were doing exactly what Godwanted you to do today?
How would it feel to live eachand every day with such
conviction?
In this episode, we'll explorehow you can do just that.
You're listening to theCatholic Pursuit of Excellence,
(00:24):
the show that helps youaccomplish more, stress less and
become the saint God createdyou to be.
I'm your host life and healthcoach, jessica Castillo, and
this is episode eight.
In today's episode, we'll talkabout why it's so critically
important to know that you'redoing what God wants you to be
(00:44):
doing, both in your life as awhole and in the nitty-gritty
details of each day.
Then I'm going to share twobasic ways that you can
effectively discern God's willfor you right now.
And finally, I'll share a toolthat I've created that's going
to make all of this so mucheasier to put into practice.
(01:05):
So a few weeks ago, I sent outa survey to my audience asking
for feedback on my highperformance group coaching
program, the Catholic Path toExcellence.
I was trying to find out whatmotivated my ideal client, what
they most wanted to achieve intheir lives, and one thing
(01:28):
really stood out to me in theresponses Not only did almost
every person who took the surveyshare their desire to become
saints and to get their familiesto heaven too, but they also
wanted to know for sure thatthey were doing God's will in
their lives.
They wanted to live withconviction.
(01:50):
And this is so criticallyimportant for each and every one
of us, because the whole point,the reason that we're here, is
to imitate Christ and do what hedid on this earth, and we know
that.
He told us that he came to dothe Father's will.
So the Father's will, findingit, accepting it, carrying it
(02:12):
out with love if that was therule for Jesus's life, then that
should also be the rule for thelife of every Christian.
So this is not an unimportantquestion.
What does God want you to do isso important.
Finding that out and doing itis basically the work of your
life, and if you know thatyou're doing what God wants you
(02:37):
to be doing, then you can livewith that kind of conviction,
and conviction is so powerful.
If you knew beyond a shadow ofa doubt that you were doing
exactly what God wanted you todo, think about how differently
you would show up.
Not only would you be doingyour best at whatever you were
(02:57):
doing, but it would alsoeliminate so much fear and
uncertainty, which I think iswhat really saps our energy in
the day-to-day grind of ourlives.
Because things are hard, you'regoing to face things that are
really disappointing andfrustrating or just annoying and
(03:19):
mundane, and sometimes we canbe really tempted to think that
everything should be smoothsailing if we were really in
God's will.
But obviously that's not thecase Because, again, just look
at Jesus's life as an example.
His life was full of sufferingand hardship and trial.
(03:41):
Look at even his passion indeath.
That was perfectly fulfillingthe will of the Father and it
was hard and awful and painfuland excruciating, but that was
God's will and you know.
Just as another example, thinkabout Mary, who also perfectly
fulfilled God's will for herlife.
(04:03):
Her life was also full ofhardship and suffering.
It was not easy for her towatch her son be ridiculed, to
be tortured and to watch him die.
And that wasn't the only hardthing in Mary's life.
Her life was probably full ofjust as many hardships as any of
our lives.
(04:23):
The thing is, knowing thatyou're doing God's will can help
you to live boldly andconfidently and to keep pressing
forward on the path that Godhas set for you, even when that
path is scary and hard.
Because, looking at theexamples of the lives of the
saints and Jesus's own life, weknow that oftentimes our lives
(04:47):
are going to be scary and hard.
But this is really important,because if you thought that it
wasn't God's will for you, forthese hard, scary, bad things to
be happening to you, then youwould be completely tempted to
quit and to give up.
Then you would be completelytempted to quit and to give up.
(05:09):
And I think one of the manycommon lies of the devil is that
God's will is something obscureand mysterious and so hard to
figure out that you have towaste all your time and energy
spinning your wheels andricocheting like a pinball from
one thing to the next, becauseyou can never be really sure
that you're doing it.
But that just really doesn'tjive with the God that we know
(05:35):
and we believe in, because Godloves us so much and he wants us
to know and understand his planfor us so much that he sent
Jesus into the world to tell itto us in human words that we
could understand.
He left us the church and themagisterium, and not only that,
(05:56):
he wrote his own law on thehuman heart.
Those are not the actions of aGod who's trying to hide his
will from you.
Now you might be thinking okay,sure, I know that God's will for
me is to know him, love him,serve him in this world and be
happy with him forever in thenext.
But that still doesn't tell meif I should launch a new program
(06:19):
in my business or where Ishould send my kids to school.
In other words, how do I knowwhat I should be doing today to
be doing God's will?
And, fortunately for all of us,there are two basic ways to
find out what God's will is foryou right now.
And it's going to sound reallysimple.
(06:40):
But, honestly, all of theprofound truths of our faith are
like that.
They sound too simple, butthey're really really so true,
okay, here are the two basicways.
So true, okay, here are the twobasic ways.
One, the demands of yourvocation and two, the
circumstances you're in.
