Don’t Look Back
My son says I find messages in the most trivial things. But I think even he would agree that what’s been taking place in my life lately has been pretty phenomenal.
I’m always the one to say, “Follow your passions. Embrace change.” I’m also the one who’s been unhappy for the past year. There have been a couple of reasons for that. One, I wasn’t sure I was doing enough to allow my passions to become my purpose. Or to be able to write fulltime, like I’ve always wanted. Although, truth be told, I already write fulltime. I guarantee you I spend as much time at Starbucks as the baristas. But when I got the email about possible library appearances, I panicked. Speak to people? In public? Strangers?
Every motivational speaker and Baptist church preacher will tell you that you work on your dreams every day so that when opportunity arrives, you’ll be ready to embrace it. Or walk into it. So, that’s why I write as much as I do. I refuse to let rejections, no matter how soft they are, stop me from following my passion. And I will not let my fear of speaking to strangers keep me from accepting the opportunities to show up for the author readings at the library this summer. The door opened. And I’m walking through it.
So, on to the “Don’t look back” part of this post. I said earlier that a few times this year I have had people talking about me behind my back. Only these people were saying good things and the good things they said, well, they opened doors of opportunity for me. One door was for my writing and the other was for my teaching. Out of the blue, people called me because of what these wonderful people had told them about me. Once these new doors opened for me, though, I found myself looking back to where I’ve been for the past few years. And I wasn’t so sure I wanted to leave. No, that’s not true. I realized I’d been uprooted from my place of comfort and this terrified me. A part of me is still scared to face these new opportunities, but I know there’s no way I can’t face them. Because to not face them means to choose to stay in a place that has made me so very unhappy, to the point of being exhausted. Mentally and physically exhausted.
One of the doors to open is a new school home. After being in one place for going on seven years, I’m moving. And it terrifies me. I know the people at my current school. I know the students. It took years, because I’m such an introvert, to reach the comfort level I have now, but I’ve been unhappy for the past year. And it was not within my power to change anything. It became a choice of stay here and suffer or move on. Sadly, I chose to stay here one more year just to see how things end up. Then an email arrived. “I have an available position. Would you like to interview?” I stopped breathing. I mean literally. I was looking back and finding comfort in where I was, even when where I was was a place of unhappiness. A part of me planned to purposely sabotage my own opportunity. That’s what fear will do for you. But then I got there and it felt like coming home. I wanted to be there. I wanted the new opportunity. And the principal was prepared to hire me based on what had been told to him about me. The door was opened. I spoke my desires into the universe and the opportunity presented itself. When that happens, peeps, it’s not the time to look back, but the time to look forward.
As Marianne Williamson says, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be?”
Peace & Love,
Rosalind
P.S. Keep working on your passions so that when the door of opportunity comes for you, you’ll be ready. And when it does, don’t look back. Instead, look forward to all that lies ahead for you.
