0:00:00 - 0:00:33 Walkie time. So here's the story. Uh, someone left the gate open. Here's the story. Um, from long ago, one day, uh, back when I was in the military, I was in the National Guard and, uh, I was minding my own business one day and the Lord spoke to me and he said, uh, stop house hunting. I was young and 0:00:32 - 0:00:59 single, had a nice job. Um, and I was looking to buy my first house and I was very excited for it. It's kind of, I thought at the time it felt like kind of an apex moment in life where, you know, finally on my own out of poverty and ready to go in life. And, uh, I had a real estate agent looked at a 0:00:59 - 0:01:22 couple of houses. It's about to sign a contract on one. And God said, stop looking for houses. I was like what he said, you're getting deployed. Well, huh I said, ok, that was it. Right. And I had no doubt like it was just super clear. The voice was clear. It was such a small thing and this is something 0:01:21 - 0:01:47 I wanna keep hammering home, I think, you know, I talk about visions and dreams and voices and visits and all these things. But I tell you this, um, these things are all real, um, and they're all available for people. But one big old reason they don't happen for more folks is because people wouldn't 0:01:47 - 0:02:16 take them seriously and they'd ignore them. And, um, they, they just make excuses to diminish the validity of what had happened. Like when I hear a voice, I stop, I write down what the heck I was told I go and do it when I first, the very first prayer I ever gave offered to God. Um I'm not gonna say 0:02:16 - 0:02:34 like I fully expected him to answer me. I guess I did. I think that'd be true. But, you know, I didn't have mighty confidence that God, I prayed because I wanted to know if God existed, not because I knew he did. I, I just figured I was far enough in my life that I couldn't leave this one a question 0:02:34 - 0:03:01 mark anymore. But one thing that was absolutely true is I was ready to believe and obey anything he said if he was real. So I'm not saying from that moment I was perfectly obedient. I absolutely was not. I had to learn a lot of things and I have to learn even more now, so much more to learn. But um I'm 0:03:01 - 0:03:29 saying that uh it's so easy to take things lightly. And I think, I think that's um that's a propensity of mankind that's far underestimated. So, um, if you were to stand in my shoes and have the experiences, I did, uh, early on, I think you would just dismiss them and do nothing and pretend it didn't 0:03:29 - 0:03:55 happen and then you wouldn't get anymore anyway. Um, and if you wanna, if you wanna know why you're not getting those, if you're in that boat, there you go. Or if you wanna know how you can get more, there you go. Be willing to do whatever he tells you and don't impose um crazy, crazy degrees of um certainty 0:03:54 - 0:04:16 before you're willing to act. Um, which is exactly what this video is about anyway. So back to the story. So, um I said, ok, and that's what it was. So I, I called up my real estate agent immediately and I said, hey, um I'm not going to be getting a house and she thought I was pulling a fast one on her 0:04:15 - 0:04:31 because you signed a contract say says you're not gonna go with another agent. She's like, well, you know, you signed and said, I said, no, no, no, I'm not getting another agent. Uh I, I'm just not gonna buy a house and she said she's really pushy. She's like, why? And I said, oh, because I'm getting 0:04:31 - 0:04:50 deployed and she's like, oh, ok. Ok. No big deal. And she didn't ask how I knew that she just assumed that I had been told in the no normal ways. This is I, you know, I always say God has a sense of humor. So I was smiling because this is a, this is one of one example. I think it's hilarious. So, so 0:04:50 - 0:05:12 then my company commander, a really good guy. Um he calls me up and he says, this is like a day later, I think I had an hour uh 24 hours lead time from the Lord. And he says, hey, um I'm not really supposed to tell anybody yet, but I was, I was second in command in this unit. I was his executive officer 0:05:11 - 0:05:34 . And uh he said, I'm not supposed to tell anybody yet, but I just wanna make sure you knew because we're getting deployed. And I said, yeah, actually I have heard and he's like, oh, OK, good. And he also didn't ask how, so that, that was some comic relief in, in what was honestly a pretty stressful 0:05:33 - 0:06:05 situation. So, so anyway, so that word came out and uh I was so torn about this at the time. Um The particular situation at hand, I had serious moral misgivings about going and participating in a military action that I did not believe was justified. And my biggest concern with that was not any danger 0:06:05 - 0:06:35 to me or the dilemma of choosing to take someone else's life for something you don't believe in or give your own. So that, that doesn't happen. But for an equally dumb reason. Um, nor was the issue, any issue of courage. Uh, I have never struggled with that but I shouldn't say never. Um, that's a, that's 0:06:35 - 0:07:03 not something that has