I woke up at 4:13 a.m. Thursday morning, 17 minutes earlier than I normally wake up each day and I said to myself, "In ten years, I will be 31 years old. Ten Years! 12 short years ago, my younger brother was born, that seems like just yesterday. So you're telling me that in 10 EVEN shorter years, I will be above the age of 30....30, say it with me thirtyyyyyyyy!"
Why did I ever believe that I would be young forever? Why would anyone get fooled into believing that? It's not possible. I love who I am right now, I'm young, I'm happy, I'm fun, and I'm still a natural blonde which I hear changes the older you get. So that is when it hit me, why rush my life away? Why not go back to school after graduation next year and get my doctoral degree? Why not visit every MLB stadium on the East coast? Why not travel to Denmark one day and experience culture somewhere else? Why not do all of these things that I have always wanted to do?
Well, I will tell you why...because I put my life on hold for people, boys in particular! I came to Francis Marion following a boy, I stayed at Francis Marion an extra year waiting on a boy, I decided that I would follow a baseball player all over the country instead of pursuing my dreams to be something important one day, to be someone great, to change things and people, or at least try to change things and people. I have continuously put my dreams and goals on hold because I have been exposed all my life to the idea that you go to school, you go to college, you graduate, you get married, you get a job, and you have kids.
I have spent my entire life trying to please everyone around me. I have tried to do what everyone else wants me to do instead of doing what I want to do. I have followed guys that I thought I would spend forever with just to find out that my idea of success is unlike most other Southern women. My idea of success is not finding a husband, getting a huge engagement ring, planning the perfect wedding, being a housewife, having two perfect chidlren, and then transforming into a housemom. My idea of success has to do with being someone, being known! I want to go to school and make something of myself. I want to travel and drink beer while watching sporting events. I want to be myself before I am locked into being someone else's forever. Why is that so bad? Why does that make my mom's "nerves in knots" as she told me today.
I think I'm going to make a great wife and mother one day, one day when I'm ready, one day when I can look at my kids and tell them everything that I accomplished and motivate them to do the same. I want to experience bright lights and big cities. I want to disappear to Raleigh on the weekends and pretty much only recall my friend Chris walking down the main street asking everyone we passed to give him a hug. I want to run marathons and teach fitness classes. I want to look what little bit of muscle I have on my body in the mirror every day instead of worrying about stretch marks and cellulite. I want all of these things while I am still young and can do it. I want to serve the Lord through my accomplishments. I want to pick up and go on missions trips thousands of miles away without having to miss my husband or my kids.
So I am challenging myself.... from this day forward, I will do big things. I will have fun. I will be young. I will take pure and full advantage of the one life I have to live. And then, for my mom and brother's comfortability, when I am ready and I feel it, I will be a wife and a mom but until then, I will love the Lord, and I will love my life because we only get one shot at it. It's not like baseball, you don't have nine innings to bring in runs, you have ONE, that's all. You have to go big or go home.
"The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?" I the LORD search the heart and examine the mind, to reward a man according to his conduct, according to what his deeds deserve." Jeremiah 17:9-10
No comments:
Post a Comment