Forward

If there’s one thing I am, it’s self-aware (to a neurotic fault). So self-aware, in fact, that I find myself frantically typing my thoughts into the Notes app on my phone. On June 25th, I wrote:

I’ve been quite reflective lately. I think about what my life was like a year ago and two years ago. Then I think about what my life will be like a year from now. With all this looking backwards and looking forwards, I crave to savor this last summer. I want this summer to be its own entity. I don’t want to spend it solely looking ahead. I want to steal more forks with my friends. I want to have new hoodrat adventures. I want to lay on the beach and soak up the sun. I want the rejuvenating recess that past summers have provided. I want time to slow down.

I have always believed that we view time as having passed quickly after the fact because we’re not constantly aware of it passing during. However, this summer proved my theory wrong. I knew the season would come and go as quickly as the morning dew. Yet, even as I was aware of it, time didn’t slow down. 

Although the summer was fleeting, it was significant in its own right. I did what I once considered to be impossible: I embraced the present. Be here now, I reminded myself. I put down my phone, opened my eyes, and took it all in. I also let go of the past. It was a relief to stop reopening old wounds. For a while, I even brushed off the future. What a freeing feeling it was!

But now it is time to look ahead. I have nowhere to go but forward. It’s terrifying because it’s change; it’s terrifying because it’s the unknown. Isn’t that what makes life worth living, though? What fun would it be if God gave you an itinerary of every single thing that would happen in your life? There would be no surprises. There would be no excitement. There would be no adventure.

In your mind, there isn't enough room for worry and faith. You must choose which one will live there. And I choose faith. Instead of being anxious about the season of change ahead of me, I am embracing the adventure. I hope you do the same.