This is me, shortly after finally being allowed out of an incubator for a short visit (oops, might not have been me and instead my parent’s old friends baby! lol). A comment by the lovely Anna, has made me think a great deal about how our life pans out. This week I had some very disappointing and upsetting news, news that has stopped me in my tracks and makes me want to pull in all the more. Thoughts are currently rambling through my head about the choices I’ve made, the life I’ve chased that in fact I may not really want or need.
I was the good girl raised to understand and value the importance of education, to never expect anyone to pay for you or help you financially (including the government), to work hard, climb the ladder and contribute on all levels to society. I had an early first-hand lesson in loss, in understanding why we need to make good choices financially and seeing just how plans can fall apart. My mum didn’t plan to become a widow with child, but nonetheless she did. She returned to work full-time six weeks later and continues to be an inspiration to me and a good example in the value of being a hard worker who puts others before herself and never expects anything from anyone.
There is something about Christmas that makes one reflect on where they are in life and in society, for some this may bring incredible feelings of success in how they define success, for others they may wish things were different and put a lot of hope into the new year. As I see friends around me who made different choices to myself, it can at times make me ponder where I went wrong and make me feel the need to dissect how my life got to this point and to this place. There is little I know or understand about life, but what I do know is questioning can be helpful as long as we don’t take away the element of choice (good and bad) and replace it instead with feelings of being the victim or feeling entitled to something else, something bigger or something we define as better. As I sit and write this I may feel sadness, disappointment and fear over what lies ahead, but I also must find a way to remember what I don’t feel is starvation or destitution so really it isn’t half that bad.
I don’t know what lies ahead, I don’t know all of the places I’ll go, but I do know I’m bound to make mistakes along the way and have no choice but to yet again pick myself up, dust myself off and find the strength to continue. Under the guidance of the King my life may not be working out how I’d like or planned but I’m surrounded by love and even when it all feels so hard, so disappointing and incredibly sad, I’m still surrounded by grace in abundance.
I won’t be putting a full stop where God puts a comma; my story is not over!
I think sometimes that many of us are raised to think that if we’re good people we’ll never make wrong decisions and then bad things will never happen.
Sadly, we’re not in control of things that can turn a good decision bad so many times and the best we can do is constantly keep reevaluating what we want and need in our lives to make it the best it can be until something changes again.
I hope that you regain your footing soon!
Those are very wise words Molly, thank you for sharing them!
It’s natural to lose perspective once in a while and obsess about what we haven’t accomplished instead of what we have.
I recently went through a funk primarily driven by one aspect of my life. I decided to write down what I had accomplished this year despite my funkiness. It was a big list. It surprised me..and l felt much better afterwards. One bad event or person can overshadow all the other positive things in your life that are great and that you do well.
Lastly, I agree with the feeling thankful thing. It only takes a moment to think about people in developing countries who are struggling to put food on the table to know how lucky we are. My mom grew up hungry, malnourished and cold. I was never any of those things and am so thankful for that.
I’m so sorry for your setback, I hope things improve quickly. Yet again I am amazed at the grace by which you live and write.
only today was I revisiting the ideas that a book, that has never left me, brought into my life. One – is that you make the best choices you can at the time, and this is all you can do. You can’t do two different things and compare them because you have this one life. Two – we make our choices, not necessarily by logic but often by what this author called ‘Poetic Thought’ something or other will ring true to you because it makes Poetic sense. For example, a character in the book, falls in love, because she meets someone at six o clock on the dot when her favourite piece of music is playing. Six is a number she likes because she grew up in a house that was number 6 in the street. She may have fallen in love despite this, but this makes it makes sense to her. We all live our own Life Poems. Ah. Life eh. Its what we do with the cards we are dealt. We do the best we can. We make it beautiful the best we can. We cope the best we can. xx
Oh I’m so so sorry. Please don’t be hard on yourself, I am sure with each decision you made it was made with the best of intentions. You show such strength and character through your words and actions. I think your philosophy in life is inspriational and motivational.
Blessings to you!!!
i’m sorry you had bad news.
my friend is very wise, and very zen, and whenever i start to worry like this he stops me in my tracks (often literally) and says “you are exactly where you need to be RIGHT NOW. every choice you have made, every thing that has happened to you has brought you to this point. you can’t change them. so rejoice in the “now” and look forward, place one foot in front of the other and embrace what the universe is offering you.”
i hope his words of wisdom bless you the way they have blessed me in the past. remember who “knows the plans” he has for you – plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to bring you a hope and a future…
Proverbs 3:5,6
Bless you – you sound like you have a lot of thoughts running through you at the moment.
Take care, I have no words of wisdom but there are some fabulous ones from the comments above.
Anna x
I don’t know what your bad news is but just remember that God is still on the throne, he is still working things out for the good for us – our eternal good. We can never be righteous in our own strength, or work to earn salvation – it is the gift of God. We are righteous only through Christ who paid the price for our sin. God Bless You.
I hope that you are feeling better about the setback now. This year has been one setback after another for us and I have started to learn that I can only live for today as I have no idea what the future will bring (and I am the kind of person who likes everything to be planned out ahead!)
Thank you for reminding me to be thankful for the many things I can be thankful for each day. I am doing that daily and, together with living in the present, it is helping me to feel much more positive.
I hope that you’ll feel better very soon and that you’ll have a wonderful Christmas.
Best wishes,
Roz