If you are going to live freely, you must kill the desire for other people’s approval. The approval that you must seek is to please your Father in heaven, and live peacefully with your conscience.

If you want to live freely, release others from the expectation that they will fulfill you. No human can fully stretch themselves across the Grand Canyon of your heart.

To live lightly, burn the receipts of others’ actions toward you. You are not the accountant, balancing ledgers of grains of sand that have been paid and grains that are due. We are all debtors to One more than debtors to each other.

To live at peace with your mind, cull your past. Make peace with the troublesome parts and affirm the wholesome. One has more time to enjoy the landscape when one is not busy stashing luggage in the trunk. Carry the essentials but not the weight of your entire life.

Do not look side to side in jealousy of others. We bloom in our own time. Celebrate when others succeed and know that their progress does not threaten your own.

Traveling freely and lightly does not always come naturally but it contributes to a more enjoyable journey. In removing the pressure for others’ approval, you open yourself to your Father’s direction on your life. When you release the presumptive expectations that others will meet your emotional needs, you free yourself from others holding the key to your happiness.

Like a flame within a glass lantern being sheltered from the wind, maintaining internal peace is the protection against a hostile world. No one can take your peace unless you first surrender it. Carry your peace within you, not your ledgers or weighty burdens of the past. Travel lightly, friends.

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Author and watercolor artist Emily Lex recently released a devotional titled, “Freely and Lightly.” I haven’t read it yet, but the words of the title had been percolating in my mind. What is the essence of living freely and lightly? The above thoughts came to me one day while driving and I quickly transcribed them into my files. If you would like to hear a more polished take on this topic, Emily’s book is available here: https://emilylex.com/book/