Don’t Get Used to It
God never called us to adapt to dysfunction
Beloved Friend,
My brother was complaining about something recently, and because that particular thing had become a staple in my life, I didn’t see it as a big deal. He had obviously experienced better, but that had become my new norm. I told him he would get used to it.
The way baba rejected it immediately and said he wasn’t going to let that become his new normal got to me. I laughed at first because it wasn’t exactly a bad thing, nothing worth forbidding, but it made me realize how easily we normalize things that were never meant to be permanent.
It reminded me of how quickly what is “manageable” becomes “acceptable.” How pain becomes familiar, and we start calling it endurance. How struggle becomes a cycle, and we start calling it our story.
Sometimes we even comfort ourselves with comparison. “At least mine isn’t as bad as theirs.” We settle because someone else has it worse, and that small sense of relief makes us feel it’s fine to stop expecting more. Yet gratitude was never meant to replace growth.
This also connects to my previous letter about not desiring things just to endorse God. That was one side of the coin. The other side is this, refusing to settle for less under the guise of contentment. Both extremes rob us of the full picture of what God desires for us.
It made me think about the things I’ve adjusted to that I should have resisted. The situations I excuse because “that’s just how life is.” We all have them, the quiet compromises that slowly shape what we call normal.
It could be working hard but never really seeing fruit, and you’ve begun to think that’s your story. Or facing delay and rejection so often that you no longer expect ease. Maybe it’s loving your friends well only to keep getting hurt, and now you’ve concluded that friendship isn’t for you. Or perhaps it’s living in constant tension, always bracing for something to go wrong, because peace feels too unfamiliar.
It’s not always about material things. Sometimes it’s our mindset. When we start believing that struggle is noble or that lack proves humility, we begin to settle in places God never meant for us to remain. Over time, dysfunction becomes comfort, and we start calling it contentment.
God never called us to adapt to dysfunction. Scripture says, “Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:2). Conformity adjusts to what is; transformation seeks what should be.
His design was never that we would barely get by, emotionally, spiritually, or otherwise. He said, “I have come that they may have life, and have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). Not a life of excess, but a life of wholeness.
So maybe the real question isn’t “What do I need to change?” but “What have I stopped expecting?” Sometimes, the problem is not the situation but how long we have lived with it.
Don’t get used to what God never planned for you.
With thoughts of kindness,
ABBA’s Shofar