What If It Was You

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I’m all about the slow life for the most part. I’m not a quick thinker, as bad as that may make me sound. I’m not quick witted and I think slowly and completely about most things.

Which also makes me a very emotional thinker and I reflect on things for days. And I feel, and feel and feel, way more than I wish I did sometimes.
Maybe it’s a blessing, maybe it’s a curse.

I guess that’s why sometimes everyday mundane activities can spark deep thoughts.
I can’t help but think of what ifs.

Maybe because I’ve been to some dark places in my life and it truly does make you appreciate the good in life more easily.
That is why I get so caught up in treating people fairly. And trying to always do the right thing.

I am not a saint by any means! But I get it. I know what it feels like, and if I haven’t been through it myself, I am able to put myself in a place to empathize with that person or situation.

Last night I looked at my 19-month-old daughter and a wave of sadness came over me thinking about a story I had just read about another mom that didn’t get 19 months with her baby, actually, she didn’t even get 19 seconds. The thought of so many women experiencing this type of loss makes me want to fall to my knees. Not only to thank God for what he has given me but to ask why them, why did they have to experience this?
And I think about what if that was me?

What if that was me standing by the interstate holding a sign? Not knowing where my next meal would come from or where I would sleep. With a few more wrong turns and bad decisions, I could have come close as a teenager.

What if that is me in 40 years sitting alone everyday without a spouse and family living too far away to visit? Being consumed with crippling loneliness.

What about the innocent children that don’t have a safe, loving environment at home? Who are treated like a burden and will never feel worthy.

What if I was that 12-year-old kid that gets relentlessly bullied at school everyday unable to escape it even at home.

What if I was the mom that had terminal cancer and knew I wouldn’t watch my babies grow up? Living with the fear of someone not being able to raise them how you’d always hoped.

What if it was our kids on lockdown in the school because of an active shooter? Those parents of the victims of school shootings never thought their child would not be coming home that day.

There a million and one more examples I could use here, but doing so would have me in tears even more so than I already am.

Just traveling to these places in my head provokes such a significant emotional response.

I’m trying not to come off as doom and gloom. It is just such a reality that there are people literally going through these exact nightmares every second of their day. And it is SAD!

How BLESSED our lives must look to the people enduring the excruciating pain this life has handed them! They would swap places with us in a heartbeat!

Thinking about the harsh realities going on in other people’s lives really has a way to put things in perspective.

As human beings we are not invincible. At any moment our reality can change. We can’t think that these things will never happen to us.

Maybe that is one teeny tiny perk to having anxiety, if you can call it that.

Those of us with an anxious spirit who are hypervigilant, empathetic, highly sensitive people, can legitimately understand what it must feel like. We don’t know, and will never know, in this lifetime why them and not us, or why us and not someone else.

Slow down and pay attention to those hurting around you. Offer your heart, hand, ear, or home where you can.  Appreciate everything good that you have, love everyone God has blessed your life with, and pray without ceasing for those in a critical season in their life.