We have reached the point where you know where your shots are going, and most of your shots are in the same spot. Now, you are working to hit your target. Do you know what your target even is, though? Maybe you are looking down range at a paper with 4, 5, 6, or 8 different smaller targets, maybe you have just one big target down range, or maybe you are aiming at flying clays coming from many different directions. No matter what or where your target is, you have to pay attention and be focused on where it is or where it will be.

Over the next few posts I want to focus on the targets of relationships, love, family, careers, and yourself. I want to spend time looking at these ideas, how these targets intersect, and how to adjust the target, when it wasn’t really the one you should have been aiming for.

Relationships

When you sit down and look at your relationships, how many of them are superficial, and how many are meaningful? What relationships drive you in your daily life? I’m not only talking about relationships with people but relationships with things. Many of us are known by our titles, our things, our hobbies, our friends, or our families.

How do you describe yourself when you meet someone? Does it sound like, “Hi, I’m Cory, and I’m the CIO of… “ or “Hi, I’m Cory. I’m a Christian husband and father who does IT.” What are you known for or as? What have you worked towards? Do you need to adjust how you’re known? How you introduce yourself may point to where you place your value in yourself. Do you want to be known as the Jeep guy or the guy with that awesome truck? Do you want to be known for being a big shot at your workplace? We all have a drive for success, but how do you define success for yourself? Is your main relationship focus based on success? What in your life determines success? Growing up in a small town, success looked like owning a Cadillac, a BMW, or a Mercedes would show you were successful. Living in a certain section of town pointed to being successful as well. After moving from a small town to a bigger city, all the cars that weren’t common back home were now everywhere. The section of town that would mean you were “successful” became more out of reach. When we measure success with things, things are always going to change. A relationship with success is bound to be an ever-changing and moving target. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have a focus on being better; I’m saying that we need to know how we are defining success and not letting success define us. Also, when looking at a relationship with others based on your “successes,” what happens if and when those things go away? What happens if the company downsizes or gets new leadership and you lose your high-power position? If those relationships with others go away just because you no longer have this specific thing, how deep and strong was that relationship to begin with? Changing how you are known can help you recognize what relationships you need to be focused on. If you didn’t have your job or career, who would you be? Can you describe yourself without talking about work?

What does your relationship with God look like? I’m not talking about religion; God wants to walk daily with you. God wants a relationship with you; that’s how he built us. We were designed to be in a relationship. For many of us, we don’t like vulnerability, but having a relationship with God gives us that foundational relationship and friendship that fills the hole in our heart and soul. When I talk about a relationship with God, I have to go back to the other posts from this series and remind all of us that we can only get closer to Him by spending time getting on paper with Him. We HAVE to spend time learning more about Him, talking to Him in prayer, and listening to Him when we pray. When you started dating your spouse/significant other/baby momma, you didn’t just say, “ Hi, I’m __________, will you be part of my life?” You spent time getting to know them, their likes and dislikes, finding out more about them, getting to the point that you were of one mind. This is what God wants to have with us. He wants us to be in a loving relationship with Him. Still, if we don’t put forth the time and effort to know Him, that relationship will never grow past the superficial, easily broken, not-real relationship many others have. When you look back at the very start of the Bible, God designed us for relationships. He knew we shouldn’t be alone, and He also spent time interacting with Adam.

”Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him.” So the Lord God formed from the ground all the wild animals and all the birds of the sky. He brought them to the man to see what he would call them, and the man chose a name for each one. He gave names to all the livestock, all the birds of the sky, and all the wild animals. But still there was no helper just right for him. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep. While the man slept, the Lord God took out one of the man’s ribs and closed up the opening. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib, and he brought her to the man.“
‭‭Genesis‬ ‭2‬:‭18‬-‭22‬ ‭NLT‬‬
https://bible.com/bible/116/gen.2.18-22.NLT

God also spent time walking around the garden with Adam and Eve, in the cool air of the evenings. We see that when God came to see them after they had sinned by doing the one thing they weren’t supposed to do. But God still provided for them.

