I have been thinking about making big changes, from moving to another city to going to grad school to complete another master’s degree. And while I finally came to the decision to follow my dream of being a counselor (paperwork is almost done), I mentally put on the back burner moving to another city. I kept coming up with excuses for not doing it: the costs involved, going to a new atmosphere with new people, packing up all my stuff (You never know how much stuff you have accumulated over the years until you start packing!), and I thought why not just stay where you are. True, you are not happy being where you are, but at least you are used to the surroundings.

Then I thought, Would God have you continue to experience being in a non-contented state? Then some thoughts seemed to appear to come out of the blue.

Being involved with your grandkids. I miss the twins, as I haven’t spoken to them in months, and haven’t visited them in over a year. I started thinking about wanting to be involved in their lives, and the way to do that is to first facetime them often and eventually move to where they are and do all I could to be their grandmother. I have been thinking about that a lot this week.

When you make the move, do it for you, not depending on anyone’s decisions about their life. I have been thinking that I don’t want to move to be with my loved ones, only to have them move. But what if that did happen? What would you do? Whether they stay in the city I move to or whether they move somewhere else after I settle there, I have to determine why I made the decision to move in the first place. And that would be to experience something new and refreshing: a city that is for the most part warm (actually hot and humid), but I would not have to worry about boots and winter coats to shield me from the snow, because there wouldn’t be any (for the most part). My decision to move would be for me, doing something new instead of being in a city I have lived in for years, and feeling like I am in a rut, stuck in my ways. No, if I am going to do it, it has to be for me.

And then, as God always does, He showed me something that brought me to tears. And the way He does it with me is through a tv show, looking at the life of another, and seeing myself.

On this show was a senior woman who just 18 months prior lost her husband. They lived in the house they purchased back in the ’70’s for $75,000, and down through the years they often talked about renovating the house. Some projects were done, but not everything. Then he got sick, and the renovations were not fully accomplished. But in the show, she now had the funds to do a full renovation that would take months to finish, from building an addition to gives her a large ensuite, a larger kitchen as she loved to cook, a two-car garage, and sprucing up the front yard and the brick on the outside of the house.

As the plans were described to her, the woman turned and started to cry, as she realized her decades-long dream was about to become a reality. She knew her husband would have loved it, but at the same time she wished he was there with her. Well, at that point, I started crying. Not about the renovation, but about her making a big change. Change so she would not have to climb the stairs and experience her knees hurting. Change to experience her home being transformed into a place she could enjoy, and all because she took the leap to embrace change.

The tears kept coming and I started praying.

God, these ideas I’ve been having. Are they from You? Please tell me because I need to know. I don’t want to do something, and it is not from You. So please, tell me something!“

At the end of the show as she was shown her house overwhelmed her. Her answer, when asked if her renovated house was what she thought it would be, was that it was much more than she thought. Tears again started flowing down my face (Really, God? Must this keep happening?) Maybe this experience answered the question I asked God. It is time to pack up and move to Houston, TX, regardless of what happens, regardless of who stays or who goes, I need to bust a move and do something new.

Will it be this year? No, it will not. I want to get out of debt, graduate from school, and pass the test to be a licensed counselor and then make the move. But then again, who knows, I may bust a move before I finish school, as I can continue my online classes anywhere.

I am trying not to be afraid of change, but to embrace it. The way to embrace is to go for it!

“Forget about what’s happened; don’t keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand-new. It’s bursting out! Don’t you see it? There it is! I’m making a road through the desert, rivers int he badlands…. Isaiah 43:19 MSG

“Do not remember the former things, Or ponder the things of the past. Listen carefully, I am about to do a new thing, Now it will spring forth; Will you not be aware of it? I will even put a road in the wilderness, Rivers in the desert. Isaiah 43: 18,19 AMP