Happy Birthday!

This month is my birthday month!!  So with the knowledge of turning a year older comes the need to reflect on the past year.  Of course, my birthday is a day for celebrating--so who wants to get that serious?  :)  Yet, I still find myself remembering little moments as they sneak into my brain.  Moments from my childhood, days in college, friends I once knew, times of heartache and pain, along with joyous occasions--all of these times make up the pieces of my life.  These events make me the person I am today. 

What does your life story say about you?  Have you learned from mistakes and regrets?  Or do you let them hover over your life like a burden that never lets go?  I know I find myself doing the latter too many times.  It is important to learn from our mistakes and then move on, but for some reason it becomes easier to continually ponder over these issues.  And we allow these moments to rule our lives while making us feel worse and worse about our present circumstances.

Have you ever been going one direction in your life only to stop and realize that suddenly you are on a completely different path?  A path that you never saw or intended to be on?  This is what I have realized about my life so many times.  However, I have also come to understand that finding out this revelation is ok.  Perhaps my original path would not have made me happy or been the best for my life.  Only the Lord knows the answers to those questions.  My advice--do not feel bad when things do not work out as you would like them to.  Instead, learn from various events and take that knowledge to your next adventure.

With each passing year, we are supposed to gain more wisdom about life and ourselves, and as I get older, I hope that is true of me.  I don't want to view the world in an immature manner or act like I did when I was a teenager.  I would rather grow and mature into the person the Lord is making me out to be.

With this birthday, another year has passed.  And I pray that I have lived in the best way possible this past year.  I hope that I made a difference in someone's life.  I hope that someone was encouraged by my story, and I pray that each choice I made was prosperous.

Not every moment in life is good or filled with happiness, but we can choose our mood and how we want to view our present circumstance.  So for my next year, I want to choose my feelings.  I don't want to live on my emotions, but I want to choose to be happy.  I want to choose to do the right thing always.  I want to choose to serve others.  I want to be more disciplined in my daily routine and at the end of this year I hope to have accomplished more than the last.  So, with one step at a time, I will make this my best year yet!