30 Day Challenge: Day 8

Day 8: A moment you felt most satisfied with your life.

As I was thinking about this question throughout the day, I kept coming up short.  Satisfied?  It’s sad, but do I ever feel satisfied with my life?  I realized that I have a difficult time living in the here and now, which; in turn; makes it hard to appreciate life and feel satisfaction.  To feel satisfaction, you have to stop and smell the roses per say.  If I’m always either craning my neck to see what’s around the corner or straining to look what once was, I miss what’s right in front of me.  So then I asked myself…when was a time when you were living in the present? 

Then it hit me.

My summer before my junior year in high school.  I was fifteen, awaiting my sixteenth birthday in a time where my family and I had very little.  And yet, it was at this time that I knew we all felt like kings and queens of this earth.  We were moving to (at the time) Greeley.  We were having a house built there in fact.  But in order to break ground and begin construction, we were required to sell our old house first.  And so with many painful months of showings, we finally sold my childhood home.  With a bulk of our things moved into storage, we took the bear minimums to a cozy three bedroom apartment in Fort Collins.  With our beagle, and my cat, parakeet and two rats, we began our summer with simplicity. 

With what could’ve been a disaster of cluttered tight quarters, I felt a closeness with my family that I’d never felt before.  And to this day, it still makes my heart break because it was the calm before the storm.  A time before everything changed and we all began to grow up and go our separate ways with jobs and school.  But I didn’t know.  All I knew was that this…this was what life was all about.  And I felt complete and happy and I knew neither need nor want.        

As the summer progressed, my mother’s health began to weaken and we all began to worry.  However blissful that summer was…well, it wasn’t perfect.  We seemed to be surrounded by chain smokers and, well, let’s just say they enjoyed a variety of substances.  My mom’s lungs and heart began to flare up.  Tests needed to be ran on her heart and lungs to obtain the damage.  We had to break our lease.  We couldn’t wait for the completion of our home in Greeley.  We broke contract and began searching for a new home elsewhere.    

Just as everything was beginning to unravel, God swept me away on an experience I’ll never forget.  With a High School friend, I went to a church retreat with hundreds of other adolescence.  In all my life of thinking that I knew God…that retreat was the first time I ever truly FELT Him.  An overwhelming feeling of life and vigor, dreams, hopes and pure joy filled my heart.  I came home with a fire blazing in my heart.  I was different, never again to be the same.  The retreat ended on Father’s Day and my family came to pick me up. 

I was greeted with wonderful news on top of even better news.  First, it was Father’s day, and having just spent a miraculous time with my heavenly father, I was feeling especially grateful for my wonderful Godly earthly father.  My mother greeted me with a clear from the doctors.  There was nothing wrong with her heart or lungs!  Praise God!  My family and I (brothers included) began driving home as I happily babbled about my wonderful encounter with God.  As we stopped, I looked around puzzled.  This wasn’t the apartment.  I looked at my family who starred back at me with giddy expressions.  A key was held out to me and dangled loosely in front of my face.

“Welcome home,” my mother said with a radiant smile.  I don’t know who was more excited that day.  My heart was soaring.  Before me was a beautiful new house…our home!

It was at that moment (June 20, 2004) that all of life was perfect.  I felt completely satisfied with my life.  Neither the past nor the present was before me.  How could it be?  Everything that mattered to me was right in front of me.  My entire family was well and happy and together and we had a home.  And it was all because of God. 

If I could choose one day to go back to, it would be that day.  As a reminder of what satisfaction feels like.  Satisfaction isn’t just a feeling…it’s a choice.  And with this feeling and choice rekindled, I can now apply it to any stage in life.  Just look straight ahead and appreciate what is before you.  There is so much good in life and it’s too often missed.  Writing this was like breathing.  Memories such as these never leave your heart.  It’s a personal and dear memory of mine.  Hope anyone who reads it can appreciate it.