But, no, probably not. She said if she had known, on her first visit to a BSF class, that she was going to be teaching one someday, she would probably have run for the hills.
She's right. I'm glad I didn't know what was coming up in my life. I would have made stupid decisions that messed everything up.
Lord knows, I never dreamed I would ever be writing and directing plays for students. But if I had, I would have probably tried to take all sorts of classes trying to get better at both skills. I probably would have gotten more involved in theaters, trying to get more experience. I probably would have looked for mentors to attach myself to and learn from. And in the end, the work I do, I would be attributing to my education, experience, and mentors. As it is now, I can only give credit to God, because I have no idea how these plays ever come out as well as they do.
My daughter is very anxious to run into her future, figure out her life calling, get a jump on that today. She so wants to know what God wants her to do with her life so she can immediately start preparing. I keep telling her to chill out on that; God will reveal those things to her in due time. For now, her best preparation is to do the things she loves to do to the best of her ability -- take advantage of the opportunities God places in her lap today.
I had my own Creative Memories business for several years while we lived in New Jersey. As I've already mentioned here, I am SO not a businessperson. I loved making scrapbooks, I loved teaching others how to make them, I loved encouraging others to make the effort to record their life stories . . . but the business side of all this was completely and totally out of my comfort zone. It took a tremendous effort of the will for me to, for example, make business calls -- just thinking of it now makes my hands sweat. I doubt anyone ever knew how hard that was.
But even at the time, I had a feeling that this business venture was merely a means to an end. I always thought that God was using this business to build up certain skills or knowledge in me that He intended to use later for something else.
(Which reminds me of my whining the other day about not wanting to do the work to market my scripts. Sigh! In any case . . . )
No, as much as I always wanted to have a roadmap for where God was going to have me in ten, twenty, thirty years, I'm quite grateful I didn't have that. As uncomfortable as it was sometimes, I'm glad God kept me in suspense, just showing me the next step, one step at a time. Otherwise, I would be taking the glory for it all. My planning. My learning. My doing. My pushing. My knowing. I got myself here. Thank you, God, for making me so capable.
I'm so glad now that I know I'm so incapable. It makes me all the more aware that anything I accomplish is all God's doing. And I'm so much more successful and happy that way.
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