Accepting Where You Are

It’s official – summer is over! The vibrant green colors of warmer and brighter days are becoming a faint memory. When I look around now, I see a sharp contrast to the green of summer. I see vivid oranges, muted browns, burgundy reds, and tawny taupe’s emerging.

I’m reminded now how the changes in the seasons mimic the days of our lives as we transition through various life stages. I recognize how transitional life is - how we transcend one season to another.

As a child, summers were full of carefree days, playing games outside like hopscotch, red light, hide and seek and any other games our creative minds could conjure up during summer recess. In contrast to those carefree days and the transition to young adulthood (before marriage, children, and a multitude of other responsibilities) when my primary goal in life was to have matching shoes for my ever-growing wardrobe, I realize now that each transition was preparing me for the next.

And as quickly as summer passes, fall and autumn emerge. And before I was ready to close the chapter on the summers of my life, I find myself in yet another transition. My, where did the time go? It seems, one day I was a young mother, then a young adult who was ready to conquer the world and “bam” – here I am moving toward what some call the autumn years.

I sometimes still feel young at heart but there are days when reality reminds me that I’m not as young as I use to be. I’ve heard the saying “youth is wasted on the young”. I’m beginning to understand what that means. If I had only known then just a smidging of what I know now, how different my life might have been. How many more untapped dreams could I have pursued? How much more joy could I have experienced? Of course, when I was younger I had no clue that each day presented an opportunity to learn from each experience and embrace each stage of life as it unfolded. I also had no idea what it meant to live my dream. In fact, back then, I didn’t have the insight to even know what my dream was, let alone pursue it. Realizing I can't go backward, I must accept where I am now and what it is I want to do now. I have choices and wisdom to make the choice that is best for me. I can either accept my present or dwell on the past. I choose to accept where I am and look forward to what's yet to come. Life is not a digital camera where we can delete the pictures that don’t meet with our approval. What I've learned is that we must fully experience and accept each transition so that we can learn from it and become wiser and more mature. The wisdom and the experiences I have had could only come through the transitions and knowledge I have gained as I navigate my way through each life stage.

I choose to view each transition as just another season that I will embrace, savor, enjoy and know that where I am today is the culmination of where I have been.

Be grateful for each accomplishment, milestone, and transition that you are blessed to experience. Your unique talents are just waiting to be unmasked. Begin today to use each experience as a platform for growth, development and pursuing your dreams.