I often hear young people who are about to graduate high school say that they aren't sure what to major in, in college. Do you want to know how I picked my major? My mom went and picked up a bunch of different papers with the different major options on them. She brought them home and laid them on the kitchen table. I looked at each one for about a minute and then just picked one. I picked the one that looked like I might enjoy the most, and probably had the best pay, to be honest. Then, I started college that fall with full blown anxiety. But, I did it.
How in the world are kids at the age of 17 supposed to know what they want to do with the rest of their lives? They aren't. At 17 or 54, you have no idea what will happen the very next day. We are called to do something great, and we spend every single day figuring out what that is without even knowing it. I used to think that because I went to college for a health degree, and didn't end up finishing with a health degree, that I wasted money. Maybe in the small scheme of things I "lost" money, but it was never wasted. In the big scheme of things, I realize that I had to go through that and learn those things as a part of my journey. I was just living life day by day and doing what I wanted to do, or what I thought I wanted to do. Every choice that we make is either working towards what we are called to do, or against it, but each choice comes with lessons. I realize that no matter what choice I make, right or wrong, He will lead me to the right path. This is what happens when you live your life how you think YOU should.
There's a void in your happiness
Do you ever feel like you are just not satisfied with the way you are living? Do you feel like you are happy but there is a small void because you are always wanting something more? Are you never quite completely content? Maybe you get up every day and have the same routine. Maybe you dread Sunday night because you know what's to come the next day. Maybe you live every week for being able to say "happy hump day". There have been many times in my life where I know that I am happy, but I am thinking about what else I could have, or what more I could be doing. When you live your life the way that you want to live it, you will always have that void. Take some time and pray for the path you should be on. When you are given opportunities and chances to make changes, take them. When you live your life how He has planned for you, you are then living your life to the fullest and genuine happiness comes with it.
You encounter many roadblocks
Do you ever feel like you are headed in the right path, and then something just doesn't go in your favor? Maybe it's something as small as trying to leave the house on time but then your coffee spills all over you, or you trip over the dog's water bowl and it goes everywhere. You are then stuck cleaning up a mess and changing your clothes instead of leaving when you were supposed to. He puts these roadblocks in our lives for a reason. This is why I try my hardest not to get worked up about those types of things. When you can't get that job you have been waiting for, step back and figure out why not. Is it really because of something you are doing wrong or is it because you are doing something that He doesn't have planned for you?Pray for signs and follow them when they are given. I challenge you the next time you are behind a slow driver to be patient and think beyond yourself. There are things we just don't understand and simply put, there are bigger things to stress over.
You experience karma
Do you ever feel like you are having a streak of bad luck? Maybe you are having one of those days where nothing is going right and you feel like you should just go back to bed. Rethink over the past few days or weeks. Were you the best possible version of yourself? Have you been selfish for good reasons or bad? Did you go out of your way to make someone's day better, or did you let the door slam on his or her face going into the mall because you had to get over to that 20 percent sale, and they were walking just a little too slowly? When you live morally correct, great things happen to you. This doesn't mean that when you sin or make mistakes that you are a bad person, you are just not being the person He knows you can be. He wants the best for you, He knows what is best for you, and He will put bad karma in your way to hopefully make you realize what you are doing wrong, and to help you turn around and make it right.
Your timeline is "Off"
Do you ever feel like that timeline you had for yourself is going off track? Maybe you thought by the age of 23 you would be madly in love and on your way to planning a wedding. Maybe by age 25 you thought for sure by now that you would have at least one child. Maybe at age 27 you ended a long relationship that you thought was going to last forever and then suddenly start thinking about how much this throws off your timeline. It isn't "your" timeline, it is His timeline. Until you realize this, or recognize that you weren't put on earth to live for yourself, you will never be completely happy or content with your life and how it is going. The choices you make are yours to make, but where those choices take you and the lessons learned along the way, all have a purpose. That purpose is to get you on the right path towards the life he has planned for you.
Do not let kindness and truth leave you;
Bind them around your neck,
Write them on the tablet of your heart.
So you will find favor and good repute
In the sight of God and man.
Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight
Proverbs 3:4 †
I didn't know what I wanted to do for the rest of my life at the age of 17. At 24, I have an idea of the path that I should be on, but I still have no idea where tomorrow will take me. I make choices every day, and those choices either keep me on the right path or steer me off of it. Either way, I have no fear in what I do not understand. I don't have to understand if I always have faith in the outcome. There are some days when my faith is weak and my knees take the fall.
Never underestimate the power of prayer. Just because you pray for something to happen and it doesn't happen, doesn't mean He isn't listening. Just because what you wanted isn't what you got, doesn't mean there isn't a God. Once you start living your life how He knows you should be, and not how you think you should be, you will acquire the real benefits and happiness that life has to offer you. Sometimes the hardest route, and the right route are the same thing because nothing great in life comes easy. You weren't born to be mediocre and to live life just going through the motions. You were born with a purpose and you are supposed to spend every day trying to figure that out. Be the best person you can be, do the right thing, keep Him first, and watch yourself reap happiness. Some days are going to be harder than others, but don't worry, he's a very forgiving God.
