I cried over some placemats the a few weeks ago. Sixteen placemats, to be exact. Sixteen placemats that are sitting on the shelf of my linen closet, their future not as sure as it once were.
Before you think I’m completely materialistic, let me explain.
I bought these sixteen red-and-black buffalo plaid placemats at an after Christmas sale on December 26 last year. I love Christmas. Like, L O V E it – the baking, the music, the trees lit up at night, all the family get togethers. Did I mention the music? And I’m a sucker for an after-Christmas sale, as if I need more Christmas décor.
So this past December, after a beautiful Christmas season with all the aforementioned qualities, I went and bought these sixteen place mats, already thinking about the Christmas to come the next year, planning my table for the large family gathering I knew would take place.
Except now things are different. I am recently divorced, living in a different house, no longer the owner of a large dining table and no longer in the possession of a large blended family that I had inherited in that marriage.
And so I cried for the placemats the other day. Not for the physical placemats themselves, but for the future I had bought them for that no longer exists.
LOSS HAPPENS
Everyone dreams of a future. Maybe it’s with a family. Maybe it’s a future at a job. Maybe it’s a vacation they’ll take, or a bad habit they plan to give up before another decade goes by.
We all have dreams. And we all experience loss. It’s a part of life.
The thing about the future is that it’s so uncertain. It doesn’t always go as planned. Hell, it rarely goes as planned. And one day we’re planning a future Christmas meal around a big table, to be eaten on pretty placemats, and another day we’re crying because it’ll never happen.
Except here’s the thing. It may not happen exactly as we think it will, but the future will still unfold. And if you ask me, it will unfold exactly as it is meant to. The thing I’ve learned is that sometimes the Universe removes from our lives the things that no longer serve us, the things that will limit us, or will keep us from being our true, badass selves.
In the days after that tearful night, I realized that being free of the future that is no longer mine opens me up to one that is so much bigger and better than I could have ever imagined. There is just no telling what is coming my way, now that I am open to anything.
And you know what? The same goes for you and whatever the placemats are in your story. Whatever isn’t working out for you, the way you thought it would – well, it’s just getting out of the way for something better.
Does it make feeling the loss any easier? A little. Not completely though. We still have to walk through the feelings. We still have to feel the loss. And then, and only then, can we move on.
Whatever you are going through, keep walking into the future that awaits. Something good is coming. And it’s going to be SO good. For you, for me, for all of us. I can feel it.
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