(07:00):
And I'll explain what I mean byboth.
So, first, how you know God'swill for you today and every day
are the demands of yourvocation.
So, back in episode three, isyour business taking over your
life?
I talked about the three levelsof your vocation.
(07:20):
So if you haven't heard thatepisode, I do recommend you
check it out.
But I'm going to give you justa quick summary here.
The three levels of yourvocation are first, the
universal pursuit of holiness.
Are first the universal pursuitof holiness, you're called to
be a saint.
That's your relationship withGod.
Second is your state in life,which is your relationship with
(07:42):
others that's meant to make youholy.
So this could be either whetheryou're married or a consecrated
virgin or religious or a priest.
That is your state life.
And then the third level of yourvocation is all of the daily
stuff of your vocation.
So this is the level of yourwork, your business, your
(08:06):
volunteer roles, your communitysupport, all of these things.
This is also where laundry andhousework and all of this that
all fits in here with all of thedaily stuff of your life.
So I like to think about theselevels of your vocation as a
triangle with holiness at thevery top right.
(08:28):
So becoming a saint, theuniversal call to holiness, is
the tippy top of that triangleand then everything else is kind
of like a rung supporting that.
So your state in life is thenext rung and then underneath of
that is all of the daily work,the daily stuff that makes up
your life, and this is reallyimportant because it has to be
(08:48):
in balance.
This has to be in the properorder and when it is, it'll just
feel right, even if it's hard.
It's not going to be easy, it'sjust going to be, it's going to
have a feeling of like it fitsand this is right.
So, if you think about therungs or the levels of your
(09:12):
vocation, all of those thingsare your vocation and I like to
think of it too as all of thestuff on the bottom rungs tend
upwards and towards thatuniversal call to holiness.
In other words, every part ofyour vocation can be geared
toward and leading toward thatuniversal call to holiness,
(09:40):
toward that universal call toholiness.
Now, even when this is hard,this is going to feel like it
fits, that you're doing theright thing.
You'll feel that.
So, for instance, if you aretrying to finish a big work
project and that's what you haveto be working on today and then
one of your kids gets sick andis throwing up everywhere and
you're cleaning up, puke andcomforting a sick child, you've
(10:02):
dropped your work project andnow you're focusing on your kid.
Well, even though that's notgoing to be fun, it's not going
to feel delightful.
You are going to feel like thatwas the right thing to be doing
.
That was the right order ofthat activity.
And the same thing will happenwhen you wake up and maybe you
(10:24):
prioritize your prayer timefirst thing in the morning,
before you open your Facebook orcheck your phone or scroll your
feed.
That's going to have a certainfeeling of rightness about it,
because you're keeping things inthe proper order.
And I really like to think aboutthe demands of your vocation as
kind of a filter for yourchoices and activities and you
(10:47):
can think about whenever you'reconsidering doing something
where does it fit within yourvocation and does it cause you
to prioritize something out oforder, in an order that it
shouldn't go?
And I just want to make acaveat here that this doesn't
necessarily mean that you spendthe vast majority of your time
(11:09):
in this order, because most ofus are not going to be spending
eight hours a day on our kneespraying, while we should be
praying always in our hearts,according to St Paul but it
doesn't necessarily mean thatwe're going to be constantly in
the church or attendingreligious services or praying
(11:33):
vocally, but that is the primarygoal of our life is that
relationship with God, whichmeans everything flows into that
.
Now it could be that you arespending eight hours working in
your job.
Technically, that's the bottomrung of your vocation, but this
is a way that you're supportingyour family and by the attitude
(11:55):
and the disposition that youbring to your work, it can also
be tending towards your holiness.
So I just wanna make thatdistinction that it doesn't mean
this is how you must bespending your time, in this
order, but it's really adisposition of your heart, and
you know what that feels likewhen you start to let something
(12:15):
else take over or have morepride of place.
Like I said in episode three,if you've ever been calculating
sales conversions at mass, or ifyou've ever been constantly
thinking about your businesswhen you're trying to play with
your kids, then you recognizethe imbalance.
It's not in the right orderbecause your heart is not in the
right order.
(12:35):
So the demands of your vocation, that's God's will for you.
Your vocation is God's will foryou.
This is your path to sanctity,this is your path to holiness.
This is God's plan for you tobecome the saint version of
yourself.
So if, for whatever reasonyou're not living your vocation
(12:56):
in the proper order and with theright balance.
That's going to be that filter,that just like a sieve right,
you're going to sieve all ofyour activities through this and
decide is this God's will forme?
The next basic way that you canknow what God's will is for you
is to just look at thecircumstances of your day.
When I was a new convert toCatholicism, I used to love
(13:19):
watching Mother Angelica rerunson EWTN and one day a caller
called in and asked Mother, howdo I know if a certain situation
is God's will for me?
