HJFinAZ: Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a stroke of good luck.
--H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
Managing desires is one of the most crucial elements of being an adult. Children want many things that aren't good for them, and their impulses can often get them into trouble. They need loving, caring adults to protect them from the harm that can come from getting what they want. As adults, our spiritual development includes learning how to regard our desires and how to manage them. On the one hand, it isn't healthy to become so controlled and repressed that we never let ourselves have fun, and on the other hand, we know that indulging every desire will kill us.
Sometimes we want something very badly and when we don't get it, we feel desperate or very disappointed. However, life continuously points us in directions we hadn't expected. Disappointment can serve to reset our lives. Not getting our desires, if we keep our eyes open, points us in directions that can be better than what we had imagined for ourselves.
Today I will be open to the new directions that life points me toward.
Oh, Pat, how timely this one is for my life today! It's one of the hardest lessons, and I'm living it now...life as the woman of a sandhauler is all about learning to get over your disappointments when the job changes at the oil field and when you were supposed to get time together, you didn't and you can't even talk then because he has no signal. But then there are the times that the job changes and when you were only supposed to have a couple of stolen hours together, you get the whole night while a part gets shipped in. Flex and roll, and don't let it drive you crazy. Life took me in this crazy direction, and I feel so very blessed that it did, though, because of the man that comes with this crazy life, and the best of friends who are there with us along the way.
We don't always get exactly what we want, but we do get exactly what we need...and find that we love it even more than what we thought we wanted.
