Ecclesiastes 8:6-7 – For there’s a time & place for every matter, though a person may be weighed down by misery. Since no one knows the future, who can tell what is to come? As no one has the power of the wind to contain it. 

Boy oh boy it is good to be home. My heart is SO reenergized from my crazy siblings and my comforting Momma & Dad. The funny thing about leaving for school is that every time I come home, my siblings seem way more grown up than the last time I’ve seen them. Little changes that would float right by me before I moved to California become so evident when the time I get to spend with my siblings is rare. It’s weird, I feel like I know them better when I see them half as much.

Anyways, watching Abby grow up is nothing short of hilarious. Honestly, I can not believe that we’re related. Aside from the fact that we look and sound exactly alike, there is nothing similar about us. Her 15 year old humor is 100x more inappropriate than mine will ever be, she sleeps a solid 12 hours a day, knows how to talk to boys, doesn’t look like an ugly ferret like I did freshman year, the list goes on. Point being, my sister is way cooler than I will ever be. Ouch.

Mostly, I have always been jealous of Abby’s careless personality. She doesn’t give two rips about what people think of her, doesn’t stress tremendously over grades the way I do, does what she wants, says what she wants, wears what she wants, she just doesn’t care. That, unfortunately, is where we will never be the same.

Abby hates high school. She’ll tell you straight up. I, on the other hand, LOVED everything about high school. I was always a teacher’s pet, expected perfection when it came to grades, and was loved by nearly everyone. Nerdy me established the label of “try hard,” right from the get-go. And I didn’t mind, because well, it was accurate. I loved learning and improving and achieving – I thrived in high school. But I guess I’m starting to notice that unfortunately, my “try hard” nature sticks with me a whole lot farther than just high school.

I care too much about perfection. I care too much about what people think of me, and I care too much about keeping up with other’s expectations. I care too much about the future – knowing where I’m going and what I’m doing and whose going to be there.

“Try hard” was a title I thoroughly enjoyed in school – but now I wish I could just get rid of it.

I “try hard” to control, well, everything.

Knowing Jesus is my highest priority, my greatest joy, when it’s not hard to see Him.  Of course, why would my faith shake when I don’t have to actively seek Him? As soon as I feel like I’ve lost control, approval, success – trust flies out the window – and my life’s focus immediately flips. My lens shifts focus from God to gaining security and control in what is worldly, temporary. I wish it were easy enough for me to just say that I’m going to stop trying.  But I am impatient, I struggle with trust, and forget that someone a whole lot greater than me already has me on a map that is more incredible than anything I could imagine. It’s funny to think the times I could be learning the most about Jesus and growing the most in my faith are the times when God is the last thing on my mind.

God is challenging me to accept the fact that I am not in control. I am learning that my life cannot be abundant and genuine and pure if it becomes some sort of timeline. Life cannot be lived the way God designed it for me if I’m constantly focused on tomorrow, because then I miss Jesus in today.

I have come to the conclusion that I am an “over-everything” over-achiever, over-controller, over-worrier, over fill-in-the-freakin-blank.

But what if I just got over… myself?

What if I got over the fact that I don’t always know where life will take me next? What if I accepted that I am limited to living one day at a time? And the reality is – that limitation is so freeing, so freaking wonderful, to be confident in knowing that everyday holds so much opportunity to know and trust Jesus deeper.

Today, I am learning to take life day by day, and that sometimes God is present where I least expect Him. I have a great need for Christ, and a great Christ for my need. And there will never be anything greater than that.

“Perhaps the work God does within us while we are waiting is just as important as what we are waiting for.”