typically been a problem for me. But, um, the issue was, uh, I had serious issues issuing orders to people to do things that I didn't believe in and, um, I really didn't want to have to write letters to these people's significant others in the event that something happened to them 0:07:03 - 0:07:33 trying to justify that. So I pray in it like a madman and um in very short order, um I uh realized that that actually through circumstances that are gonna make this even longer. So I'll skip them. Uh I had not, I had moved to that place but I wasn't officially in the guard. My paperwork had not been 0:07:33 - 0:07:53 transferred even though I was really trying to get it transferred because there's a pay situation. Um Anyway, um it wasn't, I, I wasn't the person that had to sign the papers and the person who had to sign them wasn't doing their job for a very long time. So um I realized that that I could volunteer 0:07:52 - 0:08:20 to go with this unit, but I was not legally assigned to go yet and I had the option of moving. Um All this happened very quickly. This is like a day 24 hours. Um And uh I was, I was praying and praying and I said, Lord I'm not a coward. I care very much about these people that are in this unit. I'm serving 0:08:19 - 0:08:40 with, I want to help them. I want to be with them. And, uh, this is why I signed up for. And even though I don't agree with the particulars, I think it's a weaselly thing. If I were to move, I'm not sure about that. I don't know that that would be a good thing to do. And I was racked about this and I 0:08:40 - 0:09:02 expected the Lord to say just do, just do it because it's the right thing and OK, cool or something. I don't know what I was expecting honestly. But II I thought he would just give me the answer right? And uh he spoke to me and this is what he said. He said, um you don't realize this, but this choice 0:09:02 - 0:09:29 is not just about going. He said you can go or you can go and the choices before you, but realize that if you go, you will not have a family. Your choice is you either don't go and have a family or you go and, and you will not have a family in this life. And I was like, and he said the choice is before 0:09:28 - 0:09:52 you. And uh I mean, it was so clear what I needed to do because I could see that it would be better to have a family. I thought about it. And I said, you know, I I think I'm a good soldier in everything. But is anything gonna be different for these guys with me? Not going, probably not. Um I don't think 0:09:52 - 0:10:14 anything's gonna be left undone but if I don't have a family that, that is something that individually, I am going to have an impact on that other people can't do for, for what's my family? That's me. So, um, no joke. 24 hours ish. This might have been two days. It was a lot, a lot of years ago. But 0:10:14 - 0:10:32 I mean, it was like a day I called my boss. I may have met with him face to face. But I think because of the timeline I called him and I said, look, I gotta move across the country like right now. So because I didn't know when the paperwork is gonna hit, you know, maybe it would have been months because 0:10:32 - 0:10:55 it had been months, but it could have hit any minute and then I'd be on the hook, right. I knew what I needed to do. So I called my boss and I said, look, here's, I gotta move now to another state. So, uh, they had like this, uh part of the company that was national is like a traveling group, not just 0:10:55 - 0:11:10 in the office where I was locally. And he said, well, no big deal. We have this like where you're going. There's this other part of the company you could work for, I'll make some calls we'll get you transferred. You're great. We wanna keep you. It's not a big deal. He was so accommodating about it, which 0:11:09 - 0:11:30 was unbelievable to me. There's no notice for this and he's a good guy. But so I was like, cool. I told my roommate, hey, man, I'm out and I packed up everything that could fit my little car and I started driving out west, didn't have a place to live. I didn't have a job but God said, look, the path 0:11:29 - 0:11:52 is before you and here you go. And I was like, ok, started driving down the road. I had to leave behind a whole bunch of stuff that didn't fit my car and, uh, much to my roommate chagrin anyways. So, um, ok. Well, the story is over, right? And obviously it's made, I cannot tell you, oh, the truck's coming 0:11:52 - 0:12:11 . I can't tell you what kind of difference it's made in my life. That choice. Um, of course, I can't tell you completely because I don't have both sides of the story to tell you how it would have gone the other way. But I can tell you, I'm pretty confident it wouldn't have been good. So, or however good 0:12:11 - 0:12:33 it would have been, it wouldn't have been the best. And that's, that is the point is, um, God promises to show us what's better, but he, he doesn't promise that we're going to know at the time of the decision just by how much that's like this is what I want to underline and highlight and stomp about 0:12:33 - 0:13:01 . Uh, you gotta understand that he gives us the tools to