What I’m About

I’m taking my first writing course. It’s online, and covers many practical topics from finding my writing voice to maximizing the effectiveness of a blog to authoring books. One assignment involves rewriting my “About Page” for garysjournal.com.

As it currently reads, it’s about me – my family and my hobbies. The next paragraph tells you more of “what I’m about,” if ya know what I mean.

There’s a difference between knowing about someone and knowing what someone’s about. “Knowing about someone” can be reduced to a list of facts – marital status, social security number, weight, job title, or even their Myers-Briggs personality profile.

But “knowing what someone is about” is knowing what gets them out of bed each day, what keeps them up at night, what compels them to live life to the fullest. “What someone is about” is the hill they would willingly die climbing. It’s their great adventure for which God has wired them.

In that spirit, I want to tell you what I’m about. This is what gets me out of bed:

Climbing trees.

“Climbing trees” is a metaphor for rising above a crowded world in order to catch a fresh glimpse of Jesus. There is a story of this short guy named Zacchaeus who climbed a tree. You can read about it in Luke 19. His view obstructed by a crowd of people, Zacchaeus climbed a tree so he could see Jesus. And that simple act led to a seismic change of perspective.

I want to daily climb above the crowded and loud and distracting world I live in so that I can catch a fresh glimpse of Jesus. I need this change of perspective so I can re-center, recharge, and be reminded of who I am.

My guess is that you, too, would like to rise above the crazy busyness that is your life. You understand the potential value in pressing pause and taking a deep breath. But pulling back is tough. Time is scarce. Silence is scary. Reading a Bible can be daunting. Finding the sacred in the secular and seeing the Messiah in the mundane is not something that comes naturally to most.

But that’s where I can help. I can help you climb trees. In fact, I invite you to climb my tree. What I’m saying is that the words I write are like low hanging branches, inviting curious (and short) people to climb above their crowded world to see Jesus.

I want to help you climb to a place where your perspective is changed and you see more clearly. That’s what I’m about. I will help you climb a tree for a fresh glimpse of Jesus so that when you slide back down the trunk you are more fully the person God will use to make the world a better place.

What motivates you to get out of bed? What are you about?