For the most part we enjoy a good origin story. There can be a little origin story fatigue from time to time. Do we really need to see Peter Parker get bit by a radioactive spider again? Is there anyone who doesn’t know what happened to Bruce Wayne that turned him into the Dark Knight? But if there’s an origin story we haven’t heard before, we’re excited to see how this normal person realized his or her greater purpose and made an impact in the world.
The farm boy who becomes a Jedi.
The Muggle-born daughter of dentists who helps save the wizarding world.
The four children from England who take their thrones in Narnia.
So many origin stories involve characters discovering their purpose as they navigate their hero’s journeys. We engage with their paths, hoping to see them fulfill their purposes and make an indelible mark on the worlds they inhabit. Along with excitement, though, I have to admit there’s a tinge of envy when watching the origin stories of our favorite heroes.
I’m envious because Luke, Hermione and the Pevensies discover their purpose and fulfill it. Sure there are struggles in their journeys and bumps along the path, but eventually they do what they were made to do. They realize their purpose, act upon it and then change the world. Their origin stories are merely a small blip of what we can see, a quick formality before they get on to the purpose-seizing, life-defining, world-changing actions for which we know them.
Unfortunately our origin stories aren’t a mere blip or a quick formality. Sometimes they seemingly stretch on forever as we wonder when we’ll be transported off of our proverbial rocks.
I’ve been thinking a lot about this lately. I left a job that I loved for which I earned a graduate degree. It’s been almost eight months and I still haven’t written a book. Also nobody is knocking down my door to give me money to talk to them about Jesus. Batman’s origin story only took an hour in Batman Begins; mine is pushing three quarters of a year.
In my head I know that I’m going through a process, a process that takes time. I’ve got my first camp at the end of July when I’ll be able to get video of myself speaking. That video will make it easier to promote myself and book more speaking engagements. I was also caring for a pregnant wife or newborn baby over the past eight and half months, which definitely ate into my free time.
In my head I know those realities, but my heart sometimes think they just sound like hollow excuses. I sometimes feel like I’m not fulfilling my purpose and I’m dragging my feet, refusing to get beyond my origin story. I feel like Luke if he had decided to stay on Tatooine with the charred corpses of his aunt and uncle. Yet instead of smoking skeletons, I’m clinging to dreams that will never be.
That all sounds rather desperate, but feelings aren’t always logical and rational. I’ve definitely got more in common with Spock than Counselor Troi, but even I get caught up in my emotions sometimes. The challenge is sifting through my emotions to find what is beneficial and what is the product of my broken self. Feeling unsatisfied can propel me to keep pushing forward to fulfill my purpose. I can’t allow those same feelings, though, to make me doubt myself when my origin story is taking longer than I want it to.
I know God has a purpose for my life and I’m in the process of understanding and achieving that purpose. I’m still at the beginning of my story and there’s no use in wishing I was at the end. Everyone needs to go through their origin story and we have to trust that God will start the next chapter in his time.
What’s your origin story? Is it still being told?
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