I am notorious for looking toward (and obsessing over) the future and what exactly God has planned for me and WHAT IS IT ALREADY I'M TIRED OF NOT KNOWING WHERE I'M GOING!!!! See? I was in Daily Mass today and this thought kinda washed over me.
I am wasting the life I am living now by thinking about my future all the time.
That isn't an exaggeration, either. This past week has been really rough because I've spent literally almost every waking moment thinking about the future God has in store for me and how I have no idea what that is or where I'm headed. It leads to some really depressing days, let me tell you! It has attempted to ruin (and at times has ruined) the experiences I'm currently part of. For example, yesterday was a glorious day. The weather was very warm for Midwestern October, I went to my brother's football game, my godson/almost 2 year old brother was being uncharacteristically well-behaved, one of my closest friends called me out of the blue just to talk, and it was my Confirmation anniversary. The day was essentially ruined by myself and the ever-present thoughts of the future. I wanted to be alone most of the day and I walked around feeling all depressed. And for what? Nothing.
God absolutely does not want His Plans for our future to consume our lives. He wants us to be happy where we are at this very moment because this is exactly where He wants us. Given the fact that God is God, we aren't going to figure out the future, anyway, so we might as well sit back and enjoy the ride. That does not mean, however, that we just sit on our butts all day and suddenly Pier Giorgio Frassati, I mean, Prince Charming, I mean, Future Husband, will show up at our door. Nor does it mean that our career path will magically appear in the form of a random job offer personally carried by an owl (sorry for the HP reference, couldn't resist) will get dropped into our lap. Nope.
God needs us to just do life to the best of our ability and our future will fall into place.
I will be the first to tell you that this is much easier said than done. Every day we must give our lives, including our futures, to God and trust Him to lead us in the right direction. And He will. He always does. The thoughts of what career you want someday and daydreaming about that cute guy at Daily Mass becoming your husband will still pop up and that is totally okay! You just can't obsess about it. Letting these thoughts distract you from life on a regular basis is a problem. Pray constantly for the gift of self-control and for guidance. God holds you and your future in His hands. Trust in the Lord always! He loves you and will lead you to where you are supposed to go.
Just grab His hand.