And Mother Angelica, withoutmissing a beat, said Is it
happening to you?
Then it's God's will for you.
And that really struck mebecause I had never considered
(13:42):
just that if something washappening to me, that it must be
God's will for me.
And I think that this can bereally hard to wrap our heads
around, because sometimes awfulthings happen and we think
there's no way that this isGod's will for me.
And that's where it's reallyimportant to understand the
difference between God'sindicative will and his
(14:04):
permissive will.
So his indicative will iswhatever he wants us to do.
That's for our greatest good,and God can indicate that he
wants us to do certain things.
So in this category of God'sindicative will we're going to
find things like the 10commandments, the commandments
(14:24):
of the New Testament, thecommandments and teachings of
the church, the responsibilitiesof your state in life, again,
your vocation and, if you getspecific inspirations from the
Holy Spirit.
So if we want to know God'swill for our lives, these are
the places we need to start andthat's why I mentioned your
vocation first.
(14:46):
Now the field of God'sindicative will is really vast,
because it's going to touch allof those normal activities and
relationships of every day,because all of this stuff that's
happening to you every singleday.
This is the arena where,through your choices, you're
going to be either growing invirtue or vice, so you're going
(15:08):
to be either deepening yourrelationship with God or
damaging your relationship withGod in those circumstances of
your daily life.
This also includes the endlesspossibilities of the works of
mercy, the things that you couldbe doing.
The works of mercy are feedingthe hungry, instructing the
ignorant, comforting thesorrowful.
(15:29):
All of the corporal andspiritual works of mercy, all of
the ways that we can carry outthe Lord's commandment to love
our neighbor as ourselves.
All of that would be God'sindicative will.
So when we ask ourselves, whatis God's will for me?
Most of the time God'sindicative will is going to be
(15:52):
really clear actually Lovinglyfollow the commandments,
lovingly carry out your dailyresponsibilities and look for
the practical ways that you canlove your neighbor the way God's
loved you.
So it's to seek to accept, toembrace, to fulfill his will for
your life.
That's the surest way that youknow that you're doing what God
(16:16):
wants you to do, right.
So that's God's indicative will.
Now, the permissive will of Godrefers to that which God allows
to happen.
So, for example, god allowssinful behavior even though he
doesn't desire it.
And why does God allow sin?
(16:36):
Well, that's because God wantsus to love him freely.
So he allows us to freelychoose or reject his will.
And we know that whenever wereject God's will, or whenever
anyone rejects God's will,there's a consequence for that,
and it hurts the world and ithurts other people, it hurts
(16:57):
everyone.
So the catechism addresses theissue of God's permissive will
really well.
It says Angels and men, asintelligent and free creatures,
have to journey toward theirultimate destinies by their free
choice and preferential love.
They can therefore go astray.
(17:17):
Indeed, they have sinned.
Thus has moral evil,incommensurably more harmful
than physical evil, entered theworld.
God is in no way, directly orindirectly, the cause of moral
evil.
He permits it, however, becausehe respects the freedom of his
(17:39):
creatures and mysteriously knowshow to derive good from it.
For Almighty God, because he issupremely good, would never
allow any evil whatsoever toexist in his works if he were
not so all-powerful and good asto cause good to emerge from
evil itself.
(18:00):
Okay, so at each and everymoment, you're either
experiencing God's indicativewill or his permissive will for
you.
So if you want to know whatGod's will is for you in any
given moment, it's to fullyaccept whatever is happening to
you in that moment.
(18:20):
So that's the people, theplaces, the circumstances accept
all of that as coming directlyfrom the hands of God himself,
and this is exactly what itmeans when we pray thy will be
done in the hour of father.
I've also heard Bishop Barronsummarize it really simple as
(18:42):
love, god's will for you, isalways the path of greatest love
.
But I know sometimes thatdoesn't sound very clear For
many people.
We're still thinking well, Ineed to make a decision, I need
to do this or do that.
How do.
I know what God's will for meis in those circumstances.
(19:03):
Well, I do want to console youwith the thought that, like St
Therese says, all God reallywants from you is your goodwill.
Like St Therese says, all Godreally wants from you is your
goodwill.
So if your desire is to loveand serve God, like I can't
remember which saint said tolove and do as you will, just
(19:24):
love and do.
Just make a choice, go withsomething loving God and loving
neighbor, and if you do that,then God's going to work good
from it, whatever it is.
I taught the first HolyCommunion class this year and
last year, but I told my kidsyou can think about this as
God's plan A and God's plan B.
(19:45):
You can't miss God's will foryou, because if plan A was his
original indicative will for youand you chose differently or
did something else, well he'sjust going to reroute you
because he has a plan B, and ifyou miss that, he has a plan C,
and if you miss that he has aplan D.
In fact, he's not limited bythe alphabet.
God can infinitely reroute youback to his plan for you.
