I have reached that age where I really wish I could go back in time and tell my younger self a thing or two.
Does that come with a certain age?
I guess you can probably feel that at 16 about your 14 year old self but there is something about nearing 40 that kicks this into high gear.
I will be 38 this year and hubs is turning the big 40.
I would have sworn this would never happen to me. It was inconceivable that I would get flaky about getting older. Truth was I had no concept of what "getting old" actually meant.
At 24 I was 5'8" and 125 lbs. My body could tackle any challenge without injury. I could read anything without glasses. My hair was free of grey strands. Yet, honestly I was wildly insecure and critical of myself.
Now all I can think is, how dumb could I have been?
I want to shout at myself, "Wake up you fool, enjoy every minute, relish your health, take better care of it and for heaven's sake count your blessings."
Now, I find myself in a slump. Many pounds have crept on the old frame, I have a healing foot injury from my year of jogging and I had the eye doctor tell me at my visit two week ago "Wow, your eyes have gotten much worse for being still under 40".
Grump, slump and grrr. I want to know I still got it, know what I mean?
I feel frumpy. I look at my pretty little daughter and realize soon she will be a million times prettier woman than I ever was at my best. Even as I write that I know it reveals how horribly vain I am.
Then it hit me as I visited with a sweet older widow who will be 90 this year. She was describing someone she knew and she said, "She's a girl like you". She then giggled and apologized for calling me a girl, like as if she needed to.
My thick as concrete brain finally got it- I am the 24 year old still.
I am blind to what I have.
To this 90 year old my age was a time of youth, joy and adventure.
I have young children to watch grow, I have a husband who truly loves me (who still looks at me like I was that 24 year old), I can jog, I can afford reading glasses, I HAVE JESUS- daily teaching me to be present and accounted for in my own life.
You know it's easy to discount the idea of counting your blessings.
"How naive", "How can I be made happy just because I am not suffering as badly as another person?".
It's not that you have to compare yourself to others, it's that sometimes you have to look around to see where you are.
It's the whole not seeing the forest for the trees idea.
You can get lost in the ordinary, so much so that you might loose track of the fact that your ordinary has plenty of miracles in it.
I only hope I live to be 80. I hope I do it with my eyes wide open. I hope I get out of my own head and really live. I pray that. I repent of being wrapped up in foolishness. To quote a famous group of theologians - *The Newsboys ;) - "faithfulness, not easy fixes". Time provides a true test of every heart.
* They also said "Whistles make for better mixes" which is equally true.
Check out the song: Secret Kingdom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIUHpvSkXOI&feature=kp
