9 Lessons: Lesson 1 – Planning

One year ago, from today, God placed me on a course to teach me 9 life and spiritual lessons. His first lesson was not an easy one to learn and took me months to fully understand it. July 29^th 2017, I had a flight booked to go see mom, a flight I had planned in my head that I would have to take, but was planned to be much later. Little did I know that this was not the only plan I would have expedited. I never planned to take over mom’s blog, until this day one year ago.

I will never forget that plane ride. Thoughts, memories, plans all rushing through my head, until a brief period where my mind was clear and I felt an urge to write. I pulled out my laptop, and through tears (that were hidden behind sunglasses of course) I wrote my first post. I knew while I wrote what I wanted from Mom, and I knew God wanted me to have it to remember her and to share her story. Being that I studied Psychology in college, I understand grief, and had planned somewhat to the stages. Acceptance is sometimes seen as the last stage of grief, but for me I think it was the first, again, something I had not planned for. I knew Mom’s fate, and I knew that I would be flying back home at some point knowing I would never hear her voice, text her about what I’m doing, or see her again. I knew all of this, before I had even landed.

I usually get extreme anxiety from flying, but for this instance, I wish I could’ve stayed in the air forever, because although the flight had many tears, nothing compares to the driving. I remember landing and getting a rental car and driving to where Mom and my Step Father lived. It was the worst hour and half drive I have ever done. I wanted nothing more than to turn around, get back on a plane, and fly back home and hide. I couldn’t of course, and I knew what I was going into. Or at least, I thought I did.

The day before was when my Step Father had called me to tell me that I needed to get to them as soon as possible. He gave me some details about how Mom was doing, but generally it was just “she’s not good” or “she’s really bad”. On the drive, I went through what I expected. I mean, how bad could she really be? I just went to the beach with her less than 2 weeks ago. I thought maybe she was just bed ridden, but that was it. It was not. When I walked into their room and saw her, it was a mixture of extreme happiness, but extreme sadness. I was so happy to see her still there, but so incredibly sad that I knew she would not be there long.

She was much worse than I had imagined, and I am like mom, “Hope for the best and plan for the worst” was our motto. However, I am sometimes too much of an optimist and did a poor job at understanding where mom was at. Mom was bed ridden, but not in her bed, in a hospital bed. She had just gotten on oxygen, and had a care nurse already. Even with tubes in her nose, and glazed eyes, she was still my beautiful Mom and smiled at me and in a soft, faint voice said my name before we hugged. I spent the rest of the day next to her chatting, and enjoying my time with her, because now my original plan to stay there for hopefully a few weeks was quickly being altered.

Now, as I said at the beginning, this lesson took months to be taught. Before Mom passed away, for many years, all the way to even after she passed, I had my life plan. I was in school for what I wanted to do, I wanted to get my PhD in Clinical Psychology and eventually go on into Forensic Psychology. It was what I planned to do since day one of college. However, I needed a bunch of extracurricular things to get into a program. Luckily, I had it planned out to get it all done in my last year because it would be my easiest year. The first thing I was going to do was volunteer for a help line, something I had already gone in to interview and basically was a for sure place for me, and something that greatly helps a résumé. However, training began the day after Mom passed away. I still planned to make it, so the night before, a few hours after I had landed, I grabbed my dog, jumped in my car, and left my girlfriend’s house. My girlfriend and her whole entire family have been my rock, and my absolute biggest help through all of this, it’s why I rushed back after Mom passed away to be with them. So, leaving them so soon after Mom had gone was difficult, too difficult. Maybe ten minutes down the road, I heard a voice in my head that sounded like Mom tell me to turn around. I did just that, and went back to those that could help me more. Doing so, though, virtually ruined all my plans of four years of school and studying. What I had planned was no more.

God taught me through my first day with mom, and first day without her that no matter what you plan for, only His plan matters. Never put all your eggs in a basket is what I always hear, and its true. I never planned to be where I am today. A year and a week ago I would not be expecting to be writing blog posts on my Mom’s blog, I would be expecting to be working on a PhD. However, things always happen for a reason, even if it’s not clear when it happens and I learned that if I ever needed guidance for my  own path that I just need to ask God for his guidance, and he will always show you the way.

Proverbs 3:5-6- “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 straight your paths.”