Some years ago, there was a book written by Siimon Reynolds, a legend of advertising, titled, ‘When They Zig, You Zag’. The entire point of his book was doing the opposite of what the crowd is doing.
Right now, we are right in the middle of Covid and this is the perfect time to do something different. This is the time to look at your business, your finances, your family, your faith and your life in general and see if you have just been zigging along, when in reality, you need to zag.
As a younger man, I would get these ‘out there’ idea on business and the way I thought one could be run. Because everyone was zigging along in business, I thought that they must have been right and my idea to zag was wrong. So I followed the business crowd a bit, thinking all those business guys with MBAs and multiple degrees must be so much smarter and wiser than I was.
Of course, now I am older, I realize that God was giving me unique business wisdom on how to do things His way. People were just zigging through life because they were not getting wisdom from God on how to zag.
In fact, I wrote a book on this and to this day, in everything we do here at Initiate Media, I try and ensure that we are zagging. We are doing things with excellence, but looking for God’s hand and vision on how we can literally do the impossible.
Honestly, as a businessman in Christian media, we’re running a pretty good company, but in my mind, I literally feel like I am living a real-life loaves and fishes story (check out John 6:1-14). In reality, what is in my hands in trying to run this company debt-free means that I need miracles from God and ideas from him that are not going to come from reading the Wall Street Journal. In my hands is really only ‘five small barley loaves and two small fish’, but that is enough to see God perform miracles.
My vision for what I want to do is so big that I simply, in the natural, cannot achieve what I feel I am called to, unless I tap into a higher source. Sure, I keep on top of lots of business and media trends, but if I am to zag, then this is only going to come from unique wisdom and insight from God.
Wisdom is a gift from God, and in your life and mine, God has insights, ideas, innovations and strategies that are far beyond what we can conceive and perceive in the natural.
Times are tough, but I am determined to keep zagging when the world seems to be going a little crazy. So I encourage you to take an inventory on where you are at and see if you have been zigging along in your life, when a word from God or a change of direction in one or more areas might just be the zag you need to turn your dreams into reality.
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Matt Danswan is the CEO of Initiate Media, publishers of Christian Woman & Co. He also blogs at www.mattdanswan.com and is the author of NOT Business As Usual.