(20:09):
So you don't need to be afraid,you don't need to worry that
you're going to somehow miss it,you're somehow going to get it
wrong.
Because if you live in that fearof I'm going to mess this up,
I'm going to miss God's plan forme or not do what he wants me
to do, then you're living infear and we have not been given
(20:30):
a spirit of fear.
We've been given a spirit ofadoption.
So we can say with confidenceAbba, father right, your father
loves you, he wants you to bewith him.
He's not trying to hide thepath to get back to him.
He's trying to make it really,really clear.
Looking at your vocation,knowing that you're fulfilling
(20:51):
the duties of your state in life, your vocation, knowing that
you're fulfilling the duties ofyour state in life, and then
embracing in every circumstanceas it comes as coming from the
hands of God, that is really allyou need to be able to do.
That is all you need to be ableto do to know that you're doing
what God wants you to do today.
Now, in order to make this evensimpler, I have created a tool
(21:15):
that will help you.
So, since so much of God's willis tied to your daily
circumstances and yourresponsibilities in life, it can
be really helpful to craft yourown rule of life to keep
everything in its proper place.
A rule of life is basicallyjust a plan for how you're going
(21:35):
to live, your daily and weeklyroutines and what you'll focus
on when.
Now, if you think about peoplewho live in religious
communities, they tend to have arule of life where they have
set times of prayer, work,recreation.
You can make a rule of life foryourself even if you're living
(21:56):
in the world, if you're in afamily or if you're single and
living in the world.
You can think about your ruleof life as kind of like a block
schedule, but the emphasis is,of course, on using your time,
energy and focus to serve God.
Well, now, this is somethingthat I work with my clients to
develop in the Catholic Path toExcellence, but you can get a
(22:18):
free copy of the tool we use tocreate this rule of life at
thrivingcatholiccom forwardslash planner.
So the tool is called a habitsplanner, but it's really so much
more than that.
So this is an editable Googlesheet where you're going to find
different tabs.
One tab you'll see instructionson exactly how to use this
(22:42):
planning tool for maximumbenefit.
You're going to see a tab withcustomizable routine builder
templates that are going toallow you to efficiently and
effectively plan when you'regoing to do everything like how
does all of this stuff fit in anordered way?
And then, finally, you'll seeanother tab that has an ideal
week template and that's whereyou can structure your routines
(23:06):
and this is basically what'sgoing to be your rule of life.
There's further tabs whereyou'll see interactive monthly
habit trackers so you canactually set implementation
intentions and try to build someof these habits that you might
be wanting to build into yourrule of life.
But when you've created yourideal weekly schedule and your
(23:29):
rule of life, well, what shouldyou do today?
Kind of comes down to what's onyour schedule, what's on your
calendar, what have you alreadydecided using your intellect and
will doing this in a prayerfulway what should you be doing
right now?
Now, a lot of times people willwake up and they'll start a day
(23:53):
and they'll say what shall I dotoday?
But really the question is,what should I do today?
What is already outlined for me?
That is also the path ofgreatest love and that's
fulfilling, as well as I am able, my duties in my state in life.
And so, when we have this plan,when we have this rule of life,
(24:15):
it becomes really simple toknow.
Well, I know that I spend thispart of my day praying, or I
spend this part of my day withmy kids and my family, or this
part of my day is for work.
Now, when it gets into theactual what, should you be
working on things?
Again, that's prayer anddiscernment.
(24:35):
But don't think you can get itwrong.
God doesn't want you to beafraid of missing his plan for
you.
So if you want that freeresource to help you plan out
your own rule of life becausethen you'll know if you're in
this block of time you should bedoing this thing you can get
(24:56):
this free resource atathrivingcatholiccom forward
slash planner or you can justfollow the link in the show
notes.
So here's what we just coveredin this episode.
We talked about why it's socritically important to know
that you're doing what God wantsyou to be doing, both in your
life as a whole and in the nittygritty details of each day.
(25:18):
And again, this is theimitation of Christ.
This is the point of your wholelife is to be doing God's will.
Then I shared with you the twobasic ways that you can
effectively discern God's willfor you right now, which are
filtering through the levels ofyour vocation and accepting and
(25:38):
embracing each circumstance asGod's will and choosing the path
of greatest love.
And finally, I told you how youcan get the free habits planner
that will help you to createyour own rule of life so that
you have a pretty clear sense,day in and day out, that you're
doing basically what God wantsyou to be doing.
(26:02):
That's it for me this week.
If you enjoyed this episode andgot something out of it, I
would love if you could leave arating or review on your podcast
app.
It really helps me to get theword out about the show, so go
ahead and leave a rating andreview if you like this content.
Until next time, remember thatit is Jesus who inspires you to
(26:23):
do something great with yourlife, so don't let yourself be
ground down by mediocrity.
Bye for now.
