Take your top off... And get off road

There are some things in life that require a little bit of extra effort, but make the experience so much more enjoyable. When my wife and I moved to Indiana our car lease ended and we started dreaming about what kind of car we might want. In California it is incredibly normal to want a car that is in pristine condition, there is almost this unspoken competition in church, grocery story, and city parking lots to have the nicest/cleanest car within eyesight. Never truly attainable unless you’re the guy with the Tesla X but we all tried anyway.

When we moved to Indiana that unspoken pressure that I felt to have the “nicest” fell away. Whether it was actually the move across state lines that stripped that pressure or that I had entered into a season of deep healing from so much of the stress of the last 4 years (lets be honest that is much more likely) I may never know. What I do know is that when my wife and I were looking at cars we quickly fell in love with a 2006 (older than the last TWO of the cars i’ve driven) Jeep Wrangler. She had been driven, there were some scuffs and scratches, things weren’t “perfect” but when we jumped into the car, smelled that famous jeep dust smell, fired her up and her inline 6 cylinder motor started purring it was love at first sight (or smell or sound I suppose).

If you live in southern Indiana during the summer, you know it can get HOT. Humid, nasty hot. When you are driving in that heat it can sometimes be unbearable, unless of course your care has removable doors and roof and you are able to get a nice breeze while you drive. Which is exactly what we do. The second the weather looked like it was going to turn I took that top right off. My buddy and I went off roading that weekend, it had rained a few days before but we didn’t think much of it. We got stuck in mud 3 times, had to be pulled out of a ditch and COVERED ourselves and the inside of the jeep with mud as we would rev the engine and try and push ourselves out of mud pits. It was awesome, it will probably go down in my year highlights. What did I not do… Think about the clean up.

And that is how life goes sometimes right? When we jump into things that are enjoyable but take some extra time. Maybe its the clean up afterwords, maybe even the prep work before hand, there are things in life that are more enjoyable when we work a little bit. I have this terrible habit of want to “life hack” my way through my existence and get the most results out of the least effort. Frank (that’s what we named our Jeep, a story for a different day) has been trying to teach me a different way. Often times the most enjoyable things in life come with a little extra prep work or clean up, and that’s okay. As I step into this new season with my family and new daughter I want to be the father that does the extra work so that my baby girl can adventure, play and thrive in the best environment. If I am constantly trying to “life hack” she will inevitably get the short end of the stick.

So here’s to the life without hacking. The life where we play, we get messy, we learn to do things together because the most enjoyable things in life often come with a little extra elbow grease. I hope and pray that my daughter meets the me that has mastered this life style. Not the one that struggles daily to go that extra mile. The reality is she will probably see both. And ill have to learn anew this lesson of grace and love. Which if you ask me, means a lot of work, but isn’t that the point? It will all be worth it.

So take your top off. Get a little messy. The best moments in life are the ones where you look at the person next to you and realize “oh we’ve outdone ourselves this time” and then smile and keep going. Join me in making those moments.