”And the Lord God made clothing from animal skins for Adam and his wife.“
‭‭Genesis‬ ‭3‬:‭21‬ ‭NLT‬‬
https://bible.com/bible/116/gen.3.21.NLT

Through our lives, God wants us to depend on Him, He wants us to have a relationship with Him, and He wants to be in a relationship with us. He is still providing for us; we have to know what and how to look for Him in our daily lives. Sometimes, we may not even see what He is doing until we have gotten way past when it happened. We look back and see, wow, God did something amazing. That is when we need to take the time to refocus on Him and thank Him for always being there, even when we didn’t know it.

The next most important relationship is with your spouse. Most likely, you spent time dating and learning about each other, getting to know each other, and falling in love. Hopefully, you are still falling in love. Dating is when we put in all the front-end work: dressing up and going to dinner, celebrating that six-week anniversary, that three-month anniversary of your first kiss. But sometimes dating and marriage can have times that things become stagnant. It’s easy to look at all the bright, shiny new things in the relationship when everything starts, but what do things look like, when one or both of you have the flu? When someone almost loses or loses a family member? What happens when both of you have a lot of obligations at work?

You have to be careful not to lose sight of each other. It’s fun when you are dating, engaged, newlyweds, and spending your time planning the future. What no one is prepared for is that first fight, the first time the water gets shut off, the day no one remembered to turn on the crockpot. Relationships are work. Relationships take communication and connection from both sides. After almost 20 years of marriage, I’m happy to say that we are still happily married and deeply in love. No, we aren’t the same people we were 20 years ago; that was a few houses and several jobs ago. One thing that we have always kept in mind is that we have to keep working on us; we have to fight for us. We are a team. When we got married, we had a reference to Ecclesiastes 4:12 placed in our wedding rings: “A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.” We knew that the 3rd strand in that cord was our relationship with God. We work to build each other up; we have come to know when the other person just needs a little space, and we also know when to call the other one on some BS. Yes, there are times that there have been struggles and stresses, but knowing that we have each other holding each other, holding each other up has allowed us to grow stronger and closer every day and every year. Again, it takes work. It doesn’t just happen. It takes compromise, support, communication, space, understanding. You have to be focused on this relationship because other things will fight for that focus. When you don’t feed and nurture this relationship, it will suffer. You can’t let other relationships take the place of your relationship with your wife. This relationship and your relationship with God should be your main relationship focus.

You can’t just go through the motions with God, you can’t just go through the motions as a husband, and you can’t just go through the motions as a dad. The third relationship I want to focus on is the relationship with your children. We have all seen the sitcoms and movies and stories of the dad who comes home, sits in the recliner with a beer, and falls asleep while the kids want a little attention. As a dad, yes, working hard and showing your kids a strong work ethic is important, but most of the time, your kids would rather have your time than have you buy them something. As dads, we have a big job, we need to love our children’s mother, show our kids what a strong marriage should look like, and we have to try our hardest not to screw them up too much. We don’t have to be perfect, we don’t have to be right all of the time, but we do need to be there. We don’t need to be lost in our phones, hobbies, or ourselves. We also need to be careful not to live through our kids. We should be teaching our kids and helping them grow. We also need to show them that it’s ok to mess up. As dads, we have to admit our mistakes, we have to show our kids how to get up after being knocked down, and we have to teach them how to build their relationships as they grow. If all they see and hear from you, is that they can’t do things right, or they need to work harder so they don’t fail, but you never help them figure out how to do it right, their relationship with you is going to suffer. You are going to be one of the foundational building blocks for their future relationships. If that block is broken, rough, or missing, they are going to find something, potentially harmful to put in that spot. When that block is made out of love, understanding, guidance, and good examples, you are setting the framework for your kid to have an opportunity to build great relationships in the future. At the end of the day just be present with your kids. Be vulnerable around them, love their mother in front of them, show them what a strong relationship with God looks like. They are going to get more out of that than any “thing” you can give or buy them. Doing things with your kids, finding stuff to do together, making memories, and encouraging them, are some of the ways that you can build that relationship. For some of you, it may be late, but it’s never too late to build/fix those relationships.

As you reflect on your relationships, please take a moment to see what ones need to change and how they need to change. Find your key relationships, and focus on God, your wife, and your family. On the relationship target, you may be off from the center, but by making it this far through this post, I’m going to say you are on track to make the needed corrections to hit where you need to on this target. Let your family see you make these adjustments, let them help you, and let other men around you help you. We have to work together; we try to do things alone to prove to ourselves we are strong, but the more strands you add to that cord, the stronger it will be.