One of the Greatest Gifts

These last few months have been very busy in my life, so many decisions, so many changes coming up and so much planning. Through it all I have almost been amazed at myself and how I have pretty much kept it together. I don’t worry and fret as much as I did years ago and part of that I believe comes from acceptance.

For the last few months I have been meeting with a spiritual director and talking a lot about my life and faith. And when I say talking a lot I mean talking a lot...the poor guy can hardly get a word in but during the times when I have allowed him to speak I have truly listened and learned a lot.

It’s hard to understand life and why things happen the way they do. For me it became even harder when you throw God into the mix of it all. Since adulthood, I have never believed God to be that old man that lives in heaven who controls everything in life. It just doesn’t make sense to me. I really have no description of God so I think of God as creation. God is in everything, everyone and all around us.

Where I get stuck of course is on the “whys” of life. Why do bad things happen to good people especially children. Yes it brings us personal growth and if life was all good it would be rather boring around here. God has given us freedom of choice and therefore we, being human, make mistakes, but it is in those mistakes that we learn and grow.  It has taken me some time but I think I finally get it. If we had all grown up in a perfect world making all the right choices none of us would grow....we would all be like flat cartoon people walking around being polite to one another. This has allowed me to believe that even when bad things happen to us, God still loves us. Even though God does not stop the awful things from happening to people it doesn’t mean that God doesn’t love us. With help from my spiritual director I now try to look at God as a loving a parent who wants what is best for us and therefore must let us make our own choices so that we can grow and learn.

It is rather hard to explain really but after spending so much time thinking about this it has brought me to a place of wholeness. I finally feel whole and complete. I think it has come from finally having acceptance of who I am and my life. It doesn’t matter that I have faults, we all do, it doesn’t matter that I have made some wrong choices in life but what does matter is that I like who I am. I feel good about myself and it has all come from acceptance. I think acceptance of our lives and of who we are is one of the greatest gifs we can give to ourselves. God loves all of us just as we are and we all need to love ourselves just as unconditionally as God does. It certainly does give one a good feeling, inside and out. J

So this is who I am....a woman in her 50th  year, aging body, greying hair, and still not really sure of who she wants to be when she grows up....and you know what....it is all good, certainly far from perfect...but that's okay.