What would it feel like to know with certainty that
you were doing exactly what Godwanted you to do today?
How would it feel to live eachand every day with such
conviction?
In this episode, we'll explorehow you can do just that.
You're listening to theCatholic Pursuit of Excellence,
(00:24):
the show that helps youaccomplish more, stress less and
become the saint God createdyou to be.
I'm your host life and healthcoach, jessica Castillo, and
this is episode eight.
In today's episode, we'll talkabout why it's so critically
important to know that you'redoing what God wants you to be
(00:44):
doing, both in your life as awhole and in the nitty-gritty
details of each day.
Then I'm going to share twobasic ways that you can
effectively discern God's willfor you right now.
And finally, I'll share a toolthat I've created that's going
to make all of this so mucheasier to put into practice.
(01:05):
So a few weeks ago, I sent outa survey to my audience asking
for feedback on my highperformance group coaching
program, the Catholic Path toExcellence.
I was trying to find out whatmotivated my ideal client, what
they most wanted to achieve intheir lives, and one thing
(01:28):
really stood out to me in theresponses Not only did almost
every person who took the surveyshare their desire to become
saints and to get their familiesto heaven too, but they also
wanted to know for sure thatthey were doing God's will in
their lives.
They wanted to live withconviction.
(01:50):
And this is so criticallyimportant for each and every one
of us, because the whole point,the reason that we're here, is
to imitate Christ and do what hedid on this earth, and we know
that.
He told us that he came to dothe Father's will.
So the Father's will, findingit, accepting it, carrying it
(02:12):
out with love if that was therule for Jesus's life, then that
should also be the rule for thelife of every Christian.
So this is not an unimportantquestion.
What does God want you to do isso important.
Finding that out and doing itis basically the work of your
life, and if you know thatyou're doing what God wants you
(02:37):
to be doing, then you can livewith that kind of conviction,
and conviction is so powerful.
If you knew beyond a shadow ofa doubt that you were doing
exactly what God wanted you todo, think about how differently
you would show up.
Not only would you be doingyour best at whatever you were
(02:57):
doing, but it would alsoeliminate so much fear and
uncertainty, which I think iswhat really saps our energy in
the day-to-day grind of ourlives.
Because things are hard, you'regoing to face things that are
really disappointing andfrustrating or just annoying and
(03:19):
mundane, and sometimes we canbe really tempted to think that
everything should be smoothsailing if we were really in
God's will.
But obviously that's not thecase Because, again, just look
at Jesus's life as an example.
His life was full of sufferingand hardship and trial.
(03:41):
Look at even his passion indeath.
That was perfectly fulfillingthe will of the Father and it
was hard and awful and painfuland excruciating, but that was
God's will and you know.
Just as another example, thinkabout Mary, who also perfectly
fulfilled God's will for herlife.
(04:03):
Her life was also full ofhardship and suffering.
It was not easy for her towatch her son be ridiculed, to
be tortured and to watch him die.
And that wasn't the only hardthing in Mary's life.
Her life was probably full ofjust as many hardships as any of
our lives.
(04:23):
The thing is, knowing thatyou're doing God's will can help
you to live boldly andconfidently and to keep pressing
forward on the path that Godhas set for you, even when that
path is scary and hard.
Because, looking at theexamples of the lives of the
saints and Jesus's own life, weknow that oftentimes our lives
(04:47):
are going to be scary and hard.
But this is really important,because if you thought that it
wasn't God's will for you, forthese hard, scary, bad things to
be happening to you, then youwould be completely tempted to
quit and to give up.
Then you would be completelytempted to quit and to give up.
(05:09):
And I think one of the manycommon lies of the devil is that
God's will is something obscureand mysterious and so hard to
figure out that you have towaste all your time and energy
spinning your wheels andricocheting like a pinball from
one thing to the next, becauseyou can never be really sure
that you're doing it.
But that just really doesn'tjive with the God that we know
(05:35):
and we believe in, because Godloves us so much and he wants us
to know and understand his planfor us so much that he sent
Jesus into the world to tell itto us in human words that we
could understand.
He left us the church and themagisterium, and not only that,
(05:56):
he wrote his own law on thehuman heart.
Those are not the actions of aGod who's trying to hide his
will from you.
Now you might be thinking okay,sure, I know that God's will for
me is to know him, love him,serve him in this world and be
happy with him forever in thenext.
But that still doesn't tell meif I should launch a new program
(06:19):
in my business or where Ishould send my kids to school.
In other words, how do I knowwhat I should be doing today to
be doing God's will?
And, fortunately for all of us,there are two basic ways to
find out what God's will is foryou right now.
And it's going to sound reallysimple.
(06:40):
But, honestly, all of theprofound truths of our faith are
like that.
They sound too simple, butthey're really really so true,
okay, here are the two basicways.
So true, okay, here are the twobasic ways.
