Stop. Drop. Role.
(I promise that is not a typo…)
I don’t have long to write, and you don’t have long to read. My house is on fire. So is yours. I’ll make this quick.
You are being poisoned by toxic fumes. They are engulfing the house you worked so hard to make a home. The bedroom curtains are in flames. The living room is now inaccessible. The playroom has burned to the ground. You haven’t noticed because something is blocking your vision. Something is taking over all of your senses right now this very moment and you cannot see, hear, taste, smell or feel the actual world that is smoldering around you.
Listen to my voice. It is not too late to survive, to save what remains, and to rebuild. There is still time for everyone to make it out alive, on the other side of a near tragedy, with new eyes and grateful. There is rejoicing and reunion outside.
Three words can get you out.
Stop. Drop. Role.
Stop scrolling. Drop the phone. Step into the role for which you were created.
You do not have time to stay inside, endlessly scrolling your life away. You will die there, slowly but surely, every bit of purpose and passion will be choked out of your soul. You will wish for things you cannot have, you will forget the names of the things you most love, you will cherish nothing but more, more, more, and better. There are people who need you to get out of this burning house alive. People who need your voice, your touch, your eyes.
You are the only person who can live your life. Live it. With all that is within you. With open hands, open heart. With purpose and passion, with clear eyes.
Get out while there is time.
Stop. Drop. Role.
Dear friends,
I have had these three words in my journal for several years as a reminder to myself that I do not want to scroll my life away. More than ever, I realize the pull that the digital world can have on my mind, and I am always having to reevaluate and find ways to take my thoughts captive, to set limits for myself (and also now navigating this with older children), and to live into the purposes for which God has created me. I realized a couple of years ago that I can’t scroll. I don’t like what scrolling does to my mind. It floods my thoughts with too much information. It generally makes me unhappy, feeling like I have wasted time and learned things about people that I didn’t want to know. It also usually makes me feel anxious or envious or wanting something that I can’t have. Scrolling is the opposite of taking thoughts captive. It is entrusting my thoughts to algorithms that have only one goal—keep me there, dissatisfied and distracted. This may sound extreme, and I am generalizing to some extent, but it is pretty accurate to say that I never leave a scrolling session feeling that I have used my time productively, and I am usually less happy than I was when I picked up the phone. I am often aggravated when my real life interferes with the text I am writing or the comment I am leaving, and then I have to shake it off and realize that my real life is the life I want to be present for. The real people who are circling my waist, asking questions are the ones who need my comments. The real meal that needs to be made is more important the photo of my friend’s lasagne. It sounds silly when I write it out, but we are often trading our real lives for the shadow lives that we live in the digital world. Our real houses (and relationships) can be burning to the ground while we are constructing grand houses in a make-believe world. (It brings to mind The Great Divorce, where the people between heaven and hell can have whatever they want. They just think of bigger and better houses, farther and farther out, away from people, away from the conflict of relationships, and they can have them. And yet, the houses, no matter how grand and glorious cannot keep out the rain.)
I want a real life. I want a real house. I want to live with real people and look into their eyes. I want to embrace the beautiful, transient nature of earthly life and live it wholeheartedly. I don’t want it all to burn while I am playing make-believe in a grand, spotless mansion.
If you feel the same, I would like to lend you these three words. They will get out of the house on fire and into the clean air. Stop. Drop. Role.
What is your role? I don’t know… But God knows, and you can ask him. I encourage you, if these words are speaking to your soul, to take a few minutes and ask God what meaningful thing you could do in place of scrolling. So that when you pick up the phone and these words pop into your mind, you have something that is tied to your actual pupose in life that you could do instead.
Is there something—any small thing—that you could have on hand to do that is tied to your true purpose in life next time you find yourself with ten minutes and a phone in your hand, poised to scroll? Is there something you have always wanted to learn or do that you could do in ten-minute increments? (Read The Lord of the Rings, write a book, learn piano, clean out one drawer of clutter, fill a journal, send a letter, take a walk, family read-aloud, rub someone’s back, listen to your toddler, pray for your child, read through the Psalms, weed a garden, memorize a poem, write down twenty things you are thankful for, etc.)
In this season, most of my role involves keeping a home, writing down ideas in journals, making food, nursing a baby, prepping lessons for homeschool, laundry and dishes, meal-planning, trying to stay rested, keeping my mind awake and inspired through reading, and writing down my prayers in journals. There are many other things I would like to do, but this keeps me busy. I cherish the times when I can sit down at this desk and write words to share. This brings life to my soul, and it is another small role that God has given me throughout the busy seasons of my life as a mother of many children. You are a part of this part of me, and it means so much to me that you have taken the time to read this letter. Thank you so much for considering it worth your precious time. I pray that it will inspire you and bring you a measure of hope.
Sending love and hopes for houses that are real, solid, fully-inhabited and not-on-fire—even warm and cozy—places of peace and love,
Mackenzie
From the Family Archive:
The words of this song are a perfect prayer for anyone who is looking for a real, purposeful life. Randy wrote it about a year ago, and it ministers to me deeply.
My book is now available to purchase wherever you buy books online: