I Wanted More

I woke up early today, earlier than normal. The Mr. hadn't even come in to give me a good-bye kiss yet (he leaves before 5 am). Yes, that early.  My brain has been completely stuck in a whirlwind. So many thoughts and ideas to get onto this virtual paper. I tried going back to sleep, but couldn't.  I tried dulling them away with time on the Internet, but was unsuccessful.  So here I am, instead of getting ready for work myself, writing to you - this vast unknown of readers. Below is a highly condensed version of the last twenty years of my life.  Highly. Condensed.
I got my first house, a tin can really, in the fall of 1996. It was a small, but quaint trailer in a local trailer park. I shared it with my high school sweetheart and I was going to get married, have a couple kids, and spend my life in perfect happiness. I love looking back on my naivete. It wasn't that things couldn't have progressed like my romance novels said they could, but I wanted more.  So, I got a better job, moved in with my best friend, and carried on for a while.
Then I met my first husband. We were young, had great paying factory jobs, and nothing but time to do what we wanted. So we did just that. He bought me things. I bought him things. We decided to get married. Bought a house. Did grown up stuff for all of about a year. I don't know where the things started going wrong - maybe the part where I wanted to actually grow up and he didn't, but in the end, it came to me wanting more. He found someone else and I found a lawyer.
A few months later (yes) I had a new job in a place where I knew no one - a great way to run and hide. I met husband number two. We started life on the wrong foot. I admit that. But as young adults (early-mid 20s) we did what we knew to do.  We had our daughter, got married, and began the "more" I was looking for.  Only it wasn't and still, I wanted more. I wanted a husband who provided. I wanted a home that I was proud of. I wanted a career that made a statement. I wanted all the lies the world told me I needed.  I can't and won't say we didn't have amazing years together. I can't and won't say we didn't make a beautiful family.  I can't and won't say we didn't have love between us. I can't and won't say I didn't grow together with them all, because I did.  But I wanted more. (You can read all about this starting in fall 2012.)
I have found that the place where the 'wanting more' and the 'working to get it' meet, is where you will seldom find the hands of God. Listen to me here.  I am not talking about being open to His Spirit and the path He is leading you down.  I am talking about selfish ambition and keeping your eyes on the world and what it says is best for you. And that is where I was in my wanting more.
In those years I was married to the girls' dad and the months following the end of our marriage I had  earned not one, but two degrees. Why?  Because I wanted more. I equated education with becoming. I also worked myself to the bone climbing a "corporate ladder" - one of my own design, so naturally it didn't go too high. I did make some progress, but I admit I started chopping down the rungs before I realized I needed a safe way back down.  The fall hurt. And yet, I still wanted more.
I carried on with my life. Caring for my children, owning a home, forging a career and doing everything I could to become.  Yet I wanted more. I met my husband during this time and in that span of months and years learnt a lot and lost a lot. But one thing remained.  I wanted more. I finally had the love of my life, but I didn't have my career. I hadn't quite reached the point where I had, for lack of better words, become. So, I went back to school and got another degree. I quit my job and with great expectation worked to become who I always wanted to be, all because I wanted more.
Do you see?  I have spent twenty plus years of my life working towards one thing - more. I have always wanted more. I hate to admit that.  It makes me sound, well, pretty much awful. However, in the last year or so, something has started to change in me. It was scary at first, then it was known, and now it is eager anticipation. Not because I don't want more, I do, but because I want less of all the things I have spent my life wanting more of.
I want less house. I want less stuff. I want less need for more education. I want less desire to climb a corporate ladder. I want less of the things that society tells me I need in order to become. Instead I want more time with my husband. I want more time with my children. I want more time teaching them about the love of their Heavenly Father. I want more opportunity to grow in community with my sisters and brothers in Christ. I want more of God and His Spirit in me. I want less of me and more of Him.
I had spent so much time wanting more that I lost sight of what any of it was truly about. There is only one thing in life where wanting and getting more meet to become the best thing ever. But it takes so much to get there. It takes the desire to want less of absolutely everything else. It takes putting that thing or person or place you hold more important down.  It takes realizing that more home, education, career, etc. doesn't make you more of a person. It takes, laying all of that down to be given the one thing that will fill you with more than you could have ever hoped for.
Don't misunderstand any of this. I am thankful for what I have. I am thankful for my husband, my family, my job, and the things we have, but it is no longer about the more in regards to society's view. I simply want more of what God has to offer and if I can give all of that to my family, then well, I will have truly lived with far more abundance than I could have ever thought possible.
Because with God, you always have more.
- M

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

A Slight Wardrobe Modification

Not Thinking About It

The Words