My grandma used to have a magnet with a picture of a train on her refrigerator that read, "If everything is going your way, you must be going the wrong way." Right now I am pretty sure I must be going the right way because it feels like it has been a very long time since anything has gone my way. I've bumped into roadblock after roadblock. Getting shutdown doesn't even hurt anymore. It's frustrating, but it doesn't hurt. What keeps me going? Hope.
I've thought and learned a lot about HOPE through everything. I've often wondered how do I stay so happy and optimistic. It is hope. I have hope. I always have hope. It never leaves me. I may try to not get my hopes up for anything that may or may not happen. But I am never hopeless. I believe things will eventually work out. And that hope endures always and it keeps me enduring.
It is kind of a fascinating phenomenon. At least I think it is because I have been thinking a lot about it lately. It is amazing how hope sticks around no matter how bad things are. There is always hope that things will get better and things will work out for the best. How does it do that? Hope is a gift from God that keeps people going. It keeps me going.
"Hope is not knowledge, but rather the abiding trust that the Lord will fulfill His promise to us. It is confidence that if we live according to God’s laws and the words of His prophets now, we will receive desired blessings in the future. It is believing and expecting that our prayers will be answered. It is manifest in confidence, optimism, enthusiasm, and patient perseverance.
"No matter how bleak the chapter of our lives may look today, because of the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ, we may hope and be assured that the ending of the book of our lives will exceed our grandest expectations. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into" (Dieter F. Uchtdorf, Oct. 2008)
Right now life events are setting me up for a really great and exciting path or another really hard devastating roadblock. Which way it will go is still up in the air. I am excited and scared at the same time. I am really ready to have something go my way. I am hoping now is the time. If not...I'll keep hoping.
It is funny the things that stick in your memory. That magnet was on my grandma's refrigerator when she lived in Maryland. The last time I was there was a very long time ago. And I was very young.
