Lately I feel like I have doled out a lot of advice. I have been called by former classmates (actually two in one day!) who I have not talked to in months and asked my opinion on struggles they were having about their future. I have had lunch with friends who turned to me for words of wisdom. I have gotten facebook messages asking my opinion on things and then there is the constant unsolicited advice I give my poor son. Luckily for him, he ignores most of it!
After a super long lunch yesterday, during which I gave out way more advice than I should have, I drove home wondering 1) why I felt compelled to give so much advice and 2) why anyone in their right mind would ask for my advice. (Which led me to realize most of my friends are not in their right mind! That is why I love them!) As of late I have not been so sure of what I am “supposed” to be doing with my life. Giving advice to all of these young people suddenly made me feel like even more of a fraud than I usually do! As I contemplated what I had said to each of them, I realized I gave out some solid advice. My problem is, I don’t take any of it!
Much of the advice I gave was not for me, because they are so young and I am not. They have no family depending on them, I do. They are just beginning and have time to make mistakes, I don’t. And then I realized what a crock that was! If anything, I have done all of the things I thought were “required” of me. I have made a lovely home, been a good wife for over 30 years, raised a fine son, done lots of volunteer work and been the model citizen. Now when I want to pursue a dream I feel like I am too tied down to do that. These kids, on the other hand, are free to go and do, with no one counting on them and no constraints on where they go and what they do. I urge them to go and explore and enjoy, but at their age was when I was buckling down to make sure I did “the right thing.” If I didn’t do it then, what is really stopping me from doing it now?? I don’t want to run off to a new city, I don’t really want to do anything radical. And the two main people I feel responsible to are urging me on. So what is really stopping me?? ME!
I also feel this need to follow God’s path for me. A friend just posted an article that discussed the idea that God didn’t necessarily have that “one perfect path” that I have to keep struggling to find. Maybe whatever path I take, He can make work. Another friend told me years ago that whatever choice I make, He will work with it. And yet another friend, who worked hard to get a degree in counseling and then took a job in the steel industry, told me that she could counsel people anywhere she was, that she was in the perfect place for now wherever she was. Maybe all of the time I have been searching for that perfect plan, I have actually been living it. Like “Mr. Holland’s Opus” I have created in a different way than I was expecting. And maybe while I have been searching, what I have been living has been enough. Maybe after all of this angst my mentor was right- I am enough. Maybe by pursuing my dreams and passions, I have been exactly where God intended all along. Maybe because it wasn’t grand and I didn’t hear an angel chorus, I didn’t think it was the right place.
Tim constantly points out the people I have met and impacted while in school and the aha moments I have had during every play I have done and he tells me that he is sure that is where I am supposed to be, what I am meant to do. I always brush it off as not enough. How arrogant am I that I think I am supposed to do something SO monumental that the world will stop and take note when I do it. Aren’t the small day to day things I accomplish good enough. And while I sit at home waiting for whatever is supposed to be “my path” am I accomplishing anything?? Better to put myself out there and let life take me somewhere and use me in some way, than wait for the “perfect” plan!
So for all of the advice I have given out the past few weeks, I am taking it all back in, enjoying a little time off (less than maybe I had originally thought!) and moving on. Funny thing about advice. I shouldn’t dish it out if I can’t take it!
