A life lived in isolation is a life lived short of its potential…

If you could have anything in this world, and time, money, and distance, were no barrier, what would it be? 

Before you answer that question, let me share a story. 

In 2004, my brother-in-law, Wesley, was diagnosed with an aggressive form of leukemia. He loved his family and friends, and he had a genuine heart to help other people.

I learned a valuable lesson from Wesley. While I cannot tell you the specific time or day I was with him when I heard his response, I can tell you one thing for sure. He was a young man facing death who didn’t ask to meet some famous athlete; he didn’t ask for money or gifts, he responded with an answer that is certain to put life in perspective for each of us. 

Wesley was asked: “If you could receive any gift, of any value, what would it be?” His response?

“All I want is to grow up, old enough to be a husband and a father.” That was the response of 18-year-old Wesley, before passing away in 2005.

Wesley’s statement helped me realize how much I had taken my own family for granted, and that I was spending too much time focusing on the negative and things that, at the end of our lives, don’t matter. This young man gave me the gift of perspective. This perspective helped shape the course of my life from that moment forward.

Maybe being a parent or spouse isn’t in your plans, but somewhere there’s someone who could only wish to have the kind of relationships you have today. These are typically relationships you have with friends and family, and that should be enough to humble us and cause to reflect on how much we have to be thankful for in life.

Because a life lived in isolation is a life lived short of its potential, it is only through meaningful relationships and connections that we can fully develop our identity, not because other people define us, but because other people challenge us to be the best version of ourselves.

Relationships are meaningful in life because they afford us the perspective that shapes the most important parts of our lives, maybe not in the present, but certainly the future. 

Think about how you would see your life if you were to look at it through perspective, from a distance, a different angle. It’s not the material things, our accomplishments, or our bank accounts that make us, it’s relationships.

Perspective reveals that, if we removed the little pieces of our life, the parts we look back on and wish we didn’t have to endure, we begin to see a change in who we are today. All the pieces have come together to create our identity.

At the end of the day, we are nothing without Christ, and we were created for more than our own pleasure. We were created for relationship with God, with each other, and to change this world for His glory. 

This is an excerpt from my TEDx talk first presented at TEDx Troy University on November 5, 2017. For the full video on YouTube, watch here.