No Re-Do's

We're having some great fall weather here in my sweet little area of Texas that I call home.  Yeah, I know it's winter, but they say we may still get a bit of that in the next few days.  I love a cloudy, cool day.  If you add some rain to that, darlin, I'm in heaven. 

 

Ya know, sometimes we all feel a bit helpless.  All of us.  I'm assuming that everyone that reads my drivel on here is an adult  (I'm being generous with Epsilonicus and Heart *teasing guys, I love you both*), and carries the responsibilities that life brings with it.  There are relationships, responsibilities, bills, decisions every single day needing to be made that will have an effect on tomorrow, next week and next year.  It's not easy.  It doesn't matter whether you're 18 or 80, your decisions today will decide your tomorrow.

 

I've made some lousy decisions in my past.  Seriously, lousy doesn't even do them justice.  Starting drugs and drinking around 13, completely wasted my high school years.  Carried those habits with me to college and wasted my time and my parents money my freshman year.  Hitched around ending up in Florida, instead of going back to college my sophomore year.  Met some decent people in Florida, but opted to live with the not so decent and wasted another year.  Went back home and back to college, but on my own dime this time, and I took it more seriously.  Working that summer between sophomore and junior years at college, I fell back into old habits and made the same bad decisions I'd been making all my life.  School started without me and after awhile I ended up married to a guy making all the same stupid decisions I was making.  I think the only reason we got married was because we were both trying to stop the other from sleeping with other people.  Not the right reason to get married.  Jealousy does not equal love.  Neither one of us took the marriage seriously, but it lasted about 5 years.  Two people, both on a road of self destruction...not a lot you can do to save it. 

 

Somehow I just managed to cram 11 years into one paragraph.  Sure, I left out details, but if you want details you'll have to buy the book. (No, there isn't any book)  My point here is that my decisions set a pattern that I couldn't see, I was blinded to it because I was out of control.  Did I know I was out of control?  No.  People told me I was, people who loved me...and people who didn't, but I didn't listen.  I remember wishing they'd all leave me alone and just let me live my life.  MY life.   But you know what?  Unless you're living on an island by yourself and you have absolutely no family whatsoever, living life for yourself and yourself alone is just not possible without hurting and even destroying the lives of others.  It just isn't.  Every single decision you make has an effect on your life and your life is a part of someone else's.  Like it or not, that is just the way it is. 

 

I watch my kids needing to make decisions of their own now.  Sometimes I really want to step in, but they're not toddlers anymore and I can't force them to do what I think they should.  I may try to suggest something, sometimes I'm greeted with an eye roll and an "I want to do this myself", and I'll step back.  It's tough.  *Okay, I don't step back 100% of the time, but if it's not going to kill them, lead them on the road to prison or cost me huge bucks, I do.*  But we all have to learn our own lessons.  My lesson for today is: Every decision you make is important.  Weigh it, pray over it, ask advice...but make your decisions today with thoughts of tomorrow, because, sadly, you can never turn back time.

 

Do I regret the decisions I've made in my youth...and some more recent?  I've always said that I didn't because they've made me the person that I am today.  Recently, I've began to wonder if that's true.  Regrets are useless and a waste of time unless they move you into action that benefits yourself or others.  But, I believe that God knew me before I was born, and I was created to be that specific 'someone' that He knew.  However, being human and having the right to decide for ourselves, well, we all fall short.  Some more than others...and I fell way short.  So, I fell, I got up, stumbled and fell again, and I'm up now.  I make no promises for tomorrow, other than to promise to make my decisions as wisely as possible, not only for myself, but for those I love.

 

And if that was way to serious for y'all, did any of you catch 'The Office' last night? The boys and I lauged till we were crying.  Funny stuff.  Can I change a subject or what?   :)

Hugs to all.