Push.

Tonight I pushed. For the first time in nearly two decades, I really pushed.

I’m talking doubled over, burn-in-my-chest, sweat-and-spit-flying kind of push. I honestly haven’t felt that way since my drill team days. When the workout was over, I have to admit I was kind of surprised. I’m not sure exactly what put that fire in me tonight, but there it was…I had left it all on the floor and it felt good. But why? Why tonight? Why THIS workout?

I’ve had a little bit of an identity crisis lately. To be honest, it’s a bit more than little. In 2011, after graduating from one of the top law schools in the nation, I moved to Houston with my new husband, and for three years I worked as a full-time lawyer in one of the city’s biggest law firms. Around that time, our prayers were answered and my husband – whom I affectionally call Hunky Hubby – got a great in-house job (he’s also a lawyer) with a company based in west Texas. Although he started out working in their Houston office, we always knew that at some point we’d need to consider whether we’d be willing to move. While Hunky Hubby was raised a big-city kid – and to be honest, I too had grown quite fond of large cities – I was raised in a small town and was firmly settled on wanting to raise our family in a small town as well. So when our first daughter was born, the conversation became more serious. Ultimately, we decided to move. Somehow I was able to sucker my firm into letting me continue working remotely. So we packed up our four month old and off we went. For about four and a half years, I worked diligently for my clients, but once we found out we were expecting our third child, we decided as a family that it was time. Time for me to take a step back. Multiple factors contributed to that decision, and I felt 100% confident in it.

There’s something funny about life, though. Regardless of how confident you are in the choices you make, life has a funny way of reminding you what you’ve sacrificed. For me, that reminder came in the form of a message on LinkedIn. Well, not the message itself, but what followed. I rarely sign into LinkedIn, but since I received that message (which, ironically, was a congratulations on my 8 year anniversary with the firm), I decided to hop over to the feed and see what my peers were up to. Accomplishment after accomplishment flooded my eyeballs. Classmates making partner, former colleagues engaging in international panels as experts in their fields, friends gaining momentum in their entrepreneurial endeavors. And me…sitting in my living room checking messages between folding laundry, scrubbing spit-up out of the carpet and playing chauffeur to ballet and tennis lessons. Then I made the ultimate poor choice…I checked the latest salary scale. (In case you didn’t know, the standard for big law salaries is set every year by one particular firm in New York and published publicly.) Yikes. My earning potential had I stayed on full time through all those years was staggering.

Now trust me, I am fully and painfully aware of the value in and privilege of being able to take a step back and invest this way in my children, my husband and my home. It is a privilege denied to many who desire it, and not a day goes by that I don’t feel extreme gratitude for the ability to be here. Having said that…it can still be a shot to your ego to have a visual representation of what your potential could have otherwise been. Not to mention having to figure out how to describe yourself to new people when they ask what you do. For years, I was able to immediately gain legitimacy and respect by simply reciting the phrase “I’m a lawyer.” But what happens when that answer is more complicated? “I’m a semi-retired lawyer.” “I stay home right now but I’m a lawyer by trade.” Because as much as we hate to admit it, we all make immediate assessments of people when we find out what they do for a living.

But the real question is…why do I care?

Two years ago, our youngest daughter died unexpectedly of a rare acute-onset heart condition. In the two years since then, I have had the humbling and beautiful opportunity to share our journey and our hope with many people. Countless numbers of friends and strangers have reached out to share their own struggles and experiences with me as a result. I still cannot believe that God would use such a broken person as me to give a tiny bit of encouragement to people. But there are no numbers attached to that. No metrics. No pieces of paper that reflect the impact. Nothing I can put on LinkedIn or announce as a badge of honor when I meet new people.

But…what if that’s EXACTLY what I was created to do? What if, more than helping my clients build roads and schools, more than earning income for my family, more than being an expert at anything – all of which are noble and laudable ways to spend your life and endeavors I am very proud to say I pursued for many years – the task for which I was ultimately destined was something much less tangible?

In some ways, I think I’ve always only gone half-way with things. Fear of failure, fear of investing in something that’s ultimately not worth my time, fear of being asked to know or create or lead something I find myself incapable of doing. But what if, rather than being concerned about the world’s definition of success or worth, I chose to stop concerning myself with whether anyone thinks I’m smart or accomplished or influential and focused instead on using this new-found time freedom to giving my whole heart to doing exactly what God created me to do? What if I decided to be proud of the intangible?

So perhaps in this next stage of life, that’s exactly what I’ll do. Perhaps my workout tonight was the new visual representation of what my life can look like, what it WILL look like when I reach the end of my sojourn…doubled over, out of breath, chest burning because I gave my all to the cause for which I was created, whatever that may look like at any given stage. Proud because I held nothing back. Hopeful that the words I spoke and the time I invested will give glory to the Almighty and hope to those who needed something the standards of this world can’t offer. Now wouldn’t that be beautiful?