Tempered Steel: How God Shapes a Man's Heart through Adversity by Steve Farrar

Author:Steve Farrar
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781588601193
Publisher: The Doubleday Religious Publishing Group
Published: 2013-02-06T00:00:00+00:00

THE LONG PLATEAU

Not everyone has the bottom drop out. Some people just plateau. But both elevators are controlled by the same omnipotent and omniscient Operator, and each elevator contains its own lessons. The point is this: both Moses and Joshua were promoted by God to the top spot in Israel. But before they could be promoted they were both prepared.

God prepared one by letting the bottom drop out. He prepared the other by letting him plateau. What they had in common was this: before they were promoted in their careers, their careers were significantly interrupted.

Moses crashed and spent forty years crawling out of the wreckage.

Joshua was put on hold and waited for forty years.

And God was in charge the entire time.

Have you been laid off in the recent economic crunch? In His time, God will put you back to work. But for now, you’re on hold. You’ve plateaued. Plateauing is an interesting concept. You can plateau because you’re out of a job and you can plateau even in a job. Neither experience is one that a man relishes. But the lessons are priceless.

Career plateauing is becoming a national phenomenon. A case could be made that it is the number one career dilemma in America. For years, it has been the experience of many professionals to receive promotions every two to three years. But things are changing. It’s now more like five to seven years before a promotion comes down the line—if it comes at all. Corporations are cutting back. And now, with America in an ongoing war with an invisible enemy in our midst, there will be more cutbacks than ever.

The idea of languishing on a plateau is tough to handle when your entire mind-set is geared to motoring up the slopes. When you’re plateaued, you can’t get it in gear. You’re stuck in neutral. Or, to go back to the original metaphor, you’re stuck between floors.

One reason it’s so tough to be plateaued is because we treasure such high expectations of continual advancement. For nearly a generation promotion has been a “gimme” for those who worked hard. But as Bob Dylan used to sing, “The Times, They Are A-Changin’.” Things today are almost the reverse of what they were. When executives with Ivy League MBAs and fifteen years’ experience and high six-figure incomes are plateauing (and happy to still have a job), then it doesn’t take rocket science to figure out that promotions are going to be few and far between for everyone else on the corporate ladder.

There’s a big difference between plateauing and hitting bottom. There is a difference between a mid-life crisis and a mid-life plateau. The guy who bottoms out in mid-life is the guy who leaves his wife and kids, buys a red Corvette, several feet of gold chains, and applies Rogaine to his bald spots three time a day.

The guy who plateaus in mid-life doesn’t do that. He still loves his wife and kids, he keeps his SUV, the only chain he owns is

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