The Principle of the Path

One of my favorite books of all time is "The Principle of the Path" by Andy Stanley and I recommend it for anyone who wants to live a fruitful, productive life. A principle is not a rule you follow and it is also not a law. Rules and laws can be broken, but principles have the power to break you if not respected and managed properly. The nature of a principle is that you don't have to know it or apply it to be impacted by it, but once you discover and understand a principle, it can be leveraged and you can use or borrow from its power. Think of the principle of buoyancy, when it is leveraged, things float, but when it is ignored or misapplied, things sink. Embracing the principle of the path is the key to avoiding regret and if regret can be avoided, it should be.

The Principle of the Path is that "direction - not intention - determines our destination".

The direction you are currently traveling - relationally, financially, spiritually, health, family and the list goes on... - will determine where you end up in each of those respective arenas. This is true regardless of your goals, your dreams, your wishes or your wants. Like it or not, the principle of the path trumps all those things. Your current direction will determine your destination, period. Simply put, you and I will win or lose in life by the paths we choose because direction determines destination every time. You don't have problems to fix; you have directions that need to change. We all have the propensity for choosing paths that do not lead in the direction we want to go and for some reason it is much easier to see this at work in other people than it is in ourselves. Funny how that works.

"The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it". Proverbs 27:12.

We are all on a path that is leading us somewhere and will have an eventual destination. Today's decisions create tomorrow's experiences and you will never get to where you want to be if you don't know where you are to begin with. So it might be time to ask yourself, "what paths am I on and will they lead me to where I want to go?" That is a question worth asking yourself on a routine basis. Remember, direction - not intention - determines your destination and you can either leverage that principle and "float" or ignore it and "sink".