I have great news...turns out I don't suddenly have freakishly oily skin; I'm just an idiot...what a relief! A few weeks ago, I thought it would be a good idea to try and go organic when it comes to my face wash. I mean, all the cool kids seemed to be doing it. So, I went to the store and got myself a bottle of the good stuff. Upon trying it for the first time, I marveled at how freakishly smooth it felt on my skin. But then, over the next few weeks, I started to break out like whoa. I'm sure if a blind man decided to study my face, there would have been some kind of message written on it for him. I didn't get what was going on...then, two and a half weeks later, I happened to notice that the bottle clearly said "Organic...Aloe Vera Lotion". Here all this time I thought I was cleaning my face when I was , in fact, literally just greasing it up...nice. Yet another case of me thinking I know what's best for me, only to grease things up royally.
A couple of years ago, I went through what was my first real life change. My mom passed away, leaving me to grow up, and do it fast. I bitched and moaned for a good while , arguing with God that this shouldn't have happened, and He was wrong for making it happen to me when there are so many people out there who don't even like their mothers. Now, almost two years down the road, I can say, with 100% guarantee, that I didn't know what I was talking about...similar to the face wash, I really didn't know what was good for me. As much as I miss my mom everyday, I have to admit that, in a roundabout way, a tragedy was just what I needed in my life to bring me to the place where I am now...a place where I feel like God is my BFFL and angels are my homegirls (and homeboys)...and they do some pretty cool stuff through me and for me on an everyday basis, and I wouldn't give that up for anything. Now,don't get scared children, this post isn't gonna turn all Joel and Victoria O'steen on you; I just can't explain the wonderful changes that have taken place in my life without mentioning the Big Guy.
The night my mom died, I was blessed with an incredible experience that changed my life forever...it's a story in and of itself, so I'll tell you about it when you're older (maybe next week). Using that experience as a launching point to explore things beyond the humdrum of everyday life, I've been able to slowly but surely realize that there is a purpose for everything we go through in life, including suffering and pain. I thank my mom everyday for saving my life by leading me to this realization. The purpose in losing her was to help me and those who knew her to grow spiritually and be present for others in a more meaningful way while on this planet....man, Mom always did know the perfect gift. Talk about the gift that keeps on giving.
The truth is, we don't know crap about what's best for us. We have but a small glimpse of a tiny piece of the big-picture. But, we tend to assume that, when things don't go the way we would want them to , that God has forgotten about us, and needs us to "take charge" and do something. Just like I "had to" go organic to save my face.
I'm a big advocate for taking action, but not of doing things solely for the sake of being busy to maintain that feeling of control over our lives. And this is definitely my "higher self" writing this, because as the words come out on the screen I marvel at how handy would it be if I could take my own advice. Case in point: a few months back, I decided that I needed $5000 extra dollars to just get any and all debt out of the way so that I could focus on saving. I prayed to God to give me $5000 extra dollars...I felt the excitement of how it would feel to get the extra money, and even bought a few lottery tickets to help speed up the process. After God didn't make a miracle by having me win the jackpot after a few weeks, I got impatient and decided to take matters into my own hands. I applied to a per diem job at the local (stinky ass) inpatient rehab hospital working weekends. After all, I did know what was best for me, and I am never wrong (hahahahahahahah!). I decided that was how I was going to have God answer my prayers (because you know, God needs me as a personal assistant....I don't know how He's made it since, ohhhh the beginning of time, without my help). Just to encourage me to double-check my decision, God made a bunch of stuff go wrong in the application process- my application got botched up when I applied online, my TB test results got jacked up, and then the interviewer from HR had a death in the family and had to reschedule the phone interview a bunch of times. But , not taking the hints, I persevered... after all, this was, in fact, how I decided God needed to answer my prayers. Well, a few months down the road, I'm still working there....and its terrible. This past weekend, sometime between getting yelled at by the lazy nurses for something I didn't do and quite literally cleaning up an old man's crap off the floor (ummm, why is there such a theme of poo on the floor in my life???-refer to previous post), I looked up to heaven and said "okkkk, You win, I get it." Goes to show, I should have trusted my heart aka that small voice inside that said "don't do it don't do it, you hate adult rehab!" aka GOD....it would have saved me a lot of crap (literally, sigh).
