Wow! I haven’t done a Saturday Review since 2010 so I thought it was time to re-visit The Saturday Review on my blog with a book review. I just finished reading “A Million Miles in a Thousand Years” by Don Miller. Not since I read “A Purpose Drive Life” has a book so dramatically changed my perception of life. What are the moments that stand out in your life? What is the story you are telling? Are you taking the easy road or ready to take risks so that your story has meaning? What memories are you making? How is your story affecting those in your life? What is holding you back from living that really great story? What are those fears that don’t allow you to live the story you know you are destined to live? What are you doing to change the direction of your story? These are just a few of the questions I have started asking myself. They are certainly not easy answers nor do I expect to have all of the answers, but I have definitely been thinking about it and know that I never want to feel content. I know that may sound strange but I want to keep moving in the direction of telling a good story with how I live my life and I believe if we get content then we stop telling that wonderful and amazing story we have to tell.
As with all books I read, I highlight what stands out to me. Here are some of my highlights from “A Million Miles in a Thousand Years”…
“You get a feeling when you look back on life that that’s all God really wants from us, to live inside a body he made and enjoy the story and bond with us through the experience.”
“Your life is a blank page. You write it.”
“…he didn’t think we should be afraid to embrace whimsy. I asked him what he meant by whimsy, and he struggled to define it. He said it’s that nagging idea that life could be magical; it could be special if we were only willing to take a few risks.”
“Joy is what you feel when the conflict is over. But it’s the conflict that changes a person.”
“After a tragedy, I think God gives us a period of numbing as a kind of grace.”
“And yet I knew he was the only one with the power to make the pain go away.”
“…misery, though seemingly ridiculous, indicates life itself has the potential of meaning, and therefore pain itself must also have meaning.…life is a pursuit of meaning itself, and that search for meaning provides the basis for a person’s motivation. Pain then, if one could have faith in something greater than himself, might be a path to experiencing a meaning beyond false gratification of personal comfort.”
“…dwell in a spiritual domain…”
“…surrender their tragic experiences to the greater whole of a grander epic, and in that role they found a purpose to continue living.”
“God says to Job, Job, I know what I am doing, and this whole thing isn’t about you.”
“He said to me I was a tree in a story about a forest, and that it was arrogant of me to believe any differently. And he told me the story of the forest is better that the story of the tree.”
“The truth is, the apostles never really promise Jesus is going to make everything better here on earth.”
The story of the parade in Chapter thirty-four ending with “Nobody gets to watch the parade.”
