In your business (and life), do you ever feel like you’re calculating and speculating and holding tight to you plans? Ever feel like if you let go, things would tumble out of control? Have you ever thought that, maybe, letting Jesus take the wheel could bring you freedom?

I used to think that holding on tightly, trying to control everything as the super responsible person I am, would bring me stability.
Security.
Safety.

That seemed like freedom to me.

See,  I’m the oldest of 4 to a single mom who was often working multiple jobs to provide for us as best she could. I was the one taking care of my siblings while she was working. The built-in babysitter, if you will. It molded me into a super responsible person, and that has served me well in life: super responsible to get my first job at 14. Super responsible to do what I was taught to do by the world’s standards: get a degree, get a job, and work hard. It’s the force that propelled me to be a driver, striver, and achievement chaser. And it’s also what brought me face down on the floor where Jesus found me.

On that fateful day in October 2014, I remember my mentor (aka The Velvet Hammer in my book) saying, “You seem to feel like you need to be responsible for everyone and everything. And you have a Savior that He invites you to lay those burdens at His feet, rest in Him and learn the unforced rhythms of His grace. He wants to give you freedom.”

Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty. 2 Corinthians 3:17

That bewildered me. “Freedom in surrender? As in, relinquishing control and reliance on the one person I know I can trust (me)?” Her answer was yes. Basically she was saying, “let Jesus take the wheel.”

That seemed like a BIG ask for this high-achieving ambitious woman!

Can you relate?

If so, it’s likely that you’re a little bit of a control freak. You like everything to be in its place. You like everything to work in its order. You have a strategy. You have a plan. You want peace, calm, joy and growth, but something holds you back from letting Jesus lead you. That “something” is bondage, and it’s stunting your personal and business growth. This bondage all too familiar to us high achieving women. I know because I’ve lived it, and I see it in my coaching clients. And these chains keep us in bondage three ways:

1. Chained to our own understanding. It’s what we’ve been taught, how we’ve been trained, and how it’s always worked. This self-reliance and self-wisdom has probably worked well for you to a point. But to go to where God is leading you next, you can feel there is an incongruence between His way and yours, and something has to give.
2. Chained to chronic speculation and analysis. We’re planners. We like to have it all figured out. So we’re often rolling scenarios around in our heads so we’re prepared in any situation, though most of all, prepared to move our plan forward. Even in all of my growth in Jesus, I still fall back into this pattern. But it’s just shuffling our feet and trodding on old ground. There’s a little trepidation in letting your analysis go and letting God drive because what if He redirects you or completely implodes your plans. even though His truth tells us His plans are better.
3. Chained to doing business as usual. In other words, doing business the world’s way, which sounds like, “Entrepreneurs work harder than anyone!” (true, yet also exaggerated) “Successful people do, what unsuccessful people are unwilling to do!” (also true, but it breeds overworking and overachievement). “If it is to be, it’s up to me!” (because if you don’t’ do it, who will?). Yes you need to show up in the assignment God’s given you, and take the action He directs. But what if “showing up” also meant allowing Jesus to TAKE THE WHEEL as Carrie Underwood sings?

Jesus take the wheel, take it from my hands because I can’t do this on my own.
I’m letting go. So give me one more chance and save me from this road I’m on.
Jesus take the wheel.

Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. Galatians 5:1 NKJV

As an entrepreneur, you probably started your business to gain independence and freedom: freedom of time, freedom of income, freedom of the choice of which clients you take on and which clients you don’t, freedom from a boss. And maybe you have some of that.

But because of the bondage above, many entrepreneurs create businesses that actually feel more like jobs: still keeping them “on the clock” and working at a chaotic pace that God never intended.

Let me challenge you today that true freedom is taking a joyride with the Lord and letting Him drive. The joyride with Jesus is exciting and scary, because He’ll often take a different road than you planned, use an exit ramp that wasn’t on the map, and He always operates outside of your worldly comfort zone. It can feel reckless to a super responsible women, and It always looks different than the world’s way.

But the world’s processes don’t apply to you because you are in the world but not of it.

For you, brother, have been called to Liberty, only do not use that liberty as an opportunity for the flesh. but through love, serve one another. Galatians 5:13 NKJV

There is freedom in walking that out with him. He sets us free from the bondage of sin and the chains of death, and that includes and the futile attempt to become righteous through self-effort. He sets us free in our business, from the futile pursuit of success the world’s way.

You shall know the truth, and it shall set you free. Therefore, if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed. John 8:32, 36

So how do you break those chains of bondage?

1. Surrender your own understanding (Proverbs 3:5-6)
2. Ask for His pruning and redirection (Psalm 139:23-24)
3. Strengthen your union with Him (Matthew 6:33)

This is how you find true freedom.

Be aware, when you operate this way, outside of the world’s processes, you will get sideway looks and some may think you’re crazy. That’s ok. Because the joyride with Jesus is always worth the freedom it brings!

I pray this brings you freedom today. If you found this helpful today, share it with a friend, and let me know with a DM on LinkedIn @erinharrigan or Instagram @erindharrigan

If your outward success is warring with your faith and priorities, I hear you. I see you. And it doesn’t have to be this way. God made you to be ambitious, but He didn’t make you to work the world’s way. I’m the coach that can help! Schedule a call to explore working with me: https://erinharrigan.com/discoverycall