When Life Doesn’t Go As Planned

Here I am finally back at my computer!  I have missed you all and my writing.  But my house has been in a constant state of change now for almost ten months and I am certainly ready for it to settle down.  But that isn’t going to happen for a while.  So… what do you do when life doesn’t go as you planned?  Let’s chat about that for a few minutes.

• I have lost some great people in my life this last year and many of them unexpected.
• I have had a move, and that wasn’t something we had been planning either.
• Circumstances changed and here I am.
• I have packed a house and unloaded into the new house and found many “oops” that weren’t planned and had to be fixed.
• I have bought a vehicle, that soon after, required work.
• I have unexpected expenses again and again in our selling and purchasing of homes.
• I have just completed putting most of our possessions away, and now I have to “undo” a lot of it to ready the house for window installations at the end of the month.

It never seems to go as we think it will go, even with all the planning in the world.  But I am getting a chance to practice how I deal with it.  Here is a most recent example.  We are making changes in our home and some have been completed.  But as we plan, we find that one area leads to another, that leads to another.  We have our son here doing the work, and so we have to work around when he can be here.

So enter stage left…flooring.  What we wanted will take at least two weeks to get in, and he can’t come back for that, so we have to change our thinking.  We found some flooring at a great price, less than $1.00 a sq ft!  So that was a big savings!  Not the flooring I really wanted, but it was WAY less and it was available for purchase.  Also, my son can install it while he is here.  Next, we look for flooring in our kitchen and dining room.  I wanted wood floors but wasn’t sure how practical it would be for us.  With that in mind, I was going to get vinyl that looked like wood plank.  Well, that can’t happen either because of the special order details. *Sigh*It takes at least two weeks to get it.  So…I have to change to something that I didn’t plan on getting.  However, they have the amount we need, so we changed mid-stream, and are getting what is available and will match the flooring we got on sale pretty close.  Are you getting the picture?  We can plan for what we want, but it doesn’t always work out that way.  For us, money is a factor, and having someone who can do the work is another BIG factor.  We have decided we have to be flexible and change mid-stream if we want to accomplish our home renovations, and have someone to do the installation.  As it turns out, this is a nice alternative that is a wood product.

I can’t always have what I want, no matter how much I would want it.  In this case, I choose to look at it as an opportunity to change it up, and make it look nicer than it was, and have most of the look I want.  I could be picky and say I’m not doing that.  I could spend more money than what is wise just to get my way.  But, then other areas would not get completed.

I think this is a perfect example of life.  We expect our lives to go a certain way.

• Have this kind of house.
• Have this kind of furniture.
• Have this type of job.
• Drive this kind of car.
• Always have our family and friends around us.
• Our kids will follow the Lord.
• We will never say some of the things that our parents said.
• Travel to many places.
• Have lots of fun.
• Expect that we will get up tomorrow and our friends and family will be there.
• Expect that if we work, we should be able to have what we want, in most cases.

However, that is not always the case.  So when I feel like I am compromising once again, I realize I am acting out of selfishness.  God has been gracious to me and provided so many blessings!   So, I give myself a spiritual spanking and I decide once again to change how I look at it.  I decide to take the changes willingly.  God knows the future and He knows what is best.  I will choose to trust Him in ALL things.  If I do, I believe God will put His stamp of approval on my efforts to spread our finances around to get the most done.  I want it to be comfortable and cozy.  After all, my home is His home.  He knows how it should look. 🙂

It is the really same in other areas of my life too.  I don’t wait to tell people what they mean to me.  There may be changes in my tomorrow which make that impossible.  Do you have situations in your life where it hasn’t gone as planned and you have to adjust your approach and come back in for a better landing?  Practice makes perfect is a saying we are all familiar with.  I don’t agree.  There isn’t a “perfect”.  But, the willingness to keep practicing makes something closer to it, a lot easier to achieve.  I know it isn’t easy, believe me.  Everyday brings another opportunity for me to practice it.  But overall, I am willing to pull up my landing gear and go for another approach.  He allows U-Turns.  He does.  I love that about Him!  He knows the end from the beginning.  Phew!!!  Aren’t you glad?

Walking the journey with you…

Update:  Yep!  That great flooring for only $.90 a sq ft just became $2.00.  What we were told when we bought it, turns out not to be true.  It would be nice if the people working with the product, KNEW their product.  So up came the vapor barrier, and down with the glue.  Hence, in increase in price per sq ft.  Advice:  Good deals aren’t always good deals, and our plans don’t usually go like we think they should.  Breathe…