TheWRITEaddiction.com

We’ve all had those seasons in life when everything crumbles around us and life as we know it is never the same.  It may be the loss of a lucrative career, a brutal divorce, the loss of a child, a home foreclosure or a myriad of things.  We are suddenly shaken to our core and are forced to pick up the remaining pieces and move forward or either stay where we are and drift into depression.  Choosing to move forward is the better option, but is much easier said than done.

For me, that defining moment was when my dad passed away over a year ago.  Others around me had passed before, but I never thought about losing my dad.  He was so healthy and full of life.  He had the respect of many and had achieved so much in his 62 years.  He was a devout Christian and loved God and family with all his heart.  When he passed, I was forced to pick up the pieces of knowing I couldn’t talk to him anymore, of knowing I wouldn’t hear his laugh on this side of eternity and knowing I wouldn’t hear his beloved singing voice.  I chose in those moments, shortly after he passed, that I couldn’t die too.  Not in the sense of dying physically, but I had to choose to live and go on.

You may be in a situation that is devastating and you can’t figure out how you will ever “live” again.  It begins by taking one step at a time.  Each day comes with a brand new grace from our loving heavenly Father who promises to carry us through those difficult seasons.  It begins by focusing on your future—what is before you and not what you lost.  It begins by believing joy is just on the other side of this valley.  It begins by accepting what happened and not trying to change it. It begins by asking for help and allowing someone to go through the journey with you. It begins by picking up the pieces of what’s left and building a beautiful masterpiece.  Some pieces may seem not to fit or as if there are too many holes, but as you continue to work with the pieces, there is a place for each one.  And the holes soon become filled with God’s grace.  Soon, you will look back and see a truly stunning masterpiece despite the pieces you lost along the way.  Never give up.  Never look back.  Keep going.  Build your masterpiece!

~Coletta Jones Patterson