Let's Chat: The Greatest Lesson I've Had to Learn

I can't believe it's almost June. Where did the year go? Time has flown by it seems, and Canada apparently forgot that it's supposed to be spring. It's okay though, life is good. Here's the question of the day: Do you start to think about your life when your birthday starts to creep up on you? Because I most certainly do. How am I in my late twenties? When did this happen? Why wasn't I told?

I thought about it real hard last night, and realized that my life changed drastically when I turned 22. Not on purpose, not by my own plans but because, sometimes you drive off a cliff and miraculously survive. Dramatic, I know. But that's how I certainly felt for most of the years since then. I've had the worst-best times during these last six years. Some of which I wish I never went through, but those times are the times that have aggressively, reluctantly and positively changed who I am and my life.

The biggest lesson I've learned in the last several years, was actually learned in the last year. Life took a dramatic turn again, I ended up right back to the place I had no intention of returning to. Physically, I was back in my hometown. Mentally, I was back to the same mindset that drove me to the decision to leave in the first place. Emotionally, also in the same overwhelmed state that I had been prior to making the big move. I don't know how that happened, but it did. It was awful. I had a weird breakdown in front of some friends. But that breakdown led to finding healing. My life is not hard, there are people with harder lives, and I know that. Life is about perspective, and my perspective was the worst.

I like the picture above, I don't know when I took it. Whether it was an early morning or during an evening ride. It's a matter of your perspective. The same thing can be applied to your life. I always saw what I didn't have, rather than what I did have. This is the lesson I feel like God has been trying to teach me for years. Literally, years! I am a complainer, I know this about myself. I also believed that God is a God of miracles; for everyone except myself. I felt for a really long time that God provided in continuous abundance for people that didn't even work hard for it. I acted like I had nothing to be grateful for. I worried about everything, even when there was never a time that I was going to go without something that I needed. And that was my perspective: negative, envious, critical, and wrong.

I went through "hard" times because I couldn't find it in my heart to just be grateful for all the things I've always had. My friend called me out on it (this is why having good, solid friends is important)and I thought about it. And you know what, she was right. I was incredibly ungrateful. And so I started changing. I spent a month not asking for one thing, just trying to be grateful. Trying not to express my doubts. Trying to always think about the small victories I had. Trying to remember that He (Jesus) is the source of my everything. Everything that I'll ever need, I can find in him. This has changed my life. I struggle everyday, there are still days I express my doubt. There are days that I'm worried about the future. But I'm glad that I'm surrounded by people who constantly remind me of the God I have chosen to serve. I'm moving forward, and I'm learning and changing. Slowly, I'm trying to be that faith-driven person, cause those people are blessed. I want to be a blessed person, more than I am already am. Life is good. God is and has been really good to me. This lesson, although involuntarily learned, has changed me forever. If I ever sound ungrateful, point me back to this blog as a reminder.

(Image retrieved from the bible app)

Be encouraged. Be grateful. It will change your life. It changed mine. What lessons have you learned this year? Tell me in the comments below!

K, bye

- R