One, the demands of yourvocation and two, the
circumstances you're in.
(07:00):
And I'll explain what I mean byboth.
So, first, how you know God'swill for you today and every day
are the demands of yourvocation.
So, back in episode three, isyour business taking over your
life?
I talked about the three levelsof your vocation.
(07:20):
So if you haven't heard thatepisode, I do recommend you
check it out.
But I'm going to give you justa quick summary here.
The three levels of yourvocation are first, the
universal pursuit of holiness.
Are first the universal pursuitof holiness, you're called to
be a saint.
That's your relationship withGod.
Second is your state in life,which is your relationship with
(07:42):
others that's meant to make youholy.
So this could be either whetheryou're married or a consecrated
virgin or religious or a priest.
That is your state life.
And then the third level of yourvocation is all of the daily
stuff of your vocation.
So this is the level of yourwork, your business, your
(08:06):
volunteer roles, your communitysupport, all of these things.
This is also where laundry andhousework and all of this that
all fits in here with all of thedaily stuff of your life.
So I like to think about theselevels of your vocation as a
triangle with holiness at thevery top right.
(08:28):
So becoming a saint, theuniversal call to holiness, is
the tippy top of that triangleand then everything else is kind
of like a rung supporting that.
So your state in life is thenext rung and then underneath of
that is all of the daily work,the daily stuff that makes up
your life, and this is reallyimportant because it has to be
(08:48):
in balance.
This has to be in the properorder and when it is, it'll just
feel right, even if it's hard.
It's not going to be easy, it'sjust going to be, it's going to
have a feeling of like it fitsand this is right.
So, if you think about therungs or the levels of your
(09:12):
vocation, all of those thingsare your vocation and I like to
think of it too as all of thestuff on the bottom rungs tend
upwards and towards thatuniversal call to holiness.
In other words, every part ofyour vocation can be geared
toward and leading toward thatuniversal call to holiness,
(09:40):
toward that universal call toholiness.
Now, even when this is hard,this is going to feel like it
fits, that you're doing theright thing.
You'll feel that.
So, for instance, if you aretrying to finish a big work
project and that's what you haveto be working on today and then
one of your kids gets sick andis throwing up everywhere and
you're cleaning up, puke andcomforting a sick child, you've
(10:02):
dropped your work project andnow you're focusing on your kid.
Well, even though that's notgoing to be fun, it's not going
to feel delightful.
You are going to feel like thatwas the right thing to be doing
.
That was the right order ofthat activity.
And the same thing will happenwhen you wake up and maybe you
(10:24):
prioritize your prayer timefirst thing in the morning,
before you open your Facebook orcheck your phone or scroll your
feed.
That's going to have a certainfeeling of rightness about it,
because you're keeping things inthe proper order.
And I really like to think aboutthe demands of your vocation as
kind of a filter for yourchoices and activities and you
(10:47):
can think about whenever you'reconsidering doing something
where does it fit within yourvocation and does it cause you
to prioritize something out oforder, in an order that it
shouldn't go?
And I just want to make acaveat here that this doesn't
necessarily mean that you spendthe vast majority of your time
(11:09):
in this order, because most ofus are not going to be spending
eight hours a day on our kneespraying, while we should be
praying always in our hearts,according to St Paul but it
doesn't necessarily mean thatwe're going to be constantly in
the church or attendingreligious services or praying
(11:33):
vocally, but that is the primarygoal of our life is that
relationship with God, whichmeans everything flows into that
.
Now it could be that you arespending eight hours working in
your job.
Technically, that's the bottomrung of your vocation, but this
is a way that you're supportingyour family and by the attitude
(11:55):
and the disposition that youbring to your work, it can also
be tending towards your holiness.
So I just wanna make thatdistinction that it doesn't mean
this is how you must bespending your time, in this
order, but it's really adisposition of your heart, and
you know what that feels likewhen you start to let something
(12:15):
else take over or have morepride of place.
Like I said in episode three,if you've ever been calculating
sales conversions at mass, or ifyou've ever been constantly
thinking about your businesswhen you're trying to play with
your kids, then you recognizethe imbalance.
It's not in the right orderbecause your heart is not in the
right order.
(12:35):
So the demands of your vocation, that's God's will for you.
Your vocation is God's will foryou.
This is your path to sanctity,this is your path to holiness.
This is God's plan for you tobecome the saint version of
yourself.
So if, for whatever reasonyou're not living your vocation
(12:56):
in the proper order and with theright balance.
That's going to be that filter,that just like a sieve right,
you're going to sieve all ofyour activities through this and
decide is this God's will forme?
The next basic way that you canknow what God's will is for you
is to just look at thecircumstances of your day.
When I was a new convert toCatholicism, I used to love
(13:19):
watching Mother Angelica rerunson EWTN and one day a caller
called in and asked Mother, howdo I know if a certain situation
is God's will for me?