know among options, which is the best, but that there's no guarantee that we'll see all the options because that takes, uh among other things, a lot of openness on our part and that's a big deal. Um, and sort of its own topic. But I can tell you 0:13:00 - 0:13:24 that um a lot of the divergent outcomes in life can be explained by people who do a better job at honestly enumerating and discovering available options. That's a big deal. The other big deal is correctly figuring the value of each of those options, the cost and benefit. And that, that's kind of the 0:13:24 - 0:13:46 problem is that value is not easily discovered and it's not just you got it right or you got it wrong. There are shades here and it takes a while to figure it all out. Sometimes it takes a really long while, many times it's not till years and years and years after the decision that you really grasp the 0:13:46 - 0:14:13 full scope of what was before you and you had no idea how important it was. So um to obtain the most of what the Lord wants to give us, we really have to open our eyes to the full scope of options available to us and really work at seeing which ones uh is best and then faithfully following that opportunity 0:14:12 - 0:14:42 even when it requires crazy extreme things because um he works through faith and faith is about our desires and the reasons for what we want and the actions that we take to bring it to pass. So huge, huge outcome swing on decisions that seem in the moment that they're not too different than the other 0:14:42 - 0:15:03 options, but it is obvious that they're better. But we just, we, we really don't know by how much until you go down the road, you gain the experience and wisdom. So just to bring a little more attention to the subtlety between available options, um I think if I had to characterize the biggest mistake 0:15:02 - 0:15:27 that's most often made, that's most detrimental in amongst these themes, it would be, um Number one would be assuming that something that's only a little worse is actually only a little worse. So I think we get into huge trouble when we say, well, it's only a little worse than the best thing I can think 0:15:27 - 0:15:49 of that won't hurt too bad because it sure feels a lot better to go this direction. It's sure a lot easier to do this one than the other one. Um And that's, that's really where you get hung up because I think if you find anyone who's had an abundant life so far and you ask them to honestly assess their 0:15:49 - 0:16:15 path through it, I think that all of us would say it's been like, like 98% of the value in my life has come from decisions that were long shots that, that had a very low probability of working out that were weird that no one else was doing. And yet that is what describes the absolute majority of the 0:16:15 - 0:16:41 value in my present life are those long shot decisions. And that's not to say that they weren't the most rational thing to do. I it's that the most rational thing to do will from time to time be really hard, be a, be a very low probability to success and take uh immense and sometimes sudden effort, sometimes 0:16:41 - 0:17:02 it's immense effort over a long time and sometimes it's just a little effort over a really long time, like actually studying your scriptures every day. Um which in the moment for some people who haven't fallen in love with that yet, um can feel like AAA an immense uh investment of time, but it's really 0:17:01 - 0:17:28 nothing in the scheme of things. Um for the benefit it provides anyway. That's the number one way I think people slip up. Number two way is in not including all of the options that you actually have the ability to perceive. So um I don't really know anybody who would have been open to what I did in the 0:17:28 - 0:17:47 story I shared uh they exist, I'm sure. But uh the these people are, are not abundant, right? Um Because because people don't open their minds to possibilities that are outside of the norm, they just look at around at what everyone else is doing and say like, oh, well, yeah, they'll just that, that's 0:17:47 - 0:18:08 the menu I'll pick from this. I mean, open your eyes to what the average person's life is. It's terrible. Do you really want that? And, and so if you're honest, you have to admit that what you're actually saying is I expect to be able to do what everyone does and I fully expect a much better outcome 0:18:07 - 0:18:33 than what everyone else gets by doing the same thing I'm doing. And that is absolutely ridiculous. Um, it's worse than ridiculous. It's, it's absurd. So, um, be honest about the options and be honest about where they're going and in value, these are all big things, but I thought I could sort of slice 0:18:32 - 0:18:58 off a tiny bit of this and stick it into a 20 minute video. So there you go. Be aware of the options. You have, be honest in assessing their value and look out for that huge trap of this is only a little worse. Go for what is best every single time. And if you stack up enough of those contiguously, you'll 0:18:57 - 0:19:03 be absolutely shocked where it takes you in life and who you become through doing that.