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On faith and fate and plans...and powering through

Posted in By Jordan 1 comments

So...I've been lacking a little motivation/inspiration lately. I am off work and school for the entire month of May, and I thought that meant I'd finally have some time to dedicate to my creativity, but, instead, I've hit a long and powerful lull. But, I've finally summoned the courage to power through...so, here we go.

It is a crazy time in the life of the Gross family. We have lots of things up in air right now, and the future has become suspended in a limbo-zone of hopes, fears, and thousands of possible scenarios that are consuming my mind at all times. I resigned my one great wish of being able to glimpse into the future many years ago...of all the gifts I've been blessed with, psychic power isn't one of them. But I've also resigned myself to another truth: if I could go back to any other point in my life and tell myself just one thing, I wouldn't tell myself all the answers. I would simlply say, "Everything is going to be okay...everything is going to be beyond okay...you are going to be blessed in so many ways beyond any of the possibilties you ever could have imagined."

Things pretty much always turn out exactly how they are supposed to. I know this, and yet it really doesn't soothe any of my anxieties. If only I had a nickel for everytime someone told has told me that "God has a plan for you" or "If you want God to laugh, tell him your plans" or something along these lines...I always nod politely, thankful for the advice, but in my mind I'm thinking..."Yeah...uh huh..but who ever got anywhere without a plan?" I've always taken a "50% work and planning 50% fate" approach to life. In the end, do I really have any control over how my life is going to turn out? Not much, but maybe a little...and I'm going to juice that little bit of power just as much as I can.

I am a major planner. I create timelined plans for accomplishing goals...small term goals that contribute to greater long term goals. Michael and I are in various stages of different sets of plans and goals, both individually and as a team. These plans are our attemts to manage and maximize the little bit of control we do have over our lives. I throw myself into these plans and attempt to micromanage every part of my life...even things like my creativity.

So, while I scheduled May out to be a time for extreme creative output before another three hectic semesters of school, life threw me one of its many curveballs and hit me with a dry spell. During the past few weeks, I have had moments of desperation...wondering if my creativity will wither and fade and die...wondering how I will ever be able to call myself a writer when I can't even manage to squeeze out a weekly blog. In these moments, I summon my future self's advice: "Things will be okay...things will be more than okay...you are going to be blessed in so many ways beyond any of the possibilities you could have ever imagined."

I feel like I am constantly learning one lesson in life over and over again...it is all about balance. I have to learn to feel comfortable balancing that little bit of control I can hold onto and the roller coaster ride of fate. I have to have a little faith that it will all work out, somehow, someway, and usually my wildest dreams will be surpassed. Dry spells end and difficulties are overcome and you can't really plan how or when it will all happen. All you can really do is suck the life out of every single day and make as much of what you want to happen happen...and try as hard as you can to be thankful for every moment you get to experience in this crazy world.

So I am going to seize the opportunity and learn from the difficulty of this limbo world. I am going to focus on having faith that the best thing will ultimately happen and I am going to power through this dry spell and believe that pretty soon, the magic will return to me....perhaps it is busy elsewhere these days, make unseen, unknown changes in my world, sprinkling fairy dust on the seedlings of a future beyond my own imaginings...

On being fine...

Posted in By Jordan 0 comments

Wwwwhhhhheeeewww....Sorry, but I had to start this post out with a giant sigh of relief. I have been fighting battles for this day for several months now, and it is finally here! I survived this semester of craziness...I had a baby, checked off six more hours of graduate credit, finished my last semester as a full time tutor in the writing center (it's on to teaching next semester...yikes!), and along the way I also juggled the rest of my responsibilities, a little financial stress, and some crazy postpartum hormones. Today is a day of sweet relief. Michael is at a fishing tournament, and I am getting to spend some much needed quality time with my baby boy.

Last night we went out to celebrate, just the three of us...and of course the crazy scary tornado weather had to come and try to blow us away, but we managed to survive and actually have a pretty amazing night together. I think it was an appropriate way to cap off the whole experience of this past semester. When we got home, the three of us huddled up together to watch the weather and Michael said, "We're going to be just fine." It was so simple but also so transcendent.

I think that I have finally reached the realization that Michael and I can weather pretty much any kind of storm together successfully. It is days like today, when I have some time to reflect, that I stand in awe at the tremendous power of our unlikely relationship.

We are two of the most different kind of people you will ever meet. In a nutshell, I would hesitantly label myself an academic. I go to school for the pleasure of learning...I cherish free time spent alone with books and even (gasp) paper writing, although I wouldn't have told you that earlier this week. I am a little neurotic, very sensitive and analytical...a moody introvert.

Michael, on the other hand, is pretty much always happy. He is satisfied by working on little (or big) tasks of any kind. He can find a way to laugh (and make others laugh) at almost anything, and he hasn't read a single book since we started dating seven years ago. He doesn't care about underlying meanings or analyzing feelings...He's more about figuring out the facts and making things happen than sitting around thinking about who/what/when/where/why and how things come to be the way they are.

We met when we were practically babies, and got married, I'd say, right around the toddler stage. Most people thought we were crazy...I'm pretty sure they were right. We didn't have money or a plan or anything going for us except for an intense desire to wake up next to one another every morning and fight through life side-by-side.

In some ways, I think the two of us are kind of like step-siblings on hormonal overdrive or something (only less creepy)...he is more like a brother to me sometimes...protective, bossy, doing his best to annoy me. And I feel like our relationship is the only place I can safely relinquish the bitchy teenage sister inside my soul. We spend much of our time bickering about stupid, little things and even more time wrestling and laughing and making fun of one another.

There have been many times when I have been full of doubt when it comes to the two of us...how can two such different people who have about nine million obstacles ahead of them make it together in a world where most people end up divorced...especially the ones who try to make a marriage work when they are as young as we are? And yet, somehow, against all odds, the two of us prove me wrong through every challenge.

I only have to look at our son to see why. As I have gotten to know his emerging little personality, I have come to the realization that, together, Michael and I make the best kind of person. Chase has inherited such distinct qualities from each of us...he is such a serious joy spreader; he just makes everyone so insanely happy. And for the most part, he is so mellow and calm. He wants to get his hands on things and move around, and he already tries to stand up and even take little steps. Those things come from his daddy. But he also has these moments in which you can tell he is just a little old soul waiting for his baby body to grow into his mind. You can tell that, as soon as he can get his mouth to do it, he is going to start spouting out all the little wonderful, intense thoughts he is already thinking. And he has these wild explosions of emotion...these things come from me. I can already tell that he has the perfect tools to cut out his own unique and amazing path through life. He is going to make it, and he is going to do awesome things because he is just the right combination of a doer and a thinker...just the right combination of a lover and a fighter.

He is the perfect example of why our relationship works so surprisingly well even when there are tornados and hurricanes and earthquakes going on around us all the time. I am certain that as long as the three of us continue to wake up each morning with the desire to fight through one more day together that we will make it through a whole lifetime of challenges like this past semester with more smiles and laughter and love than is really fair for one family to have. We will blaze our own trail through life, one never traveled before, and be thankful for the blessing of every obstacle that we are given the chance to overcome together. We're going to be just fine.
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