A Weekend Away

When my beautiful Isabel was about three we were cuddling quietly on the couch one day. She is simply the best cuddler in the whole world. After a long time, she said to me, “Daddy, are you happy at me?” My eyes filled with tears and I cannot even describe the feeling in my heart. “Oh yes, my love. You have no idea how happy I am to have you in my life. Growing up I didn’t have any sisters, and when the doctor told us we were having a little girl I was ecstatic. You are my beautiful girl, and I will always be happy you are in my life, darling.” She pulled me even tighter, and I could feel it in my soul that she felt loved and accepted.

We all have a great need to belong, to be loved and accepted.

We all need people to do life with, friends to accompany us on the pilgrimage of life. One of the things we are all hungry for is connection. We are also hungry for community. But we live in a time of empty connections and shadow communities. We connect with people online, but that is not a real connection. We join communities online, but these are pretend communities that don’t come close to fulfilling the legitimate needs we have. The only thing these online connections and communities prove is that as human beings we have an incredible need and hunger for meaningful interaction with each other.

My life has been rich with friendships. So many people have blessed me in so many ways with their time, their advice, their love, generosity, and friendship. What makes a great friend? Our best friends are those people who encourage and challenge us to become the-best-version-of-ourselves.

The second great intervention in my life came as unexpectedly as the first. At the time I was surprisingly content, really quite satisfied in many ways.

Let me share this, not to boast but as necessary context for the story I am about to tell you. I was in my midthirties and for fifteen years I had traveled well over 250 days a year trying to help people develop their own inner lives. I had written more than a dozen books, which had sold about ten million copies, been published in more than twenty languages, and had been featured on all the most prestigious best-seller lists. I had spoken in more than fifty countries to a collective audience of more than three million people. In my spare time, I had founded a very successful consulting company that had more than forty Fortune 500 clients and hundreds of small and midsize business clients. To be honest, I was feeling pretty good about myself.

What happened next was that a handful of my friends decided to go away on a golf trip and invited me to join them. It was just what I needed—a chance to get away, relax among friends, and get some fresh air and exercise.

When we checked in to the hotel on the first day, we agreed to meet at six p.m. for a drink. One of the guys had a huge suite, so we were going to meet there. Being a planner, I am usually about five or ten minutes early for things. But when I got there, everyone else was already there and I had the feeling that they had been talking about something before I arrived.

I poured myself a rum and Coke and sat down. In hindsight, the armchair that was empty was sort of the focal point of the whole room, and that was not a coincidence. As I sat down, they said, “So, there is something we want to talk to you about this weekend.”

Still oblivious, I answered, “Sure, whatever you need. What is it?”

Jeremy, who had obviously been appointed spokesperson for the group, said, “We think you are wasting your life and you need to make some changes.” You could have pushed me over with a feather. Blindsided doesn’t even begin to describe what had just happened.

“Um, okay…so, what makes you feel that way?” Then they just all started chiming in.

“Man, you are always on the road. That’s not healthy.”

“You can’t reach enough people live; you need to get off the road and harness technology.”

“You need to slow down if you are ever going to have any chance at a normal life.”

“You’re not married because you don’t stay still long enough to form a meaningful relationship.”

“You won’t do your best work until you sink some roots and get settled.”

Wow. I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t know what to think or where to look. It was surreal. I sat there stunned for a while. I’m not sure how long, but it felt like a long time. When I gathered my thoughts a little I asked half-jokingly, “So what should I be thinking about so I don’t waste the rest of my life?”

“We want you to think about how you can have one hundred times more impact over the next fifteen years than you did over the past fifteen years.”

The rest of the weekend was a blur. I hit more golf balls into the water that weekend than I had in three years combined. Maybe that was part of their plan: Drop this on me to throw me off my game. But here’s the thing. They were great friends. I knew that. I knew they had my best interests at heart. So I had to listen to them. And I did.

Dynamic Catholic exists because of that intervention. I was comfortable and satisfied, and looking back that should have set off alarm bells, but we all have blind spots.

Will this work God has entrusted to me and the team at Dynamic Catholic have one hundred times more impact in this fifteen-year period? It’s impossible to say for sure, but I think it will. It will certainly come close. If it weren’t for those friends, I would probably be out there doing the same old thing. That would be a tragedy. When I see all those young people who have moved from all over the country to be at Dynamic Catholic, I find that very humbling. I cannot imagine my life without Dynamic Catholic. It seems specially ordained to serve God’s people in this way at this time.

Where did Dynamic Catholic come from? Well, my parents raised me and loved me, John challenged me to take the inner life seriously, and a bunch of guys confronted me about how my gifts could be used to achieve the most good for the most people. Thank God for interventions. Thank God for friends who care enough to intervene.

	KEY POINT Our best friends encourage and challenge us to become the-best-version-of-ourselves. They don’t let us waste our lives and they push us to serve powerfully.
	ACTION STEP Who in your circle is God calling you to encourage or challenge to become a-better-version-of-themselves?