The F Words I Use
Now some of you might be thinking, “How dare he use a title like that? He’s just trying to draw attention.” Well you’re right. I mean no harm, and I promise this post will be completely non-explicit. Stay with me.
A few years back I read a book by Bob Beaudine entitled: The Power of Who.
In this book, he stresses the importance of dreaming and dreaming big. He also talks about the importance of bringing the right people in your life along with you and sharing your dreams no matter how outlandish and surreal they seem. Around this same time, I listened to a marriage series by Pastor Mark Driscoll, then pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, Washington. In this particular sermon, he stressed the importance of seeing the end of life with your spouse and then planning backwards. It was entitled “The Last Day is the Most Important Day.” I was inspired by these men and this topic and planned a date night with my wife. Now this is years before we had our daughter (it’s hard to believe how easy it was back then to just get up and go), and it was a very unique date night, a progressive date. By being progressive I mean we first stopped for our appetizer at Chipotle. That’s right, we split our own chips and guacamole, nothing else. We then proceeded over to Applebees where we ordered our main course and our favorite desert, the Blondie. We then ended the night at a local coffee shop. If you haven’t done a night like this with your significant other, plan it out, it’s a lot of fun and you will remember it for years to come. What we did on this date night and the locations we went were not so important as what we talked about that night. That night we arrived at seven key items or themes that would set a course for how we navigated the coming years together as a married couple. These seven themes are “The Seven F Words I Use.” They are as the follows: Faith, Family, Future, Finances, Fitness, Food, and Fun (pardon the literation but I did go to Bible school).
As we navigated each of these seven themes, based on Beaudine’s The Power of Who, we dreamed what we thought were outlandish things about each category and then lined are far out ideas with where we were at right then. By doing this, interesting things started to happen within the dialogue with my wife and I. First, some things that I thought were super far-reaching goals for myself, she believed were easily achievable and that I was really selling myself short due to lack of confidence. Secondly, a lot of our current priorities started to change because they did not line up to the future we were aiming for. I would like to walk you through each category that we went through and define each of them. This was life changing for us and hope it might be for you too whether you’re 27 or 87.
Faith
For my wife and I, everything flows out of this in life. It is not just faith that good stuff will happen in our life, but rather it is a deep faith in God Who already knows when my life’s end date will come. I have trusted Christ for my eternal destination of Heaven by asking Him to forgive my sin. It is because of this fact that I can trust Him in my day to day life. No matter our cultural backgrounds, beliefs, sexuality, race, or religion, we all have one thing in common: our life has a start date, a birthday, and it will have an end date. There have been good things and bad things that have happened to us, but in the end I can trust that I know that God has my best interest at heart and He will guide me all the way.
My Pastor, Josh Teis, recently spoke about this I would love for you to check out his sermon.
Family
At the time when we sat down to discuss this, our “family” consisted of my wife and I. So we talked about how many kids we wanted to have, how we were going to raise them, and things we wanted to put into their lives. The Bible says that, “For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required:…” I can say this not coming from a braggadocios perspective but trying to be honest with you. I have been given much, thus much is required of me. A godly heritage has been passed down to my wife and I, and we plan to do our best to pass that down to our children as well. When it comes to family I need to answer questions like, what charity will we give to or support? Who am I going to let influence my life and the life of my family? Which church should we go to? Who will be our friends and who will we resist being friends with?
Future
This one is really fun to dream about while not letting it bleed into the other categories. Think about how much has changed in less than a decade. 9/11 was over a decade ago. The original iPhone didn’t even launch until 2007, just under a decade ago. Now imagine where you will be a decade from now. It’s fun to let your mind stretch a bit, but it’s an important step. Where do you want to live or retire? What are some things you want to stamp your name on? What are things that must happen, non-negotiable, in the next month, year, or even 5 years? Who do you want to meet? What relationships do you want to create? How many people do you want to mentor? All of these are a great launchpad for conversations revolving around the future. The biggest things I can reccomend concerning the future are to remain teachable and not get bitter.
Finances
This was rather humorous for us. I’ll tell you how it went down. I threw out a dollar amount of money that I thought, one day, in the far off future, I could potentially be making, if I was lucky. In her mind, I can still see the look on her face to this day, she was saying, “oh yeah, that’s completely possible.” As if I could do that just by simply showing up. There is no telling what potential for amazing things can happen when a man/woman has a vision and he/she has a strong encouraging partner by their side to cheer them along. You need to ask yourself questions like, how am I going to get out of debt? How much of my income should I invest? What am I going to save for? Where can I donate money to? How can I use money as a tool? When it comes to this one category, my life has been influenced in an odd place and that is Ashton Kutcher. Whatever your opinion of him as an actor, during the 2013 Teen Choice Awards speech he gave one of the most thought provoking challenges I’ve ever heard and it’s stuck with me. Watch the video below.
Fitness
Some of you are tempted to skip over this section. Don’t! We have one life and only one body to carry us through this life, we should do our best to take care of it. Have fitness goals all throughout life no matter how small or large they may be. Just last year my wife completed a half-marathon after months of training. She set a goal, and she did it. Hopefully all of us will live a long life so why not set some tough physical challenges for yourself. Hike the Appalachian trail. Run a marathon. Swim a mile. The world is more open then it ever has been, and you are the only limit that stands in front of you.
Food
I’m a foodie. I am unapolegetically a Yelp snob. If your restaurant doesn’t have 4 stars or higher, I’m not going there. I love a lot of cooking shows, Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives, Man vs Food, and Beat Bobby Flay. Take time to explore new food options. I am lucky to live in Las Vegas where there is literally never a shortage of different choice food options. But even if you don’t live in Las Vegas, I’m sure there are places around you that are new and exciting to explore. Feel like staying in but don’t have the skills to cook? Pick up the book Four Hour Chef by Tim Ferriss. Tim is known for perfecting the art of experimentation and getting the most return on your investment. Whether you are a 5-star chef or don’t even know how to make a PB&J sandwich, you can learn from this book.
Fun
Last but not least, have fun in life! Life is far to short to take it all seriously and not stop long enough to have a good laugh. Most of the time fun is a matter of perspective on something, not the actual thing you are doing. I’m sure we have all been around people that are just fun people. Determine to be like this in life; avoid being a “Debbie Downer”. This category also has a lot to do with vacations. My goal is to work at a job that I love so much that I don’t feel like I have to “vacate” from it two or three times a year to be fulfilled. But some of us aren’t there. A while back, a pastor named Cary Schmidt wrote a great article about the importance of taking vacations. In this article, he defined three different types of vacations. Some vacations should be where you go see family, others should be centered around an activity, and others should be a vacation of relaxation. This article had a profound impact on my life.
Well those are “The Seven F Words I Use.” I hope you enjoyed them and aren’t too offended by the title of my post. The most important thing I can tell you is this, whether you are married, single, divorced, widowed, old or young, take the time to mentally and conversationally navigate through topics like the ones I’ve discussed. The “The Seven F Words I Use” is merely a template that has helped my wife and I. Feel free to use it yourself (if you make a ton of money and become a best-selling author and speaker before I do, I will come hunt you down for the royalties.) I hope you accomplish some amazing things in your future because of this.
I have made a printable PDF worksheet that you can download as a template for your own discussion about “The Seven F Words I Use”.
Leave a comment and let me know what you thought of this article and if it helped you in some way!
