Happy New Year!
And so it begins…2016. When I look back at my past a lot of BIG moments happened on even numbered years. I was born in 1972. I graduated high school in 1990. I graduated college in 1996. I bought my first house in 1998. I bought my second house in 2008. I married my first husband in 2004. I married my second husband in 2012. All BIG, happy, life change moments. Odd numbered years seem to bring back negative memories though. My mom passed in 2003. My first marriage ended in 2007. My second marriage ended in 2013. And 2011 was in general the worst year of my life. There are a lot more “moments”…positive and negative and I won’t bore you with more of them but this is just an observation I have made just today as I began typing. So, if things go as they have in the past…2016 could be a BIG year. But that is up to God isn’t it?
I remember being at our hotel in Maui with my first husband when we went there for a week in November 2004 to get married. I was looking through my suitcase for an outfit for dinner and he made the remark “I cannot imagine us making a trip to Europe if you always pack like that!” His parents were from England and Ireland and we planned to take a trip there to visit family when we could afford it. I remember the look on his face of total confusion. His eyes were wide and his jaw was dropped as he stood there looking at the contents inside my suitcase. I probably had about 10 pairs of shoes, 20 tank tops, 4 jeans (IN HAWAII), several dresses and 3 different colored flip flops…just in case. Not to mention a different bikini for every day at the beach.
I am a traveler at heart and I thoroughly enjoy exploring new places. I like to immerse myself into different cultures to the point where I don’t want to go back home. It has happened to me several times. And yes, I have learned to pack lighter over the years because of his comment as well as my best friend in Japan who told me basically the same thing. And when I visit her now she sends me a list of EXACTLY what to pack so that I do not over do it. Thank God for organized friends!
The last couple of years as I have been recovering from the aftermath of my second divorce and working a temporary job…I have not been able to travel as much as I have in the past so I make the most of what is around and take short day trips whenever I can. I could’ve sat at home in my PJ’s on New Year’s Day (which was very tempting) but I opted for a little road trip to one of my favorite places…Garden of the Gods in Shawnee National Forest in Illinois. It is about a 1.5-hour drive from my house and it is one of the most gorgeous, peaceful places I have ever been. I have written about it many times and I try to get over there 2-3 times per year. I have never been in January so I was not sure what to expect as far as the crowd but I didn’t pack a thing except my gloves, journal and of course my cell phone to take pictures. It was cold but sunny and absolutely gorgeous. I sat there on the rocks for a couple of hours taking in the sights and wrote in my journal my goals for 2016. I left before sunset and I stopped in New Harmony for dinner on the way back. I met a cute bourbon drinking older couple sitting at the bar because the restaurant wasn’t open yet. They had been in MY hometown exploring that day which was a bit ironic. We “met in the middle” you could say and they gave me tips on other neat spots to check out near the forest when I go back again. All in all it was a great way to start the year.
But then I woke up the next morning and it was just another day.
And I woke up today and it was just another day.
And the excitement of the New Year and my little road trip had worn off and I realized it was the middle of winter and started freaking out about my life. My contract at my job ends in December of this year, as well as my lease to my current apartment. EVERYTHING is going to change this year at some point but I have no clue how it will unfold yet. When I start worrying about it I feel anxiety creeping up behind me and I lose sight of God. I forget that HE has a plan for me greater than I can imagine. I have been knocking on doors already job searching but nothing has opened. I have no idea where I am going to live. I could stay here but what if I find a job elsewhere? What if? How? When? Where? So many unanswered questions swimming around in my brain and all I can think about is how quickly one year goes by. It will be 2017 in the blink of an eye! Wait, that is an odd numbered year…I need to put the brakes on and enjoy this one…the one that began just 3 days ago.
How quickly I go from feeling in control and trusting God’s plan for my life to feeling out of control and questioning everything!!!
In her book Rising Strong, Brene Brown talks about “The Hero’s Journey.” I have mentioned this before because her friend Elizabeth Gilbert is big on it too…Eat, Pray, Love was Liz’s hero’s journey. The “journey” is the SAME for all of us and basically consists of 3 parts…the beginning, the middle, and the end. Brown describes the beginning as a call to an adventure where there is an inciting “incident” that occurs before part 2. (For me the incident was my second divorce that began my own hero’s journey). The next step, the middle, is the hardest part. It is the part most of us want to skip past because it just isn’t pretty at all. It is the part where we are confused a lot of the time and we reach our lowest point many times trying to find our way through. (This is exactly where I am right now). And part 3, the ending, is the redemption story where we know how to resolve the conflicts we have faced and prove that we have learned our lessons. (That is what I am striving towards…through writing a book. But I cannot finish it quite yet because I don’t know the ending! I am still muddling through part 2). In an analogy she calls the middle part Day 2. (The beginning is Day 1 and the ending is Day 3). So I guess I am in Day 2. But in reality it is January 3rd now so maybe I am in Day 3? (ARE YOU FOLLOWING?!?! Ha!) So what happens if Day 167 rolls around and I am still in the middle of my journey??? Well, then day 167 is my middle. It doesn’t matter the day. What matters is what I (you) have learned in the process.
What have I learned so far in the middle? The main thing is not to pack too heavily because I don’t know what God has in store for me yet. I have no idea what I might need. The journey is 100% TRUSTING HIM no matter what. It is trusting Him to give me what I need when I need it. The not knowing can be SCARY if I lose faith and allow it to be scary but the not knowing can be equally EXCITING if I relax and trust God. By seeking Him in everything, answers will unfold as they are supposed to. By being awake and aware I am unbecoming (unpacking) everything that has been keeping me stuck. I don’t like to say that I am becoming…I prefer to say that I am BEING. I am being the person He created me to be. I have all of the answers already there inside me. Although I might not see them yet, as I walk closer to reaching my ending (or Day 3) I must give all the worry over and allow Him to reveal them to me in His time, when I am ready.
I went to visit my dad after church today for our weekly lunch date at the nursing home. As I was driving there I saw a gigantic cross in the sky. Yeah I know it was two jets that had crisscrossed and left exhaust trails but I didn’t think about the planes when I saw it. I thought about God and how He was reminding me that He is there leading me, reminding me to pack lightly and to keep soaring along in my journey.
Plane trip or road trip. Even year or odd year. Day 3 or Day 167. Just an ordinary day in January…where I am right NOW is where the magic happens. It is where I fully commit to His plan and not my own.
Blessings,
Stacey ~ iamalive