To backtrack a few, I'm not saying the first time something goes awry in a process, its a sure sign not to persevere and go through with it. Sometimes monkey wrenches are thrown in the plan just to make sure we're really in the game. And a lot of times God wants you to take action so He can in turn bless it. What I'm saying is, its about time we all stop trying to maintain such control over our lives that we actually limit God and his ability to do some crazy cool stuff in our lives...its time to give ourselves a little freedom to enjoy life and all its surprises by letting go a little. Before making a decision, I think its important to do an honest to goodness "meditate/pray/be willing to listen to your intuition-FEST"...especially when you find yourself trying to convince yourself that a certain job, relationship, or situation is right for you to do. I didn't do this when applying for the weekend job, or when agreeing to go out on a date with someone that gave me the heeby-jeebies, or when convincing myself to move to Panama City for a dead-end job after graduation because the salary was good. Having to talk yourself into something is a pretty good sign that it's a bad idea in my humble opinion.
So how do you know the difference between being in the "flow" of what God wants for you to do versus your own ego making decisions? Hell if I know, I'm a work in progress. But, from what I've observed in and of myself, is that a few quiet minutes alone, focusing on breathing can really clarify some things. What I've found is that I'm really better off listening to my heart versus my head when it comes to life decisions. I'm pretty sure my intellect has ADHD, but my heart is down with the senses. Yet, the heart versus head battle that goes on inside is hard to differentiate...so how to tell the difference? I'm no expert, but it seems to me that the heart's input on a decision is brief and to the point; whereas the mind has verbal diarrhea and tends to spin around in circles. Usually the best guidance is very simple; messages that seem like they came straight from the desk of Captain Obvious. Things like "Let go", "Relax", "Wait"... Man, that Captain Obvious has got some soul. In contrast, the mind says things that are just verbose and garbled; things like "wellll, talk to your boss and if she says this , then do this, or if that doesn't seem to work out, then do that" or "it kinda sucks but, you should do it because if you don't then.., and what if... oh no, blllaaah!" All that spinning around makes the back of my head buzz, literally, and that's how I know that I'm just overthinking things. In contrast, being in the "groove" of the heart and God's will feels more like a calm, cool inner peace right smack in the center of my chest. Like I can just chill, no worries...my head doesn't buzz ( which is so nice). Sometimes the directions you feel most at peace with are the hardest...but just do it. I tell you, it was a bitch having to tell my boss that I wanted to quit my first job after only 5 months, but I was so at peace with it, that I knew it was the right decision. As soon as I did that, a children's hospital job opened up in St Pete and off I went, doing what I always hoped to do.... glad I listened.
The big challenge is to learn to let go and understand that you don't always know what's best. If you are going through a hard time, trust that there is a purpose to even this. Don't stop praying, but in the wise words of my dad while my mom was in hospice , understand that "sometimes the miracle comes in a different way than we can understand right now."
Like I said, I'm a big time work in progress. But, as I'm learning to let go of OCD-like control of my life(thanks for the help Ma), and let God take care of my problems, I'm finding that more and more cool "coincidences" are happening in my life , things I consider unexpected gifts. Little things, but things that make me so happy. Things like seeing dolphins almost every time I walk the dog (dolphins are my "hello from heaven" sign), pens falling from the sky when I need one, and landing awesome tickets to the bowl game without even asking (thanks Lauren!) I don't know what it all means, but its certainly entertaining and a much more fun ride that just thinking and worrying about things all the time. I'm positive all the blessings I've had lately has has come with the territory of slowly but surely learning to live my life heart-first rather than ADHD ego- mind first. Try it...just for a day. See what happens if you surrender control and just ask for a little help from God, or the angels, or the Universe....I'm not going to tell you what to believe. Surrendering control is not a passive submission or sign of weakness, but is rather more like giving yourself the gift of a "direct connect" to the big kahuna upstairs, letting him do what he needs to do to bring you where you need to be for the realllllllly goood show! Keep me posted home slices, I want to hear the good news of you and all your sweet self's victories!
BT dubbs, if a single person was in any way at least minutely uplifted by this blog, consider it a gift from your home-angel Momma Vinci!
Peace! May your lives, and your faces, be clean, clear, and under control!
“Bad times have a scientific value. These are occasions a good learner would not miss.”
–Ralph Waldo Emerson
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