When I was a junior in high school, my family and I took a trip to a lake in Indiana for a week of water skiing and fun. I brought a friend with me, and we took two cars. My parents and my brother were in one car, and my friend and I were in the other. I only had my driver’s license for about 9 months, so I was not accustomed to reading maps and watching for landmarks.

I just followed my dad all the way. When my dad exited off for gas, I followed him. When it was time to stop and eat, I followed him to the restaurant. I didn’t even know the name of the place that we were going or the name of the lake or town that we were heading to. I just knew it was a lake in Indiana.
When we were within an hour or so of our final destination, something happened. I don’t even remember exactly how it happened, but I lost my dad. One minute we were right behind him, and the next minute he was gone. My friend and I were probably having some deep conversation about music or cars or something that high school boys tend to talk about, but somehow I found myself with no-one to follow.

To compound the problem, we were now on a back road, off the main interstate. I felt like Lightning McQueen from the movie Cars. This was my status:
• I didn’t know where we were
• I had no idea where we were going to
• I didn’t have a map (navigation systems had not been invented yet)
• There was no cell phone
• I had never been in the area we were driving in
• There were no gas stations or places of business to stop at
• We had no game plan

Have you ever been in that situation before? I didn’t know if we should just pull over or keep driving or try to find some place to stop. It was total confusion. There was no way to communicate, and it was a guessing game. Even if I stopped for directions, what would I say? Can you help me get somewhere? I don’t really know where it is, but I sure could use some help.

Maybe you’ve never experienced a situation like that on a trip, but let me tell you something. There are millions of people living that situation out every day in their personal lives. They started off by following someone, probably their parents. There wasn’t a need to really do much thinking or planning, because those things were done for them on a daily basis. Maybe they went to college or perhaps they started a job out of high school. Maybe they never finished high school, or maybe they got one degree after another for years and years.

And then something happened. They realized they had no idea where they were, where they were going, how to communicate and no game plan of any kind. When you don’t have a target destination, then what do you do? You can take action, but what action do you take?

Most people take some type of action, regardless of the result. Action makes us feel that we are in control. It gives us a false sense of accomplishment. The problem is that action without a plan is simply aimless busyness.

In subsequent posts, I will detail a plan for creating a mission for your life, and you will be well on your way to doing great things.