Using Our Gifts

How do we use our abilities in comparison to how God thinks we should use our abilities?

I was reflecting on this as I wandered through my evening drive home and thinking a bit more about Amy Winehouse (see here for the specifics). We are all given talents: how do we use them?

I can only speak fully for myself, but I wonder if I have ever taken a moment to truly reflect on the talents (call them gifts if you like) that I have been given, how I am using them, and how God would want me to use them.

I'll take writing as the easy example. In my writing I do - here, on two manuscripts, journaling - is it done in such a way that God is glorified, or is just about recognition (or self absorption) about me?

Or take music, something which I've done off and on throughout my life. Now it's an ancillary activity to other things, but at one time I did it regularly (whether through a worship team or as a musical duo). The gift is still there - but I am truly using it at all, let alone in the way that God intended?

It's not enough to view the tragedy of wasted talent and selfishly exploited gifts in the lives of others - what are we doing about it ourselves? Are we truly using them in ways that glorifies God, or are wasting them on ourselves, simply in less overtly destructive ways.