“Surprise! Life IS Unmanageable!” Step 1

Step 1 challenges me to see that my life “has become unmanageable.” I actually find it helpful to acknowledge that my life IS and has always been unmanageable. No matter how hard I try to keep all my ducks in a row, sometime during the day they all go waddling off in strange unpredictable directions. The fascinating thing is that I’m always so shocked. “Things are not going as I have outlined! What’s going on here?” I ask myself in dismay. Then I make a firmer resolve and I get up the next morning and try keeping it all together again. There is nothing more plain, that I resist with more gusto, than the fact that life IS basically unmanageable.

This truth is right before our eyes from the get go. Last week I took a look around at the Grand-kids. Gracie had a big bruise on her forehead from running into something she hadn’t counted on. Ethan had road rash on his arm from a unpredictable scooter crash, and one-year-old Matthew decided to give Esther a surprise bonk on the head to commemorate her first birthday.

There are surprises around every corner. Things are not going to go as planned. One key to a happy day is to resist the temptation to take all the surprises personally. No one is out to get me. It’s the nature of life. Today I make a prayerful plan with a pencil, and that pencil has an eraser on it for good reason. God’s not just watching for my commitment and dedication. He’s helping me learn to roll with the punches. He does that by allowing for plenty of surprises. Surprises make life rich. They keep it fresh and interesting.

Yesterday Matthew was playing with a large wooden maraca he’d gotten out of my box of musical instruments from the toy closet. I picked him up to give him a little love and before I knew it he’d wound up and whacked me on the head. It wasn’t personal. It was just a “Surprise Grandma!”

By Nannette W.
Posted Saturday, July 25, 2009

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