Did you ever notice that the word “change” is embedded within “challenge?”
My husband and I are making some big changes this year – we’ve just sold our home in South Dakota to move back to Texas – in AUGUST!! (What were we thinking?!?)
We are, at least at the moment, planning to open an upscale diner in the DFW area.
The challenges are many.
We had three goals on our last trip down – to attend a family wedding, to pick up a moving trailer we’ve purchased (we are moving ourselves), and to look at some potential sites for our restaurant. On the way down, we were involved in a wreck just south of Wichita, Kansas. As we slowed to pass the third (yes, third!) accident in front of us, a young woman who was behind us failed to slow down and hit the small (borrowed) trailer we were pulling behind our truck, breaking the tongue of the trailer completely off and sending it rolling. Her car became airborne, flying over our truck and landing up-side-down in front of us! We helped pull her from her car, breaking out the driver’s window to extricate her.
Thank God, none of us were hurt – a miracle indeed.
She had been talking and texting on her cellphone according to several witnesses who stopped to help, and so was cited for distracted driving.
This incident brought many challenges to us, dealing with insurance companies, changing our plans to pick up our moving trailer (did you know that rental agencies will not allow you to tow with a rental car?)
We had to be towed from the scene because the gas line in our truck had ruptured, spend an unplanned night in Wichita, and find a rental car that would hold all the belongings we had been bringing down that were in our truck and the small trailer.
Kudos to my darling husband who navigated all those issues with grace.
These challenges brought quite a few changes to our plans, delaying things by several weeks while we wait for our truck to be repaired in Wichita, and necessitating another trip to Texas to get the moving trailer.
Yet, we have had some wonderful discussions together, raising our consciousness in several ways.
GRATITUDE – NO ONE WAS INJURED!
BLESSINGS – instead of choosing anger over the situation or being fearful that things would not work out, we chose to bless the young woman and the events.
FAITH – we believe the unfolding of all this will serve a higher purpose that we may or may not know right away, or ever. Perhaps this experience will serve the young woman involved in a “growth opportunity” that benefits her, perhaps Doug and I needed the extra time in South Dakota for some reason? Who knows?
What we do know is that God is present, saturating our lives with good. And that any time we choose, we can lift the “lle” from the challenges of our lives into a change for the better, and use the lle as a reminder to love life’s experiences!