Why Your Why is crucial.

                                                  Why Your Why is crucial.

              A person's why is paramount. It must be absolutely real to each individual.

Every person has difficulty seeing things in the long term. If it is not immediate, it is dismissed. The why is a good indicator of a person's resistance to pain, suffering, or hardship. For that reason, "the WHY" has to be deeply ingrained that it becomes the reason for a person's existence. Becoming a grandfather was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. It caused me to reassess everything. (More on that later).

            A sociological tenant states that the more difficult it is to become a group member, the stronger the attachment to that group. That is true, especially in the Military. There is a reason for this intensity. The elite Navy Seals are pushed to the limit and beyond through physical suffering. This suffering is not for any other purpose except to weed out the people without the required mental toughness. The harsh effects of Coldwater, burning lungs and muscles are used to make a recruit "ring the bell just for it all to be over. If a person gives up, hot coffee and blankets are offered to the recruit as they are removed from the program. These units often travel in groups of less than sixteen people (a Platoon) behind the lines in countries where there is no help readily available. It is there, but the mission has failed dramatically if the panic button is pushed.        

          Being a Christian in the first century was a dangerous position to find oneself. Hot oil, being crucified, beaten, fed to animals, or worse was commonplace. https://pentecostalpublishing.com/products/ancient-champions-of-oneness)  This book highlights the early church's perils to clarify what I am speaking of concerning the early church. That early church had a significant why, so the how was unimportant. There are places on the planet that still have that level of commitment; however, it is more difficult to achieve in our western cultures. How did the early church spread? The way that it could it was the persecution that spread it across the known world. The worse it got, the better it was for the spread of the early church.

            What then of us here in more comfortable circumstances with our more comfortable lives? That stress of persecution must be artificially induced or, more succinctly, internally motivated. It is more difficult for a person living in the United States of America to knuckle down and get the job done in moving their lives toward a significant goal or any goal at all. Discomfort has to be manufactured. In a world that gives a person everything at their fingertips, the ability to "put it off until tomorrow" makes it challenging to reach lofty goals. Put that self-inflicted pressure is necessary for any significant purpose.

Material things do not move me to the point where I can accomplish the more difficult life goals. However, eating and living indoors did motivate me to study and change careers when I retired from the Military. I was a generator technician for twenty years. I have friends who are still working in the field; the notable thing about the ones still doing the job working for companies whose projects are outside the United States. When I retired, I was offered the opportunity to apply for a position in the middle east as a generator maintenance tech. That place was the country of Oman for six figures (tax-free) with room board and transportation there and back home paid by the company. I did not take that opportunity, as I chose to finish college to become a computer administrator for another 19 years. Within the last year, I received a phone call from a couple of friends from Shemya, Alaska; they wanted to know what I was doing and catch up on things since I left. I had lunch with a very old friend about a month before I retired; he was home after finishing a contract installing a powerplant somewhere in Asia.

Money does not motivate me; however, what motivates me is to leave something behind that will last. That is to leave something behind that can be looked at as a direction finder for the trajectory of a life. That direction finder is for my grandchildren. Getting older has done things that I thought were impossible for me, but being an example to my grandchildren has made the difficult choices much more attainable. I hear a clock ticking in my head. It is ticking down to the point where time for me will end in this existence. I know it will be over soon enough, and I want to leave something behind that will last. Some parts are under my control, and factors that are not in my power tend to dismiss those things that I do not have control over as they are not crucial to me. All other tasks are subservient to that first goal. I recently hit the gym to get myself in better shape because I have to try my best to extend this fragile existence for as long as possible in as close to good condition. I need to see my youngest grandson out and on his own.

For a goal to be significant, it has to be measurable, attainable, and essential. A person has to see their importance before any progress toward that goal. Something unseen or nebulous does not reach the tipping point for human behavioral change. The unseen has to be made visible in the mind's eye. The concept of heaven or hell has to be made tangible if they are to have life-changing effects. If something does not set a person on fire, it is insufficient to complete a goal; I remember this lesson in my Social science class from college; "a personality change cannot be made without a significant emotional event. It can be a religious awakening; it could be coming of age and being out on one's own for the first time, not knowing what to do, it can be the birth of a child, or escaping imminent death in an accident or combat. It must be significant. Merely telling a person something they will need later won't cut it. I remember this statement from my school days. "I won't be needing algebra after high school, so I won't do anything over what I need to accomplish to finish. I have a story on that one. During my second duty station, my boss asked me to tell him how much fuel a particular fuel tank contained asked. I said, "I do not know, sir," good he replied, then walked back into the office. He came back with a book that contained the tank's dimensions and gave me a limited time (about a week) to get the information to him. This information was accompanied by the order to find it out for myself and not ask anyone for the info. No one in the shop was allowed to help me.

I remembered that that was a trigonometry problem. I was off to the library to find the answer. I got a book on the formula for determining the volume of cylindrical objects, and the next day I wrote down the number and presented it to my boss. He smiled and thanked me, and left. I later found out he wanted to know what kind of airman I would become. I guess I answered his question. I got promoted quickly after that when I found out there was a promotion test, but my evaluations by my superiors weighed heavily in the promotion criteria.

Why is the most crucial question in our lives? It gives us the reason for our actions. Fear belonging to a group, missing out on something important, or accomplishing a specific task before the time runs out. Friedrich Nietzsche states, "He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how." Then why is the key to unlocking the How?

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