1) Do not under any circumstances settle in a relationship. You deserve a great love. I don’t care who you are, what you look like, how old you are, or where you’re from. You deserve a great love. When you’re my age, and you’re dating, don’t just date for the heck of it. To the ladies, search for a boy who’s going to treat you so well that you couldn’t imagine a better life, and to the guys, BE that guy the ladies are looking for. And when you find someone, don’t spend all your days constantly complaining about their flaws, but if they do something you don’t like, tell them. Don’t let it become a routine of daily shortcomings and daily acceptance of those things that you really wish would just change themselves (SPOILER ALERT: they won’t.) You deserve something more than to live with passivity. If you aren’t just dating, maybe you’re already in a serious relationship, or maybe a marriage (once again, bear with me because that is obviously not something I have first-hand experience with), and while no, I don’t know what it’s like to be married, I do know that a marriage is not meant to fizzle out over time. When you’ve picked the person you want to do life with forever, it binds you, and when you’re 90 years old sitting in your rocking chairs on the front porch, I just hope you can find it in yourselves to be as happy as those 20 year olds you used to be. Find ways to be silly and laugh and be the best “y’all” you can be because it only comes once, and when it’s gone, you don’t want to wish you could’ve done it better. Love doesn’t settle with time, it’s only meant to grow. (Yes, that was unbelievably sappy…. But I believe it 100%)
2) A comfortable spiritual life is hardly a spiritual life at all. Faith without works is dead faith (James 2:17), and dead faith is worth nothing. If you aren’t constantly pursuing the God who created you, what are you doing? Who or what are you looking for if you aren’t looking for God? And what will you do with it when you find it? Yeah, maybe it’ll keep you content for a while, but soon, that yearning for something more will come. And if you fill that void with things that are of the world we live in, you are undoubtedly settling beyond belief. You literally cannot have a full life without the love of Jesus Christ, there is nothing that will fill you up. And no, I’m not going to tell you how to do it because honestly, I think it’s different for everyone. I think there’s a certain way for each of us to find Jesus, and a way to make Him constantly present in our lives. If there was one way to do it, God probably would have filled us in on that one. All I know is that there’s a book of truths, a spirit to fill you up, and a beautiful, loving, perfect Savior who died so that you and I can live abundantly. If you are completely lost on how to start, feel free to contact me, I’d love to talk to you! And if you think you can find success in the long-run without your Creator working in your life, just know that whether you acknowledge Him or not, he’ll be there… forever.
I will be the first to tell you that I like the comfort in my life. I like my morning Starbucks, and I like my smart phone. I like my cozy bed, and I like the convenience of having a car to get where I need to go. I really am just a big fan of all things comfortable and convenient. But let’s be honest, when life gets just a little too comfortable, what’s left to push us and to motivate us to reach for the bigger and better things? When is settling for the here and now going to be okay?
Never. And I mean never.
There are so many things we can settle for in life: convenient relationships, easy jobs, simple hobbies, and especially comfortable faith. But who wants that? Who wants to know that they could have the chocolate cake if they’d only walked a little bit farther, but instead sat down and ate the carrots? There are so many opportunities passed up in life simply because we got comfortable and were too afraid to reach a little farther. I know I do it, for sure. Nine times out of ten, I would skimp a little on studying for a test and settle for a B when a little extra time and effort could have gotten me an A. I would settle for #6 on the tennis team, when just a few more practice matches could have landed me that #5. There are so many examples I could use, and we all do them day after day. When will we learn?!?
There is never a time that it’s okay to get overly comfortable in life. By that, I don’t mean you should sell your house, give away all your clothes, and raffle off your car in order to create a level of discomfort for yourself to find an abundant life. I most definitely do not mean that. But what I am suggesting is that when life presents you with a fork in the road, do not take the path you think will be the easiest, simply because you don’t think you could reach for something better. Don’t settle for the comfort that is so overwhelming in this life because in the end, if all you have to show for yourself are a lot of things you could have, would have, should have done, what will that leave you with? A comfortable life not pushed by any sort of long-term goal, may be a good life, but don’t you want a great life with no regrets? Don’t you want to take the risk and maybe fail, rather than wish your whole life you had gone for it? Don’t you want to know you did everything you could to make the best life possible for yourself? Don’t you dream of what it would be like to really just go for everything you have ever wanted? Settling will never satisfy. And there are a few things I desperately want to touch on, so bear with me here:
So here we are at the bottom of the page. I know I just ranted for a few minutes of your life about how to have a better life, and I know coming from a 17-year-old girl, advice on how to have a “better life” is a little sketchy seeing as I haven’t really lived much life yet. But I’ve seen people who have settled, and I’ve seen people live good, comfortable, convenient lives who could have lived great lives if they had only taken a few more steps. I don’t mean try to be the first man on Mars, or find a cure for cancer. I mean take the steps in order to create your own greatness that you deserve. Find it within yourself and run with it. It doesn’t have to be a grand venture into the unknown, it just needs to be that push to get yourself beyond that comfortable rut we all find ourselves in.
If you get nothing from this except for the few words I’m about to type, read closely: Don’t waste your time on things that are wasting your time, don’t settle for an easy life when a better life is down the road, love so ridiculously that there could never be anything better, and find Jesus because He alone will make your life so tremendously full.
Samantha Reynolds 
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