At the end of each year, I have a tradition to go over the entire year analyzing events that occurred and experiences I have had. Yes, it does take discipline to make the time for it, but it’s so worth it. I want to share something that helped me see the good in what initially seemed bad.
It gives me a positive outlook, no matter how difficult the experience was.
It’s easy to be pleased with your year when those experiences are pleasant and have attained successful results. But it’s not that easy when you’ve had struggles and challenges.
I believe it was the end of 2013 or 2014 when I felt so bad about my year and my life in general. I had pretty troublesome experiences in my personal life, did not attain the goals that I set to achieve, and everything seemed not the way it should be. I felt like a whole year was wasted. I felt empty. Failed. It felt that the Lord was very distant, as though I wandered off away from Him and my purpose.
Keeping up my tradition to write my reflection about the year, I took one evening off to be with myself. But this time, instead of just overviewing what happened during the year, I looked at my life from a different perspective.
I took a viewpoint of an observer and asked myself questions:
- What was the purpose behind this experience?
- What the Lord was doing through it all, what was He teaching me?
- Since the word of God says that God turns all things work together for good to those who love God and are called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28), I asked myself, “What good can I see in this?”
When I looked at my life from that perspective, the amazing thing began happening within me. As I was writing about one experience after another, behind it all, I saw the blessing after blessing! I saw a lot of value in each event, turn, and trial!
The change in personal life was definitely for my good; it would have been worse if the change didn’t happen. The goal that was not attained (to publish my book) – was for the better because I realized that the book was not complete yet, and I needed to work on it more. My feeling of failure about not attaining my goal turned into gratitude! And all those elements that made me feel like things were not the way they were supposed to be – yes, they were perfectly aligned, and yes, they needed to be there.
I saw how through those difficulties, the Lord was working with my heart. He was not distant, but precisely the opposite – He was right there with me, molding me into the person I needed to become and preparing me for the future.
As I was writing about my year from a new perspective, I saw the incredible work that the Lord did through those circumstances that seemed terrible to me. Imagine the airplane has a route to its destination. The pilot looks at the compass and sees that the plane is slightly off course. The shift might be very slight, nearly to the point that it’s not worth worrying about because it wouldn’t make any significant difference. But what if the pilot would not make any changes and let the plane continue flying slightly off course? The shift might be unnoticeable at first. But after thousands of miles, that airplane would be totally off course. The arrival would be far away from the destination it was supposed to arrive.
That’s what I saw in my life; the arrow of my compass was slightly shifted off the course. I spent a long time re-evaluating everything, and by changing my aspirations and intentions behind them, I brought back my arrow to the course of my purpose in life.
When I finished writing about my year from that new perspective, I felt uplifted, inspired, and eager to see what was next. The way I saw myself as a failure and my year as a wasted time was a lie. Not true. It wasn’t easy to live through that challenging year, but now I saw that this time changed me from within and my direction in life. I was so grateful to see what was hidden behind the “failure”!
I realized how important it is to be in charge of your perspective and take your thoughts captive.
As I review my 2021, I can say that this was quite a challenging year. (Not because of covid and worldwide events or economic struggle) But looking at it from a different perspective, I see it was a valuable year. I already see many good things through those difficult experiences. Experiences that I went through, things that I realized, lessons I’ve learned, and the changes that took place will make a big difference in the future.
Again I see that the Lord indeed turns all things work together for good. We only need to be steadfast and remain faithful to what we’ve been entrusted to accomplish.
Please don’t allow the enemy to convince you that his lies are true. Instead, look at yourself and your life from a different perspective, through the word of God. See what processes were going on behind the circumstances. I believe you will see a lot of good.
Blessings to you. I hope my experience made a difference in your journey.
I am wishing you a delightful Holiday Season!
UNSTOPPABLE 