Dave Gibbons writes, “I don’t believe we’re necessarily supposed to reject or transform culture. Our calling is to wisely flow with culture, guarding our hearts and minds, artfully engaging the world.”
So begins a book that will make you stop and think at every page. XEALOTS: Defying the Gravity of Normality is that kind of book. It’s for those of us who are different and see the world through alternative lenses. Which, really, is all of us. It’s a book that celebrates the dreamers, the geniuses, the creative types and the entrepreneurs. Which again, is basically all of us if we only let ourselves be that way.
But it’s not a book that says we all have to pursue lives of craziness or extreme high ambition. In fact Gibbons often takes aim at those who want to “build your brand” and grow at any price. He’s affirming those of us who don’t want to make 5-year plans and don’t want to keep their focus on building a larger organization. It’s almost as if he’s saying that being normal is the new different. As he puts it, “My hope is that you become countercultural, yet adaptive to culture. It’s an art that requires a radical obedience to the Holy Spirit’s leading in your life. It’s a life that is supernaturally natural.”
At one point in the book, Dave defines the XEALOT life as not making things happen but letting things happen, flowing with God without having to force it. I wish more people understood that concept. We’d have a lot fewer strategic plans and a lot more actual workers.
The book is filled with little pearls of wisdom that are thrown into larger conversations. Things like “silence is an expression of trust”, and “I don’t know is the best answer”, or even “He must become greater, and I must become less.” You get caught up in the big issues that Dave is dealing with and yet you find yourself underlining phrases that can stick in your head. I love that.
This is a wonderful book. It’s for the dreamer and oddball in all of us. We’re all XEALOTS and Dave shows us that. My admiration for Dave, which was always high, has gone up even more.
