Spiritual Steps on the Road to Success

Many people wonder if they’ve really been called to the work they do. They might like it, feel it contributes in a good way to life, and feel it suits them. Some say they’ve felt called, guided, led, nudged, pushed or shoved into their work. Some might wonder – “God calling me? I’m much too small a person to be called.”

Our theology and philosophy about our work determines, to a great extent, how we see our work and what motivates us to keep going.

There are many theologies about spirituality and work. I grew up with the Middle Class Theology that says we contribute something worthwhile to the world in what we do, and we work for a living. When I was 19, I experienced a Call to Drama. I stood in my dorm room talking to God, and asked: “I love drama. Yet, how can I go into drama when I’m not good at acting, don’t know what else to do with it, and yet, this is the most exciting subject to me.” I heard the Small Voice Within say, “Your job is to keep the dream of drama alive.” I understood immediately what they meant, and as the years have gone by, have become clearer about this meaning. For me, drama is a humanity – it illuminates the human condition. That is what I must do – use my work in drama to emphasize that insight at the heart of drama. As the years have gone by, the Calling has become clearer: I work to help express the spiritual aspects of drama which does not mean being explicitly spiritual (although at times I do that), but to express the intrinsic spiritual aspects of the human condition.

Some of my theology then developed around this Calling: I learned to see God as personal, and that God had an interest in my individual life. Some denominations within Christianity express it as: “God has a wonderful plan for your life.” Other denominations would support a personal theology  that God cares about us individually and cares what we do in our lives.

There are other theologies that tell us that the “flow of life will take us where we need to go.” We often buck the flow in our lives. We don’t follow where we are seemingly being led. We don’t believe in our happiness, so when some wonderful opportunity is presented to us, we sabotage it.

Some might substitute “Spirit” for “flow” and try to tune in to those gentle proddings and those whispers and the occasional push and shove. Others might recognize that we are made in certain ways, to respond to science or math or music or drama or art or business In a way that satisfies us. We try to understand our identity and therefore might say “I want to be what I was created to be.” We try to become Respond-ers to the moving forces in our lives.

Whatever your theology of Callings, you can test your theology to see if it’s clear enough and strong enough to get you through the tough times when the Guiding Star becomes dim.  Sometimes we need to expand our theology, or even choose a religion that has a big enough theology to contain the many questions in our lives and to help us make wise decisions in our careers. A cohesive theology in itself is not enough, but it’s a start for us to understand whether we’re called, and if so, what are we called to do.