\u201cDon\u2019t let today\u2019s\ndisappointments cast a shadow on tomorrow\u2019s dreams.\u201d ~Unknown<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Life is full\nof curve balls that are bound to come up and mess up our best laid plans. It\u2019s a\npart of life that cannot be stopped from happening. Unexpectedly loved ones\npass away, family members fall ill, injuries occur, vehicles break down, jobs\nget lost, things go sideways, pandemics break out\u2026there are all kinds of\nunexpected things that come up and force us to modify our plans, so when they\ndo we have to make sure we don\u2019t allow ourselves to let those feelings of\ndisappointment, frustration, and stress to overtake us. Because the moment we\ndo we have pretty much ensured that we whatever the new plan is will be a\nmiserable experience for us and likely those around us as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In my younger\nyears I\u2019d allow unexpected things\nto get me down. I\u2019d get frustrated and stressed out because in my mind all I\ncould think of was how my perfectly laid plans had gotten disrupted and how no\nnew plan in its place was ever going to be able to be quite as good as that\nfirst one would have been. I would go into the revised plan with the attitude\nthat it was bound to turn out worse. And with that as my attitude and outlook\non what lay ahead I\u2019d pretty much guarantee the result of a self-fulfilling\nprophecy because for everything that happened I was viewing it through the lens\nof thinking it wouldn\u2019t be as good. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many years of life experience finally taught me that even though I cannot control plans going sideways I always have 100% control on the lens through which I choose to view things.\u00a0 We can decide that rather than focusing on what \u201ccould have been\u201d and thinking a new plan won\u2019t be as good as the first, we can instead choose to believe that this change in plan is actually going to turn out a million times better for us in the end. We can choose to recognize that God knows everything so perhaps He knew our original plan was problematic and He’s trying to steer us in a different direction to protect us from future trouble. And we can have faith that whatever the new plan is it is will turn out better than anything we could have imagined ourselves with the limited view we have of what’s possible.\u00a0 <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Our job is to set goals, make plans, and then work to achieve them. And when things go sideways and disappointments come up (because they always do)- we choose to trust. Trust that whatever will happens next is going to be a million times better than anything we could have planned. After all, God is much better at this than we are \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n\n\n\n