8 questions to ask when creating life goals that align with God’s will for you.
Life can get complicated when we face an important life decision. We worry about making the wrong choice. We can feel directionless, or worse, like we’re heading in the wrong way. But having pre-established life goals helps bring clarity and align with God and His plan for your life.
Life goals. They’re not about losing weight, going to bed on time, or avoiding procrastination. They’re big, overarching goals, the ones that move us toward purpose, happiness, or success and that require discernment and prayer. And setting up life goals in alignment with God helps bring clarity to important life decisions.
Aligning Your Goals with God
So how do we figure out what our life goals should be? How do we know God approves?
Ephesians 2:10 tells us, “We are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” That’s good news. God created us with a purpose in mind. Equipped with the knowledge that we are God’s handiwork, perhaps we should approach our goals by looking at how uniquely we are made. Let’s begin at the top of our bodies, the brain, and work our way down asking God eight questions as we go.
8 Steps to Align with God
1. Brain: God, what do You want me to know about my brain? What do You want me to understand?
I remember sitting in my fourth-grade class staring out the window, telling myself to concentrate, to listen to the teacher. But all my mind wanted to do was look up into the trees and watch the light flicker down between the leaves. I could care less about the science lesson happening inside the room.
I have the brain of a dreamer. Do you? Or are you methodical or logical? What do you learn easily? Think about how the makeup of your brain could determine your life goals and align them with God.
2. Eyes: God, what vision have You given me? What do You want me to see?
When I think back to that girl staring out the window, I realize my eyes were always focused high up in the tree comparing the variety of the shades of green as the sunlight flickered through or watching a blue jay dance from branch to branch. Even at that early age I focused on the beauty around me over the knowledge in front of me. And today, my daydreams usually involve being somewhere beautiful or making something beautiful.
3. Ears: God, what did You create my ears to hear effortlessly? What do You want me to hear?
By my junior year in college, I had changed my major three times. Then I took my required second English class. The professor Dr. Elder stopped me after class one day. “You are a writer. Have you thought about getting a writing degree?” Those words changed the direction of my life. Someone I trusted spoke words of affirmation.
What are the voices around you saying? Can you trust them? How might you apply their encouragement when determining your next steps and learning to align with God?
4. Mouth: God, what is Your purpose for my voice? What do You want me to say?
One day my piano teacher asked me, “Do you ever talk?” I don’t remember even answering. Most likely I simply shook my head “no.” And yet while “no” wasn’t the truth, I’m not chatty. I trip over my words, say the wrong things, and am generally awkward at small talk. But ask me how to knit a sock and I can teach you without any difficulty. I can talk for hours about the difference between fingering and worsted weight yarn.
Someone once told me that what we talk about easily is a sign of what we love. What do you love to talk about? Channel that passion into the type of life goals you set.
5. Heart: God, what desire have You placed in my heart? What and who do you want me to love?
When I was a small child, I spent hours dreaming about turning the empty space between our house and garage into a shop full of my creations. My parents called this room the breezeway and used it like a modern-day mudroom where shoes, hats, gloves, recycling, and outdoor furniture lived in the winter. But to me it was my future dream, a room filled with all my creations awaiting new owners. My young heart wanted to give the gift of beauty away.
When you look into your heart what do you see? Do you have compassion for those who hurt? Do you feel righteous anger for the oppressed? Do you long to share your joy with others?
When you align with God, you will see how He placed that desire in your heart.
6. Hands: God, what are my hands good at? What do You want me to do?
In middle school English class, we were assigned a group project. We were sent home with newspaper-sized blank paper and told to come back with a daily issue. I spent hours on the floor of my bedroom, pencil and ruler in hand. I filled the paper with headlines and news stories, ads, and even a crossword puzzle. The love of journalism was blossoming inside me.
My daughter on the other hand is a natural helper. She says her hands go to grab the falling cup before her head even processes what she’s doing. What about you? Do your fingers tap a rhythm? Do they feel best when holding a child’s hand or massaging an aching back? How does the work you do with your hands align with God?
7. Feet: God, where do I fit? Where do You want me to go?
I’ve kidded my husband that the perfect vacation would be to do a cross county tour of local libraries. But I’m not really joking. That sounds like the perfect way to spend a day, walking up and down the aisles, pulling out intriguing titles and reading the descriptions. Then taking one to a quiet corner and reading for a couple hours. I believe that desire is God-given, the love of words and knowledge.
What about you? If your feet were in control of your brain, where would they take you? Would you go outside to push a shovel into the dirt? To a homeless shelter? Would your feet take you to the couch where you could curl up and listen to someone else’s story? Or do you desire to walk with someone through their pain?
Let’s go back up to the middle of our bodies and ask one last question:
8. Gut: God, what is my intuition saying? What do You want me to feel?
Several years ago, I sat in the back row at a poetry workshop where a presenter shared the concept of a five-word poem. My mind wandered out of the room and soon I scribbled these words onto the notebook open on my lap, “I became me for you.” But had I become me for others? Or had I become a version of what I thought others wanted me to be? What if my actions, my daily tasks, my life goals, and my purpose reflected how God uniquely created me to be? That was a clarifying moment. I began journaling and praying until I could answer the eight questions in this article and then knew in my gut my true life purpose: I am created to show beauty through words, art, and deeds that draws others to God. From that purpose all my life goals are created, evaluated, and completed.
What is your gut telling you? Are you taking the time to think, hear, see, and feel before you speak, do, and go?
Final Reflection
The good news is that we have been created by a loving God who wants us to do good works—not just any good works, but those that fit our personality, talents, and passions. Why not spend some time praying, talking with trusted friends, and journaling about what has been revealed from thinking about these eight questions? How can you use them to align with God in every aspect of your life? You might just find that your life goals bring joy, purpose, and excitement for what’s in your future.
