Demons

The other day I had a feel sorry for myself day. I was feeling all grumpy about my history, my multiple children from multiple husbands (so classy) who have to go back and forth and split their time and will have to do so for a long, long time.

And I was feeling so sad that I didn't protect them better.  Or make different choices somehow so that things would have ended differently.  And I let it consume me for a little while.

Which was so dumb.  Wanna know why?

1. Because it's in the past.  I cannot change it.  Dwelling on it is a waste of time and energy.  Learning from it?  Good.  Dwelling on it?  Stupid.
2. Because it made me angry, and put me in a grumpy mood all day.  Over something I cannot change.
3. Because while I was angry and feeling sorry for myself I was missing out on my three beautiful children.  Children who have been through a lot.  A lot of change.  A lot of instability. A lot of uncertainty.  And who are happy, kind, doing well in school, well adjusted, and basically kind of miracles.  I was focusing on the negatives in the past which caused me to miss out on the blessings of the present.

And that is a dangerous mindset, my friends.

We all have demons.  We all have things in our lives that we wish were different somehow.  And we all have the opportunity to focus on the blessings of the present rather than the would haves of the past.

Join me on the journey.

Elizabeth Smart

So last week I started reading the Elizabeth Smart story, written by Elizabeth Smart herself.  At the age of 14 she was kidnapped out of her bed in the middle of the night by a man and woman, and kept as a "wife" and "handmaiden" in the mountains of Utah and the desert of California for nine months before she was rescued.  She endured extreme weather conditions, days without food or water, being chained to a tree, threatened, and sexually assaulted over and over again.  I actually started it and finished it in one day (just don't ask me if anything else got done,  pretty sure my kids and husband survived on popcorn and cereal and spent the day rolling around in piles of unfolded laundry).  It was a quick and easy read, word wise, not so much emotion wise.  Emotionally it was draining and terrifying, but also full of hope and healing.  It has now been more than 10 years since her kidnapping, and after her rescue she went on to college, to serve an LDS mission, and has since been married in an LDS temple.  Elizabeth's perspective is so much greater than I think mine would be.  I want to share part of the ending chapter that touched me and that I've thought about numerous times.  

She states:

As of this writing, I am 25 years old.  I have been alive for 307 months.  Nine of those months were pretty terrible.  But 298 of those months have been very good.  I have been happy.  I have been very blessed.  Who knows how many more months I have to live? But even if I died tomorrow, nine out of 307 seems like pretty good odds.

I have had this paragraph rolling around in my head since I read it.  I'd say nine of those months were more than "pretty terrible."  They were full of the most violating, traumatizing, dehumanizing things a person can experience.  And yet, she has the perspective to say nine out of 307 is pretty good odds.  We all have our deserts, our dark times.  Ours might not be as public as Elizabeth's, they might not seem as heavy, but for each individual our dark times can be overwhelming.  As we come out of those dark times, as we move towards healing, what a beautiful blessing it would be to have the perspective that Elizabeth Smart has been able to achieve.  

To be able to say, yeah, that was pretty terrible.  But nine out of 307 ain't bad.