When Life Throws that Wild Card- 026

There's a part of me that's learned to surrender the need to know what direction my life is heading; at all times of the day. Just when we think we have something figured out; boom! there's a wild card. No matter how much planning we've done; there's often something that falls outside the scope of what we've anticipated or calculated for.

Sometimes life just happens- the opportunity disappears like a file from its hard drive, the diagnosis comes in and disrupts our way of living, the dream morphs into something unexpected. Suddenly, we no longer recognize our own life because the disconnect or incongruity between the life we planned and the life we're living is too wide to reconcile.

It dawned on me that progress isn't always going to be linear; like a blue print for fulfillment that might've been laid out. There are bumps and detours that cause us to reevaluate who we are without those external things that define us like what we drive, where we live or work. As a result; we find ourselves more humble, patient, flexible and willing to make peace with the situation.

In that space, we adapt, adjust, and acclimate because the human spirit is responsive. It finds ways of implementing its strength even in the face of adversity. Dealing with hardship is encoded in our dna; from break ups to job loss. We learn to concede without completely giving in by accepting what’s happened and reworking the plan; building from where we are.

It becomes apparent that the worse thing we can do is stop showing up just because our plans fell through and that skepticism grew louder than our faith. What this teaches us is how to be dedicated to our goal, how to stick it out and give it another go. What we are in pursuit of is often still within our reach, despite being on a different timeline from our own.

A true test of character happens when things are going wrong not when they are going right with us. We become more creative with work arounds, we learn how to live some quality of life despite these limitations and we become open to uncertainty; ushering in less risk of disappointment. In doing so, we hopefully become better versions of ourselves.