be an outlier.

all good things are done by outliers.

some outliers do bad things.

but all good things are done by outliers.

i heard this quote from Jordan Peterson who is an incredible psychologist and author - among other things. if you do not know him - he is a good study.

he said this while he was doing his series on Exodus.

it made me think about those that go against the grain. we all know the premise of those uber successful people who decided to go against the grain. not taking no for an answer and transforming an industry be doing it their way - completely disrupting a market.

the idea of this has always be fascinating to me - disregarding all predetermined market trends and tactics and being an outlier.

his quote basically is saying those on the fringes do good but people on the opposite fringe do evil. it makes me wonder about those who are not outliers. the “normal” ones.

i think we all begin as “normal” ones. shaped by our environments, who we look up to, who we are around. but what pushes us to be an outlier? are we all capable of both evil and good. i think we are.

just as love is a choice we have to choose every day. the choice between good and evil is a choice we must face each and every day.

God gives us each the choice to make within our hearts. we have the ability at any moment to decide in our hearts to choose Jesus. choose to accept him into our hearts and follow him or not.

the fact that God gives us this choice between eternal life and hell - i believe we also have the choice between good and evil.

so how do we become an outlier who does good while avoiding evil. i think it boils down to your heart. your behavior is a reflection of your heart. what is in your heart has to be at the top of your priorities. it is so easy to deflect focus away from our own heart, so easy to distract ourselves with the countless things the world throws at us. what if we spent half of the time that we spend focused our careers or money on our own hearts.

God creates an order for us to follow. following this order allows us to fully experience what God has for us. deviating from the order will result in things of the world and not of God.

i say this to say that we all need to focus on aligning our hearts with good and dare i say with God.