All H-E-Double- Hockey- Sticks has broken loose in my life! And I know exactly what started it. About 5 weeks ago, my husband and I sat down together and completed some goal setting. That’s right, we sat down TOGETHER and wrote out our goals. (If you are married you should really give it a try. It helps you encourage each other in a special way.) Anyway, we set goals for everything from our money and jobs to our relationship and health. We were so excited…for about a week. Then it happened. First, we had car trouble! (OK, so they worked as long as you didn’t want to stop or change gears). Then, the oven stopped working! (OK, so it works as long as you want to bake at 200 degrees.) Then, we had an unexpected bill that was huge. (They charged a fee for the fee! Really?) Then, we started having crazy stuff happen at our jobs. (I don’t even want to talk about it!) It just kept coming! And you know what? It is going to be OK. We understand that every time we set goals and start actively working towards them something will always go wrong to get us off focus. So, today I am sharing a few tips that are helping us make it through.
- Prayer. I mean on your knees out loud prayer (not silently in the shower or right before you eat). Now, I am not going to debate whether God exists. That is not the purpose of this post. I will say that for us, there is something powerful in coming together and praying that God will grant us grace (ability to handle crazy without acting crazy ourselves), strength (ability to not break down in the process) and mercy (frankly, just make it all stop). It reminds me of how my children sometimes come to me with a problem. I don’t always fix the problem immediately (or even at all) but I can tell that the act of them sharing their concern with me and knowing that I hear them makes it all better.
- Keep moving forward. It would have been real easy for us to stop moving towards our goals and focus on why these things were happening to us. We could have argued about it or even drowned our cares in food, wine and Netflix (well…um… maybe not Netflix because the WiFi isn’t working either…sigh). Instead we decided to keep doing what we said we would do, even though we had to get the car fixed, create money out of thin air, and get creative with dinner. We have to keep going because the more we move forward; the closer we are to success. It’s coming. I know it.
- Have some fun. One of the things that I can say I have a lot of in my life is laughter. I am just blessed enough to have a down right hilarious family! There is never a dull moment in my house. I especially appreciate it in times like this. Having a big deep belly laugh (even better if you can get your eyes to water) can relieve so much tension and stress! If you can’t laugh then try something that relaxes you and gets your mind off of the hell around you. It really does help!
- Wait. That’s right. Just hang in there. It will soon be over. Nothing lasts forever.
While I write this post, there is still more crazy stuff happening. But the good news is that it is getting better each day. For instance, one car is repaired, we took care of the bill, and my phone makes a really good WiFi hot spot! For now, I will just pray, keep moving forward, have a bit of fun and wait for it all to end. The truth is, once it is over, it will come back again. But I will make it and so can you. 🙂