Does everything in life really have to be so complicated? Do we really have to stay so busy that we don’t have time to enjoy the simple pleasures and fascination that life offers? Why do so many people seem to have no joy in their lives? I have been pondering these questions and others in recent days.

Lately, I have been listening to the casual conversations of others and examining my own life as well. Everyone that I know, including myself, seem extremely busy. For example, I was in the coffee shop the other day and overheard two men greet each other. One man said, “Hey Fred, you staying busy?” Fred shot back, “Yah, real busy! How about you Tom? You staying busy also?” Tom replied in the predictable way, “ I’ve been so busy you wouldn’t believe it.” After this short conversation, these two men parted paths to continue their busy lives. Now, you may be thinking, “Brandon, they were just exchanging small talk and didn’t have time to communicate in depth.” That is precisely my point. Our society has reached a place where people do not make time for one another anymore because of our busy schedules and the lack of balance in our lives.

I was curious to know Webster’s definitions of the word busy, and the fifth definition made the most sense to me. Webster defines busy as cluttered with detail to the point of being distracting. I imagine that is precisely how most of us feel at times. We feel like our life is cluttered with so many tasks that we become distracted from our true priorities (i.e., spending time alone with God, eating a steak with our Dad, calling a close friend, throwing the baseball with our little cousin, or making a trip to our Grandparent’s house to show them our love.)

Concerning maintaining balance in our lives, it is beneficial to think of our lives like a pendulum. Allow the pendulum of balance to swing to far into an obsession with work and success and you experience God’s correction and the loss of pleasure; allow the pendulum of balance to swing toward excessive leisure and neglect, despair and frustration will take their toll. Keep your pendulum rocking back and forth close to the middle, enjoying life yet maintaining a sense of divine purpose and calling, and then see a healthy sense of balance and minimal distractions bless your life.

After graduating from Penn and finishing my first full year of competition on the National circuit, I realized that my pendulum of life wasn’t rocking back and forth and close to the middle. I realized that there were some distractions in my life that were minimizing my potential and keeping me out of balance. I was partying too much, not getting enough rest, and my priorities were out of order. I knew that I didn’t move out to the Olympic Training Center to get 6th in the World Team Trials. So I made a commitment to stop partying, get plenty of rest, and get my priorities in order. As I made these changes, I began feeling peace that I had never felt before. I began enjoying life like never before because I was balanced and had minimized most of the distractions that were easily entangling me. My wrestling got better, friendships were strengthened, and overall confidence in myself increased. When it was time to wrestle in the 2000 National tournament in Vegas, I felt so alive and ready to compete for the title. Fortunately, 2000 was a good year for me in wrestling, and I attribute my success to finding that balance and getting my priorities in order.

How do we get so distracted when we know how we should be living? I think we become distracted because we are ambitious for the wrong reasons. We think that winning State Titles, National Titles, and Olympic Gold Medals will truly bring us long-term happiness. We think that a job that pays the most money is the best job. Our society is so focused on being the best, reaching the top of our field, making as much money as possible, and getting the gold medal in life that our ambitious motives become warped, self-centered, and unhealthy. After I speak to school assemblies, I usually open it up to questions. Many of the questions that kids have concern how much money I make, what kind of car I drive, and how much my gold medal is worth. These questions miss the point and burden my heart and inspire me to keep planting positive seeds of truth, character, and godly perseverance. I want kids to know, as writer Art Buchwald said, “the best things in life are not things.”

Is it really bad to have high ambitions? Of course, ambitions at face value are not wrong as long as a person has the right motives. If you want to earn a gold medal because you yearn to be popular and have all eyes upon you, your motives are impure. If you want to marry someone just because they are gorgeous and make you look better, your motives are self-centered. If you want to start your own business just so you can make a lot of money, your motives are self-gratifying. Yet if you want to earn the gold medals in life because you love what you do, whom you are with, and long to honor your Creator with all of the gifts that He has given to you, take the journey. God will bless you along the way.

As I travel across the Nation doing Greater Gold wrestling clinics and giving the Greater Gold message at schools, churches, and companies, many people ask what the phrase greater gold truly means to me. Our company name, Greater Gold refers to a lifestyle that strives to maintain proper priorities in life. The most significant lesson that I learned in my 18- year Olympic journey is that my gold medal means much to me and to my family, to my friends, and to my community, yet there is a greater gold in life. The greatest gold medal that I have in my life is Jesus Christ in my heart. When that lady at the Olympic ceremony placed the gold medal around my neck and said, “You will forever be Olympic Champion,” that was absolutely awesome. Yet the only gold medal that will truly last forever is God’s gift of gold that we receive through a life with Jesus Christ. Job 22:25 reads, “Then, the Almighty will be your gold, the choicest silver for you.” God’s gold is more important than man’s gold.

There truly is a greater gold in life because life is not merely about getting gold medals, first place trophies, and blue ribbons. We should all strive for victory and success in all that we do, yet if we come up a little short after giving our absolute best effort, we can still hold our heads high as winners. It has been said that a loser is simply one who never tried. Give it your best shot – and trust God.

Life’s greater gold is also about keeping life simple, taking it slow, being patient, loving others, having good fun, and enjoying what we do have rather than spoiling the journey in life by moaning about what we want yet do not have.

I challenge all of you to stop for a moment, smell the roses, and take note of all that God has graciously given to you and your family. I challenge you to find a healthy sense of balance in your life and to not be so busy that you are distracted from your priorities.

Life truly is all about having eternal hope, making right choices, taking life smooth, and listening for God’s still, small voice. Godly simplicity really is blessedness.

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