From Despair to Hope

I use this photo as a real life example of the contrast of death of a dream and the beauty of the small gifts in life.

We all deal with disappointments in life. Sometimes it feels like some of us have to deal with more disappointment than others. There are many things that can disappoint us. Our lives might not be turning out how we had envisioned they would. Perhaps, a devastating blow comes out of nowhere, like the loss of love, job or another sudden loss. But, I believe there is one truth about disappointments that we all share: How we view life’s disappointments will determine how we recover.

This post is kind of an “aside” to my previous post “Death of a Dream” Parts 1 and 2 and yet it is also a continuation. Death of a dream is one cause of disappointment, as it has been in my case. However, there truly are many causes of disappointment, some of which I have named above, but I know there are probably as many causes as there are people out there!

But, whatever the cause, disappointment left unchecked can lead to sadness, depression and despair. However, disappointment can also spur you on to a new vision, a new plan, and a new hope. It’s all in how you see it and your determination not to live there.

Now I know that some disappointments are much more difficult to deal with than others. The disappointment that led me to write my “Death of a Dream” posts was devastating and life-altering to me. It caused me much pain, many tears, and a feeling of hopelessness.

The sunset, depicting the end of one day…with the hope of a new day just hours away.

Thankfully, that sadness and hopelessness has worked its way into the ability to see and develop a different dream, or many dreams. One way that happened for me was to take the advice of someone very near and dear to me. In general terms, their advice was to accept what is and not expect anything more than what is. For instance: a dog will always act like a dog and never like a bird; a cow will not act like a horse, and a bull will never act like a kitty cat. So, I had to see my situation for what it was and learn to accept what was.

This was not an easy task. The dreams of “what could be” will linger as long as you give them life. When I determined that the dream of what could be was truly dead, it then freed me up to accept what is and to make a new dream based on that reality. I suppose that is survival mode kicking in?

There has been a running joke with some people who know me. My blood type happens to be B+…and it has been the joke how perfect that is because I have a “be positive” personality…most of the time. However, when my dream of what could be died, I felt no positivity…only sadness and disappointment.

But, being who I am, I could not live there. First, I am a daughter of the King of Kings and I believe in His sovereignty. This means that I believe He loves me and that He has a plan for me. His Word tells me that He will work all things together for my good and for His glory (Romans 8:28). So, when disappointment comes…and it will, I am human and must process it with my human emotions. However, my human emotions are not the last word.

I believe that if my God allows something in my life, even if I don’t know the purpose for it, I must trust Him. I must believe that He knows what He is doing. I can’t, as a mere human, see all that He is working on and I have to leave “being God” to God!

So, how do I do this? First, I fill my mind with Truth that reminds me that this was allowed into my life for some reason. It is what it is and so I must now find a way to move on. That “moving on” can take a short amount of time, or it can take a very long amount of time. But, my mind is key to my recovery. Philippians 4:8 puts it like this: “...whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–think on these things.”

Sunrise…the hope of a new day has dawned…however, what will be is still a bit foggy…

Once my mind has settled on the fact of what is…I now move to the “what can be” stage. In my situation, the death of one of my dreams was quite devastating to me, but as the weeks and months have passed, I have found a new way to live without that particular dream. It has freed me up so much to see little things as blessings….little individual dreams, if you want to see it that way.

Another much lesser example has happened this week. Besides being a writer at heart, I am also a photographer. Perhaps this is because I would describe myself as a visual person. Anyway, I often give photographic gifts to those I love.

I had a particular gift in mind and in order to make that gift I needed to locate some pictures I had taken in 2012 (not only 8 yeas ago but 3 computers ago!). I have searched through every device I have looking for these six photographs. Today, I finally had to come to the realization that I was not going to find them. So, now what?

I decided that I will just have to go to the places I took the original photographs and retake them…and then I thought, “Who knows? Maybe the new photos will even be better than the originals.” And then, hope dawned! It occurred to me that I could expand on what I had done in the past and even perhaps this could turn into a project that others might like to own as well! Amazing! Now instead of thinking of the drudgery of having to recreate something I had already created, I am excited at the prospect of creating something MORE than I had originally created!

That’s how HOPE works, at least for me. It’s a strange journey from sadness and despair, past anger, through mourning, to acceptance, and eventually to a new plan with new hope!

I hope in some small way, this post has been an encouragement to you. If it has, please comment below and let me know! That will be an encouragement to me!

Death of a Dream –Part 2

It was suggested to me by a friend that perhaps I could chronicle and share my journey through this time. I think I will take her up on that. I’m not sure how it will go, or how many “parts” there will be, but I am certainly willing to share so, if by something I am going through, I am able to help someone else going through something similar.

I don’t mean to imply that the death of my dreams is any more or less important or devastating than the death of your dreams. I just know that writing helps me process and if writing it down helps me, then perhaps it will help someone else, even if all the variables aren’t the same.

So stay tuned… or not. Either way, I will be writing my way through this processing of healing.

The first thing I want to dive into is for me, there are a couple of different types of dreams. As I said in my original post, there are dreams that just plain aren’t going to come true in any form or fashion. Then, there are dreams that won’t come true in the way that I dreamed them, but with some alterations, either in thinking or circumstances, may still resemble my dream.

Depending on which dream is on my heart at the moment demanding the most of my emotional resources at the time, the mourning will look different. For the dreams I’ve dreamed all my life that just aren’t going to come true, either by the fault of my own choices or the fault of another’s choices, the mourning is the deepest pain.

For the dream that must change, whether a little or a lot, but some semblance of that dream can remain, the mourning is different: still very painful, but some part of my brain knows that it’s not a total loss. So when you have the loss of multiple dreams in both these categories, the mourning is truly a mixed bag of emotion and thought processes.

Another aspect that I want to dive into during this introductory phase is truth. I come into this phase of my life with the basic knowledge that 1) God is sovereign; 2) I am not alone; 3) He works all things together for my good and His glory; 4) God’s word is truth; 5) I am loved by my Creator; 6) This world is not my home, so everything I go through while I am here is just temporary.

So, I invite you to come along for the journey. Subscribe, if you’d like, so that you don’t miss the posts. Feel free to comment and if something I say helps you, please feel free to share that, too. It would be an encouragement to me!

error

Enjoy this blog? Please spread the word :)

Follow by Email
RSS