And Mother Angelica, withoutmissing a beat, said Is it
happening to you?
Then it's God's will for you.
And that really struck mebecause I had never considered
(13:42):
just that if something washappening to me, that it must be
God's will for me.
And I think that this can bereally hard to wrap our heads
around, because sometimes awfulthings happen and we think
there's no way that this isGod's will for me.
And that's where it's reallyimportant to understand the
difference between God'sindicative will and his
(14:04):
permissive will.
So his indicative will iswhatever he wants us to do.
That's for our greatest good,and God can indicate that he
wants us to do certain things.
So in this category of God'sindicative will we're going to
find things like the 10commandments, the commandments
(14:24):
of the New Testament, thecommandments and teachings of
the church, the responsibilitiesof your state in life, again,
your vocation and, if you getspecific inspirations from the
Holy Spirit.
So if we want to know God'swill for our lives, these are
the places we need to start andthat's why I mentioned your
vocation first.
(14:46):
Now the field of God'sindicative will is really vast,
because it's going to touch allof those normal activities and
relationships of every day,because all of this stuff that's
happening to you every singleday.
This is the arena where,through your choices, you're
going to be either growing invirtue or vice, so you're going
(15:08):
to be either deepening yourrelationship with God or
damaging your relationship withGod in those circumstances of
your daily life.
This also includes the endlesspossibilities of the works of
mercy, the things that you couldbe doing.
The works of mercy are feedingthe hungry, instructing the
ignorant, comforting thesorrowful.
(15:29):
All of the corporal andspiritual works of mercy, all of
the ways that we can carry outthe Lord's commandment to love
our neighbor as ourselves.
All of that would be God'sindicative will.
So when we ask ourselves, whatis God's will for me?
Most of the time God'sindicative will is going to be
(15:52):
really clear actually Lovinglyfollow the commandments,
lovingly carry out your dailyresponsibilities and look for
the practical ways that you canlove your neighbor the way God's
loved you.
So it's to seek to accept, toembrace, to fulfill his will for
your life.
That's the surest way that youknow that you're doing what God
(16:16):
wants you to do, right.
So that's God's indicative will.
Now, the permissive will of Godrefers to that which God allows
to happen.
So, for example, god allowssinful behavior even though he
doesn't desire it.
And why does God allow sin?
(16:36):
Well, that's because God wantsus to love him freely.
So he allows us to freelychoose or reject his will.
And we know that whenever wereject God's will, or whenever
anyone rejects God's will,there's a consequence for that,
and it hurts the world and ithurts other people, it hurts
(16:57):
everyone.
So the catechism addresses theissue of God's permissive will
really well.
It says Angels and men, asintelligent and free creatures,
have to journey toward theirultimate destinies by their free
choice and preferential love.
They can therefore go astray.
(17:17):
Indeed, they have sinned.
Thus has moral evil,incommensurably more harmful
than physical evil, entered theworld.
God is in no way, directly orindirectly, the cause of moral
evil.
He permits it, however, becausehe respects the freedom of his
(17:39):
creatures and mysteriously knowshow to derive good from it.
For Almighty God, because he issupremely good, would never
allow any evil whatsoever toexist in his works if he were
not so all-powerful and good asto cause good to emerge from
evil itself.
(18:00):
Okay, so at each and everymoment, you're either
experiencing God's indicativewill or his permissive will for
you.
So if you want to know whatGod's will is for you in any
given moment, it's to fullyaccept whatever is happening to
you in that moment.
(18:20):
So that's the people, theplaces, the circumstances accept
all of that as coming directlyfrom the hands of God himself,
and this is exactly what itmeans when we pray thy will be
done in the hour of father.
I've also heard Bishop Barronsummarize it really simple as
(18:42):
love, god's will for you, isalways the path of greatest love
.
But I know sometimes thatdoesn't sound very clear For
many people.
We're still thinking well, Ineed to make a decision, I need
to do this or do that.
How do.
I know what God's will for meis in those circumstances.
(19:03):
Well, I do want to console youwith the thought that, like St
Therese says, all God reallywants from you is your goodwill.
Like St Therese says, all Godreally wants from you is your
goodwill.
So if your desire is to loveand serve God, like I can't
remember which saint said tolove and do as you will, just
(19:24):
love and do.
Just make a choice, go withsomething loving God and loving
neighbor, and if you do that,then God's going to work good
from it, whatever it is.
I taught the first HolyCommunion class this year and
last year, but I told my kidsyou can think about this as
God's plan A and God's plan B.
(19:45):
You can't miss God's will foryou, because if plan A was his
original indicative will for youand you chose differently or
did something else, well he'sjust going to reroute you
because he has a plan B, and ifyou miss that, he has a plan C,
and if you miss that he has aplan D.
In fact, he's not limited bythe alphabet.
God can infinitely reroute youback to his plan for you.
