Changes

Nobody likes change, or I should say most people do not like change.  Change forces us to reevaluate ourselves, determine what our core values are, and take giant leaps of faith. There is very little that rouses my deepest sense of fear than an unwanted/unexpected change. 

This summer our family was faced with, you guessed it, a huge unexpected moment of change.  It wasn't one I asked for.  It was a change that was given to me and it wasn't wrapped up with a nice bow.  I went through my normal range of emotions:  tears, intense anger, questioning, and semi-resolution.  I say semi-resolution because some days I have forgiven and moved on and am able to appreciate where the change has taken us.  Other days I feel betrayed and deeply hurt. 

I have walked away from every change, every redirection in my life with lessons.  Some of them unfortunately tend to the cynical side.  Lessons like I can't trust people, most Christians are hypocrites, and I am better off when I keep to myself.  These are lessons that I need to unlearn.  Some lessons however make my life richer and these are the ones that I am trying to embrace.

When the bomb went off this last time, and it was a bomb for us, I was reading a book by a man named Don Miller.  In his book, Miller compares our lives to a narrative that is being written.  He puts forth the idea that if we don't like the narrative we are living, we simply need to rewrite the narrative.  Unfortunately, he points out, we seldom have the courage to do this.  We simply go on each day doing the familiar.  He goes on to say that often it takes an "inciting" action to force us to change the narrative we are living.  This couldn't have been truer for me.  As I began to sort through the pieces of confusion and disappointment, I realized that I hadn't been truly happy in awhile.  I came home each day from work tired and strung out.  I didn't have the energy that I wanted to devote to my family and my home.  The things that I used to be passionate about were just dull memories.  As I was complaining about this to my husband one day, he asked me, "What do you want to do?"
I didn't know the answer to that question, but I did know what I didn't want to do and that was to return to my job.  At that moment I began to rewrite the narrative I had been living.

I am now a stay-at-home mom again, and I am homeschooling for the first time, something I swore I would never do.  I am enjoying reading to my children again.  I am enjoying cooking and taking care of my home.  I know longer drown in anxiety and stress on Sunday nights and I am beginning to find myself again as the days unfold.  This is not to say that everything is coming up roses, but there is light.  The Reverend Mother in The Sound of Music said that "Whenever God closes a door, somewhere he opens a window."  I firmly believe this.  I would never have had the courage to quit my job if I wasn't faced with an "inciting action", but it was what I needed to do.  A wise friend told me that one of the worst things she had to go through brought with it one of the best results of her life.  I believe this is true of me. So for now, when I am faced with unwanted change, after the dust has settled and the air has cleared, I resolve to pick myself up or let someone help me up, and look at the opportunity I have to allow God to turn that change into something beautiful.  I will lose the cynical lessons and embrace the beautiful ones.