Finally

The past few months have been pretty rough, I take that back the past year has been pretty rough. And with all the down days there were days of extreme joy. And which ones do I remember? The joyful ones of course. This made me realize that through sorrow and pain it's the joy within that that sticks out in our memories forever. I don't remember feeling sad, lonely or full of pain, I know I felt that way but I only remember feelings of joy, peace, comfort and love. The past two weeks have been the hardest and best weeks I've had in a long time. That hymn that says "joy and sorrow interwoven, love in all I see" has been running through my mind over and over again. These feelings of joy however far outway the feelings of sorrow and grief. Besides without these hard times how would we be thankful for the good times? Sometimes it's hard to be thankful for experiences that make you feel emotions you don't want to feel, but for myself I learn more from those than I do the easy experiences. I've also noticed if I dwell on what's going wrong then guess what?! I'm going to feel bad, but if I dwell on things that are good and make me happy then I will have joy. Lately every time I feel down I think of all that I have to be thankful for. All the friends who have been there for me whenever I've needed them for support or just companionship, this is what I think I am most thankful for. It's so wonderful to have those you can look up to as examples when you don't really know what to do. I'm thankful for parents that love me, a sister who loves me and granparents who also love me. I am also so thankful for workers that I can talk to about anything and will just listen to me when that's what I need. I've just been thinking about how I am as a person. What do people see? Am I a good example? Am I encouraging? Am I worthy to be looked up to? I want to be all of these things. In this part of my life where all seems to be changing all the time, it's nice to have peace and joy knowing that whatever happens it's ok. It's hard to allow that to be for me, because I seem to want to be in control of everything, and not being in control is sort of scary. But at the same time I know it's good that I'm not in control, because by now if I was things would be a disaster! I'm just filled with a feeling of overwhelming thankfulness, joy, peace and contentment.