Joshua 24:15 tells us to “choose today whom we will serve.” I choose to also adopt that as “choose today whom I will love.” I use them interchangeably. I watched my dad do it daily in his marriage, in his work, in his relationship with me and my brother, with his friends, and with the strangers he loved.

When we are in charge of our choices, we are in charge. I got chastised recently by several for stating I was in charge in my Facebook status. There’s always the inevitable answer to “Who’s in charge of your day?” “God is!” I have an ongoing joke with someone dear to me about who’s in charge of our mutual interests, projects, etc. I may be in a subordinate role, but I still say when and often where… and then put him in charge. So, who’s really in charge? My joke to him is I am perfectly willing to allow him to think he is in charge.

If I choose to put someone else in charge of my day, who is in charge… ultimately? The design of the Christian faith is that it is by choice. God is not lord and dominion over us just because of our zip code. He is a choice. Our faith is our choice. We are in charge of our choices. Every day.

I choose today to seek to love the people I serve… and to serve the people I love. I choose to reach out to a hurting friend. I choose to have that difficult conversation. I choose to find peace in the midst of chaos. I choose to act. I choose to get up and move and take a walk, even though it is raining. I choose to go to the store, even though I have zero energy to do so. I choose to write in spite of worries in the back of my mind about a yet-to-be-determined health issue.

I choose to move forward, press on, and make my family, my business, my friends, and myself priorities. I’ve spent too many days choosing another way—by not choosing, by letting life just happen and reacting and making bad choices. Or the days I did absolutely nothing when I allowed emotion or health be in charge.

Today, my health is in question. My technology is uncooperative and in crisis. Fear, worry, panic, and grief are all familiar issues that try to distract me right now. But today, I am in charge. My health and energy levels may try and dictate my activity level, but I am still in charge. I am up. I am breathing. I am moving. I go for a walk in the rain. So, not even the weather is in charge today.

I have a plan for my technology crisis—to end it, that is. Meanwhile, I have something that works, which is more than I had last week, because today I am in charge. It may be messy. It may not be pretty at all. I will make mistakes. But my mistake will not be doing nothing. I make the choices. I make the phone calls for more appointments with medical professionals for tests and assessments when I know the results scare me. But I do it anyway. I don’t surrender to fear. Not today.

I take charge of my sacred spaces. I choose to be still. I choose meditation and prayer. I choose gratitude. I choose to take the next steps. I choose not to make the same bad choices I used to make. I choose not to return to the path that will lead me back to my rock bottom. I choose that it’s okay not to be okay, but to keep moving forward anyway. I choose that today is enough. I choose to modify and allow myself to sleep late this week. I choose to back off of high pace and give myself permission to relax and be calm and combat the stress in my life right now.

It is not okay to stop. It is, however, okay to slow down because right now, I just need to slow down. I choose to act on something I learned while reading that book today. I will choose tonight to offer my “report” of my day. I was in charge. These are the choices I made. These are consequences I faced today. These are victories today. These are where I came up short.

I am at peace with all of it and optimistic about what I will do with tomorrow. I was given this gift of today. This is what I did with it. It is my gift back at the end of the day. I own it. I take responsibility. I can’t blame others. I can’t say, “I just didn’t feel like doing anything today.” My gift cannot be an empty box. That would just be… silly and quite embarrassing. Because quite frankly, that could very well be every day. I choose to fill my box. That only gets done when I’m in charge. I own my life and I make the necessary choices.

I can’t die today. That would look very bad on my report. I’m not finished yet because I spent too many days NOT being in charge.

You are in charge today. So, take charge! Make your knowledge work for you. Use your skills, gifts, and victories to love the people in your life you serve and to serve the people in your life who you love. Let God be in charge of God stuff. You are in charge of the rest of it… and the choices you make as to what to do with it.

Start with taking charge with your first waking breath of the day and don’t stop until you surrender your report at the end of the day. Try not to do anything in between that would look bad on your report. You can surrender your day to God, but you are still in charge of the choices that get you from breath to next breath. In the morning, you can say, “I surrender this day to God.” At the end of the day, you can report the results of that surrender to be sure it truly was in alignment in total surrender to God.

What’s going on your report tonight?

MelAnn Morales is a L.I.F.E.Strategist & Empowerment Coach. She is passionate about recreating that space between a rock and a hard place to win at the unfair game of life. She can find powerful life lessons in what she sees or experiences in every day life and excels at creating powerful habits and strategies that keep life moving forward when it encounters crisis or the unexpected. She hijacks the status quo. She “unschools” her two children. She enjoys photography, cooking, movies, reading, music, the outdoors, and the adventure of travel and new experiences. You can find her at melannmorales.com.