Rethink Happiness: Dare to Embrace God and Experience True Joy

For years now I’ve witnessed the transforming impact of Paul George at our Steubenville Conferences. His ability to deliver an engaging and relevant message is unparalleled.

Mark Joseph

Franciscan University of Steubenville

"Paul George is an extraordinary storyteller. His writing style is like sitting down with a trusted friend and having an engaging conversation that leaves you wanting to know what happens next. In Rethink Happiness, Paul shares delightful stories about his search for genuine happiness and his missteps along the way. He also invites us into intimate conversation with people he has accompanied in their pursuit of lasting fulfillment. The stories are real and engaging and potentially life-changing. There is profound wisdom in this unassuming book. I highly recommend it to anyone who is longing for greater fulfillment in life. Isn’t that all of us?"

Bob Schuchts

Author of Be Healed

Paul’s ministry has positively impacted millions of young people around the world. He has a unique ability to make the Christian life real and transparent in a way that brings hope for us all.

Randy Raus

Life Teen

"Paul George has been a good friend to my family and me for many years since ministering to my NFL teammate’s Bible study group at the New Orleans Saints. In Rethink Happiness, Paul has a special way of weaving his life experiences with anecdotal humor and relevant scripture. This book leads you to an examination of conscience that is life-giving and transforming. Even the reflection questions at the end of each chapter encourage you to go deeper in your journey with the Lord. Paul vividly paints word pictures so that his experiences come to life, and at times I laughed out loud with his descriptions of monumental moments that make him the amazing speaker and storyteller he is today. My life has been personally changed by my friendship with Paul and all he has offered in sharing his faith journey."

John Carney

Retired kicker for the New Orleans Saints

"In Rethink Happiness, Paul George has tapped into the longing of every human heart. In an engaging manner, accessible for all, Paul is able to help us understand our own heart, and at the same time, discover the heart of God. Drawing from his own experience and stories of saints, NFL football players, and hurricanes, Paul engages the reader no matter their life experience, and he shares that happiness is possible. Paul leads each of us in discovering where, or in whom, our heart will find happiness."

Rev. Dave Pivonka, T.O.R.

Author of Breath of God

"Everyone desires happiness but no one seems to know where to find it—until now. In Rethink Happiness, Paul George doesn’t just ask the question everyone asks, he offers the answer few have found. Drawing from timeless wisdom, personal experience and good, old-fashioned common sense, George walks the reader through the minefield of modern thought with sage wisdom and practical guidance. Each page is filled with anecdotal proof that a life of happiness and true joy is not only plausible but possible! A gifted storyteller, Paul George has penned a thought-provoking read here—one that will leave hearts and minds engaged and moved. I loved this book and cannot wait to give it to those closest to me. Life is meant to be lived, not merely survived. This book is an invaluable tool to ensure we never sacrifice the former and settle for the latter."

Mark Hart

Life Teen

I highly recommend Paul’s book. Through the sharing of his personal experiences, Paul provides practical and realistic ways for the ordinary person to grow in one’s walk with Christ. Paul is also a gifted speaker, who, through wisdom and life experiences, is able to speak to different audiences effectively.

Most Rev. Sam Jacobs

Bishop emeritus of the Diocese of Houma-Thibodaux

"Rethink Happiness offers a profoundly inspired examination of the heart so that we can embrace God’s love for us, our purpose, and ultimately, true happiness. Paul George is challenging, honest, and encouraging in helping us become who we were made to be."

Leah Darrow

International speaker and author of The Other Side of Beauty

Scripture texts in this work are taken from the New American Bible © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Washington, DC, and are used by permission of the copyright owner. All rights reserved. No part of the New American Bible may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Foreword © 2017 by Matt Maher

____________________________________

© 2018 by Paul George

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, except in the case of reprints in the context of reviews, without written permission from Ave Maria Press®, Inc., P.O. Box 428, Notre Dame, IN 46556, 1-800-282-1865.

Founded in 1865, Ave Maria Press is a ministry of the United States Province of Holy Cross.

www.avemariapress.com

Paperback: ISBN-13 978-1-59471-791-8

E-book: ISBN-13 978-1-59471-792-5

Cover images ©/ConWeb/Adobe Stock and Color_Brush / iStockphoto.

Cover design by Brianna Dombo.

Text design by Brian C. Conley.

Printed and bound in the United States of America

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

To Jesus:

For giving me purpose and meaning.

To my family:

Gretchen, you are the best decision I ever made (behind my decision for Christ). Marie, Jacob, Sarah, Clare, and Adeline—y’all are the greatest joys of my life. I love you.

To Mom, Dad, and Lulie:

Thank you.

To Bishop Sam Jacobs:

Thank you for journeying with me, for being Christ to me, even when I was far away, and for teaching me what it means to truly live.

For happiness is that perfect good which entirely satisfies one’s desire; otherwise it would not be the ultimate end, if something yet remained to be desired.

