If I had the chance
To go back again
Take a different road
Bear a lighter load
Tell an easy story
I would walk away
With my yesterdays
And I would not trade what is broken for beauty only
[Nichole Nordeman]-[Sunrise]
Listening to this song just now prompted a question in me?
"IF i COULD go back and do my life again (the adult part), would I do it?"
There's an old cliche (paraphrased loosely) that says: "I wouldn't change my life and I don't regret anything that's happened because I wouldn't be who I am today or know what I know without it all".
The lyrics to this song say essentially the same thing; restate the same basic principal.
I get it. I really do. Because I am wiser as a result of my life - all of the good and the not-so-good events along the way. BUT, my Spirit just doesn't agree with that perspective.
I know I have Teighlor and Alec - my beloved children - because of my marriage to Kevin, and I really can't imagine my life without them because they consume a place of my heart that no one else holds. BUT, had I married differently - say... actually consulted God on the choice - my Teighlor and Alec of today wouldn't exist, but I would have been given another Teighlor and Alec... or Emma and John... or Samantha and Nathan. I wouldn't miss the Teighlor and Alec I know today because God would have created different children within a different marriage. [Feels like I'm talking in circles but in my mind it all makes sense.]
Which leads me to answer the question "Would I?" with a resounding YES!
i DO have regrets in my life. i DO have choices that i would give ANYTHING to go back and change. i HAVE children that have lived through crap they shouldn't have because of my choices. i HAVE a regrettable past that was birthed from one tragic night when i was 19, followed by years of stupid, selfish and nearly insane choices.
i am who i am today because I cannot go back and change anything. and i embrace who i am and the life i live because I cannot go back and change anything. but i am NOT who God originally intended for me to be had i walked His perfect path; had i consulted Him before moving forward to the next stepping stone in my life.
I am not lamenting. I am simply considering the question... WOULD I?
And now I ask... WOULD YOU? If God came and told you that He would give you another chance to do it again (starting at 18), with no knowledge of the life you live currently, would you take Him up on His offer?
This is one of those pondering moments that you have when you are sitting in a jacuzzi looking at the stars. I love that you started this kind of conversation here, on your blog.
ReplyDeleteI know so many people who say they wouldn't change a thing. That they have no regrets because everything formed them into who they are today. NOT ME. I am with you, 100%. I would go back to age 17, when my turn of events began. I would listen to the Holy Spirit in certain circumstances that have happened over the past 9 years. Oh yesss, there are a whole list of things I would change!
Being someone who does not believe "everything that happens is God's will" ... I would go back and live out God's will. Not just the goodness He created out of my mess. I would honor Him more, with my life choices.
I have to answer honestly and say I don't know. For some reasons "yes" and for some reasons "no". I am with you on not being able to imagine life w/o my child but at the same time I would have never have known the difference.
ReplyDeleteI would probably go back to 4th grade...I know, young, right? But there are reasons for that as well. If I HAD to be a teen....I'd choose 15...prior to 2nd semester freshman year...
Man things would have been different!