(20:09):
So you don't need to be afraid,you don't need to worry that
you're going to somehow miss it,you're somehow going to get it
wrong.
Because if you live in that fearof I'm going to mess this up,
I'm going to miss God's plan forme or not do what he wants me
to do, then you're living infear and we have not been given
(20:30):
a spirit of fear.
We've been given a spirit ofadoption.
So we can say with confidenceAbba, father right, your father
loves you, he wants you to bewith him.
He's not trying to hide thepath to get back to him.
He's trying to make it really,really clear.
Looking at your vocation,knowing that you're fulfilling
(20:51):
the duties of your state in life, your vocation, knowing that
you're fulfilling the duties ofyour state in life, and then
embracing in every circumstanceas it comes as coming from the
hands of God, that is really allyou need to be able to do.
That is all you need to be ableto do to know that you're doing
what God wants you to do today.
Now, in order to make this evensimpler, I have created a tool
(21:15):
that will help you.
So, since so much of God's willis tied to your daily
circumstances and yourresponsibilities in life, it can
be really helpful to craft yourown rule of life to keep
everything in its proper place.
A rule of life is basicallyjust a plan for how you're going
(21:35):
to live, your daily and weeklyroutines and what you'll focus
on when.
Now, if you think about peoplewho live in religious
communities, they tend to have arule of life where they have
set times of prayer, work,recreation.
You can make a rule of life foryourself even if you're living
(21:56):
in the world, if you're in afamily or if you're single and
living in the world.
You can think about your ruleof life as kind of like a block
schedule, but the emphasis is,of course, on using your time,
energy and focus to serve God.
Well, now, this is somethingthat I work with my clients to
develop in the Catholic Path toExcellence, but you can get a
(22:18):
free copy of the tool we use tocreate this rule of life at
thrivingcatholiccom forwardslash planner.
So the tool is called a habitsplanner, but it's really so much
more than that.
So this is an editable Googlesheet where you're going to find
different tabs.
One tab you'll see instructionson exactly how to use this
(22:42):
planning tool for maximumbenefit.
You're going to see a tab withcustomizable routine builder
templates that are going toallow you to efficiently and
effectively plan when you'regoing to do everything like how
does all of this stuff fit in anordered way?
And then, finally, you'll seeanother tab that has an ideal
week template and that's whereyou can structure your routines
(23:06):
and this is basically what'sgoing to be your rule of life.
There's further tabs whereyou'll see interactive monthly
habit trackers so you canactually set implementation
intentions and try to build someof these habits that you might
be wanting to build into yourrule of life.
But when you've created yourideal weekly schedule and your
(23:29):
rule of life, well, what shouldyou do today?
Kind of comes down to what's onyour schedule, what's on your
calendar, what have you alreadydecided using your intellect and
will doing this in a prayerfulway what should you be doing
right now?
Now, a lot of times people willwake up and they'll start a day
(23:53):
and they'll say what shall I dotoday?
But really the question is,what should I do today?
What is already outlined for me?
That is also the path ofgreatest love and that's
fulfilling, as well as I am able, my duties in my state in life.
And so, when we have this plan,when we have this rule of life,
(24:15):
it becomes really simple toknow.
Well, I know that I spend thispart of my day praying, or I
spend this part of my day withmy kids and my family, or this
part of my day is for work.
Now, when it gets into theactual what, should you be
working on things?
Again, that's prayer anddiscernment.
(24:35):
But don't think you can get itwrong.
God doesn't want you to beafraid of missing his plan for
you.
So if you want that freeresource to help you plan out
your own rule of life becausethen you'll know if you're in
this block of time you should bedoing this thing you can get
(24:56):
this free resource atathrivingcatholiccom forward
slash planner or you can justfollow the link in the show
notes.
So here's what we just coveredin this episode.
We talked about why it's socritically important to know
that you're doing what God wantsyou to be doing, both in your
life as a whole and in the nittygritty details of each day.
(25:18):
And again, this is theimitation of Christ.
This is the point of your wholelife is to be doing God's will.
Then I shared with you the twobasic ways that you can
effectively discern God's willfor you right now, which are
filtering through the levels ofyour vocation and accepting and
(25:38):
embracing each circumstance asGod's will and choosing the path
of greatest love.
And finally, I told you how youcan get the free habits planner
that will help you to createyour own rule of life so that
you have a pretty clear sense,day in and day out, that you're
doing basically what God wantsyou to be doing.
(26:02):
That's it for me this week.
If you enjoyed this episode andgot something out of it, I
would love if you could leave arating or review on your podcast
app.
It really helps me to get theword out about the show, so go
ahead and leave a rating andreview if you like this content.
Until next time, remember thatit is Jesus who inspires you to
(26:23):
do something great with yourlife, so don't let yourself be
ground down by mediocrity.
Bye for now.
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