Monday, April 30, 2012

-M

Once upon a time, in a dark and twisty place in my life months and months ago, i received an e-mail from a reader about a blog post i had written. (i sort of felt like a blog celeb for a minute, and pretended i was NieNie getting emails from adoring fans. luuulllzz. jokes.) But really, it was the sweetest thing ever written.

i'm sure i made it apparent on my blog that i was discouraged about what i was to do with my future, and i was definitely discouraged about where i was in my life...because where i was, was not where i PLANNED to be. so i was asking for any advice or help anyone had for me. my friends were engaged or getting married, and i was heartbroken, once again. i was at square one... lost, confused, and sad...much like how i am finding myself tonight laying in my bed. At square one- a place i didnt think i'd revisit.

 This e-mail i recieved from this reader gave me hope, made me want to pick myself up off the floor and start making plans for my future. ANY plans, because it was my future, and only mine. And i could do whatever i wanted with it. So i did make plans. and i started getting happy. and right when things started looking great, all of a sudden my things didn't work out for me the way i planned.

And now i am back to that point, where i need to pick myself up, and start making plans again.

I remembered some things said in this email just hit me in the right way, and i forgot i was going to post it on here. So this is for me, for a night like tonight..and for anyone else who is in my boat.. who is just trying hard to start making plans again.

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I consider myself to be a "nonparticipating blogger/internet user" I rarely, if ever, I will comment back to people or make my presence known in the stalking that I do.. However, I love reading your blog and I know what it feels like to want someone who really doesn't know you that well to give some heartfelt feedback.  

Preparing yourself for marriage is impossible.  Preparing yourself for the future is impossible.  Preparing yourself for “life” is impossible.  

Things happen and plans change, I have always been a big dreamer, I root for the underdogs and I believe in life’s small miracles.  I also believe that one person can make the world of a difference in the lives of others.  My first semester at BYU I had an English teacher that really cared not only for our ability to write but for our ability to make a difference.  Classic mission story:  while he was on his mission in Montana, he and his companion randomly walked to an apartment building near their church.  Out of ideas and frustrated with their area this was a last ditch effort.  There they came across a family who had moments before been discussing what it meant for them to be a family and how they needed to figure something out for their family to survive in the world we live in, the mother of this family broke down into tears when she found the missionaries at the door and all she could make out was:  “I have been waiting for you for so long.”  

There are people out there waiting for you Nicole, some of them you have already met and you have already made a difference in their life.  Others are still waiting.. No need to go on a mission unless you feel that is where you belong, but the line of work that you are in is so needed all throughout the US.  There are so many children and families out there that need a Nicole to walk into their life and change it for the better.  Remember that there are people waiting and only you can touch them because of who you are and what you stand for.

If grad school is where you want to be, make it happen, get out of your comfort zone and go all out.  Go to Paris, go to Australia, see the world and then come back, because everything you are going through right now is going towards the future of your children.  They are going to need you and only you for their mother.  Their needs are ones that only you are going to be able to handle.  Take a cooking class for fun, learn how to make a wedding cake, do whatever you FEEL like doing, because you can.  (Apparently things dealing with food appeal to me, they may be different for you).

Getting married is such a wonderful thing, something that I think a lot of girls (especially in Utah) rush into, they start feeling like something is wrong with them if they are 24 and not married yet, people start asking why they aren’t dating anyone seriously, there’s too much pressure on that.  The average age to get married in the US is like 27, and that’s young!  

When talking about being married, people paint one of two pictures: 
A) living happily ever after with their husband and not a worry in the world
or 
B) getting a divorce because they married a monster.  

NEWS FLASH:  both of those are false.  Getting married and living happily ever after only happens in the books and the movies, there are no Edward Cullen’s or Jacob Black’s in the world.  There are real people though, real people with wonderful traits as well as flaws, and getting married to someone is realizing that yeah, things aren’t perfect, sometimes I think you are a total retard, but I love you and that’s why we are working hard to make it work.  (Please don’t think I have a horrible marriage because I think a lot of people like to hide the truth and most everyone feels this way).  You have so much to offer to a family and are so wonderfully talented.  

I know I don’t know you very well and you probably think I am crazy going on like this, especially seeing as I really don’t know your situation or some of the options you have right now.  Our brief glimpses of each other in the hallways at school are nothing to compare to a friendship but do know that I really do look up to you.  It may not seem like it but from the outside looking in, you have so much going for you right now and if you have a few options that you are bouncing between.. Do them all!  Start making plans for your future and chances are they will be rudely interrupted by your imperfect prince charming without you even realizing it.  

Guys from the past are hard to get over, not because they still hold a place in your heart, but because they took that bit of you that you gave to them and stomped on it, and knowing that you trusted someone with so much of yourself to only watch them walk away without a glance back is the most horrible feeling in the world.  That little piece of you then buries itself even deeper to avoid getting hurt again, so the next guy comes along and doesn’t get to see that wonderful part of you that’s holding back, afraid of getting hurt.  Memories never go away, even when you get married you still remember that one boy that took you to prom, or the other boy that held you while you cried, but slowly those memories become easier to look back on and easier to see that the girl you were when you were with that boy, was not the girl you need to be for the family you are going to have.  

Like I said before, I am a big dreamer, everything happens for a reason and even though that reason may not come along for years and years, it will come.. the longer you have to wait for it, the more worth it, it will be..  If you are still reading all of this I commend you for your patience.  I wish you the best in the next step, how I wish I was at that same point in my life.  You are an excellent writer, keep all of us updated because that’s a whole lot of people that either really care or are just really nosy (mostly I think we all really care)

Good luck Nicole.

-M




1 comment:

Spratt said...

Those are some really great thoughts. Thanks for posting this. :)