Musings of a Badlands Ranch Wife

Uncertainty… just typing the word tends to bring on some level of anxiety. Fear of the unknown, doubt, and worry take center stage in our thoughts, dictating our behaviors and reactions. So, let’s examine this, discover the true source of the power of uncertainty.  With age comes wisdom (according to my dear Dad), but it also brings hindsight. I know in past posts that I have asked you to always look forward and not dwell on the past, and I still hold strongly to this belief. Hindsight is a little different- it allows us to learn from the past. We cannot change things, but we can grow and become stronger. I want each of you to reflect on those life-changing moments, those crossroads that have come before this moment and helped foster who and what you are today. I can almost guarantee that each one of these memories includes a time when you were faced with uncertainty, fear and doubt. Were the uncertainty and fear based on reality or what your mind created it to be? Did your worry and fear help or hinder you? Did it consume you, or did you decide to put it in someone else’s hands? I can look back and vividly remember these moments of my life, the all-consuming worry, wondering what the future held for me and my family, the uncertainty of my decisions, and the overwhelming need to control what was completely out of my control. But guess what… no matter the circumstance, I survived, stronger and just a little more resilient than I was before. Situations resolved themselves, not always as I wished, but for the better in the long run. In the moment, I could only react to the power of uncertainty and its control over my actions. Worry would gain its stronghold and not let go. In hindsight, those are days and weeks and months that I will never get back, and believe it or not, worry and fear did not change a thing. My go to now? Faith and hope. These two are far more powerful than uncertainty and fear. Faith allows me to let go, vindicated in the knowledge that there is a plan for me, and I will be okay. Hope lifts my heart, lightens the load of whatever is before me. It lifts the spirit and releases the weight. Hope is not delusional optimism- it is the faith that good resides on the back end of struggle. Let us move forward with faith and hope rather than uncertainty and fear and let us move forward together.

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Hebrews 11.1