—St. Thomas Aquinas

Contents

Foreword by Matt Maher

Introduction

Chapter 1—We Are All Starving

Chapter 2—It’s Time to Surrender

Chapter 3—Rethink Happiness

Chapter 4—Know Your Destination

Chapter 5—Keep It Real

Chapter 6—Recover What Was Lost

Chapter 7—Recognize Authentic Beauty

Chapter 8—See with New Lenses

Chapter 9—Take the Leap

Chapter 10—Live the Abundant Life

Acknowledgments

Notes

Foreword

They say you get to choose your friends, and while I don’t necessarily disagree with that maxim, I don’t think it gives the whole picture. There are some friendships in life that seem scripted and set by the hand of God.

When I was twenty-three years old, I was a newly born-again Catholic, finishing a music degree at Arizona State University and working part-time at a Catholic parish in Mesa, Arizona. It was 1997. That summer, I met Paul George, who was recently hired as the new youth minister at the parish where I worked. I remember the first time we met for coffee—he, the obvious former college athlete, and me, the slacker cigarette-smoking musician with long hair. We were an unlikely pair. I immediately had a sense that (1) he was more mature than I was, (2) that wasn’t saying much, and (3) he actually knew the Bible.

That fall, at Paul’s request, I led worship for the first time for a Bible study of thirty-five kids on a Monday night. Over the next decade, a friendship formed on a foundation of knowing and believing in a God who continues to have life-changing encounters with people. On every occasion that we ministered together—from small Bible studies and youth group nights to conferences with youth pastors and conferences and worship nights with thousands of young people—I was ministered to by the words, perspective, and thoughts of Paul George. Paul would close every Sunday night youth group talk with a Bible in his hand, authentically sharing his love, passion, and faith for Jesus with anyone who had ears to hear; and almost every youth night would end the same way—with Paul calling people to conversion.

Paul has a unique vocation to specifically call folks to conversion while communicating the Gospel. That might seem redundant, but too often in the Christian life, we think of conversion as a singular event and not a process—as something that happened, not something that happened and is still happening. Paul sees clearly that conversion is a process. After ten years of involvement in local Church ministry, he and I found ourselves on a tour bus traveling together to different cities around America to hold worship nights—me leading worship and Paul still consistently calling people to a different way of looking at life.

With this book, Rethink Happiness, Paul is still doing that same thing: inviting people to look at the call to conversion in their lives and to respond.

During those Sunday night youth group talks by Paul, I always sensed that it wasn’t just the teens who benefited. All the adult volunteers in the room were being ministered to as well. I never left Sunday night without feeling convicted about some aspect of my life. Whether it was my ambitions, my motivations, or my desires, I was always in a place of being consoled or being convicted. I remember the kids lining up to talk to him privately afterward. They knew he had a genuine concern for them and their lives. I know how life-changing Paul’s presence and gifts were for so many people.

With Rethink Happiness, you’re getting your own personal time with Paul. I encourage you to go slowly with this book. Rather than just read it from start to finish, let each chapter be a separate conversion that starts an interior conversation, one that can continue as long as it needs to, and when you’re ready, you can move on to the next one. Let the questions at the end of each chapter launch you into the unknown spaces of your own heart. To quote the most-used phrase in the Bible, Do not be afraid!

More than ever, people today need to be met with the Good News of a God who loves them completely just as they are. With this book, Paul is doing what he was made to do. My hope and prayer for you is that you, too, can take time to pause and make yourself available to our Lord, who calls you to new horizons.

Matt Maher

Introduction

An enormous portion of my childhood was spent on a sports team of some kind—I was a multisport athlete for many years, excelling at whatever I played. By the time I reached my junior year in high school, playing sports in college was a real possibility. I wavered between playing football, baseball, or both in college. Baseball eventually won out, and I had a blast playing the sport I loved. I had worked hard, dreamed big, and practiced intensely enough to be in the running to play professional ball one day.

But in late spring of my senior year in college, I found myself sitting on the edge of a hospital bed. I had suffered a debilitating shoulder injury that would forever change the trajectory of my life. I remember sitting there, staring into space, unable to focus on anything the doctor was saying to me. The more the doctor talked, the further I faded, wishing this wasn’t real. The reality of the news was setting in: I would never play sports again. My hopes, my dreams, and my plans were coming to a screeching halt. As I lay in bed after the doctor left, my mind wandered. Everything seemed to be crashing in at once—not just the news from the doctor but many other parts of my life, too (which I will share in this book). My life wasn’t what I wished or hoped it would become, and truth be told, I wasn’t fulfilled. I didn’t even know where to start looking for happiness.

Although I don’t know you, we probably have a lot in common. For starters, we both want to be happy. We both desire to have peace in the midst of life’s storms. We both need to love authentically and to be authentically loved. We both crave true, lasting happiness. I can’t promise a quick fix to your struggles, but I can offer you some food for thought as you begin to unpack your own experiences and define who you are. But before we can successfully reach any new territory, you’ll need to recognize that this takes not only effort but also time. You see, life is a journey, and although we may experience life-altering events that change us overnight, for the most part, true change happens