From Why To What

When I was first going through my divorce, my life felt like pure chaos.

I was terrified. I didn’t know how I was going to make it. I didn’t know how I was going to support my kids. I couldn’t see a path forward. There was no plan, no map, no clear way through, only fear and uncertainty pressing in from every direction. There were so many questions with no answers, and the weight of it all was overwhelming. Stressful doesn’t even begin to describe it.

One night, I was making dinner for my four children  ranging from two years old to six years old. They were sitting at the table, hungry, loud, restless- doing exactly what hungry little children do.

"Mom, I’m hungry.
When are we going to eat?
I’m hungry. I’m hungry."

Their voices filled the room, one after another, overlapping, impatient. They had no ability yet to see beyond their own hunger. No capacity to understand  something bigger might be happening,  their mother might be carrying more than what was visible to them in that moment.

I was cooking dinner, moving between the stove and the counter, and finally I walked over to the table and said, “Hey, listen. Don’t you see………I’m preparing a meal for you.”

The instant those words left my mouth, God, in His quiet and miraculous way, spoke those same words directly back to my soul.

"Rebecca, stop whining.  You can't see I am preparing something for you. 
You can’t see beyond yourself. You can’t hear beyond the voices of fear with in. You don’t have eyes to see or the ears to hear-

I’ve got a plan. I am already on motion for you, I am preparing a meal for you. Quiet Rebecca, I AM preparing the way.   "

The Divine stopped me in my tracks.

In that moment, I realized something about how I had been living most of my life. I had been living as a victim to the circumstances around me. I believed life was happening to me, not for me.

I was consumed with the question why.

Why is this happening?
Why is everything  falling apart?
Why is this so hard?
Why... why..... why..... why me?

But standing there, hearing my own words echoed back to me, I felt God gently shifting me from being a victim of my life to becoming responsible for it. Not in a harsh way-but in an empowering one.

I felt The Spirit saying, ask better questions.

Stop asking why. 
Start asking what. What can I learn from this? What are you being shown?  What are you not seeing yet? What can this teach you? How can you grow from this? How do you apply what I am learning  to your life? What needs to shift in you to move forward in a new way.  

That moment became a turning point. A click forward.

It was the beginning of a change in perspective, from feeling like life was happening against me, to understanding that even in the chaos, something was / is being prepared.  God is trying to move me and my life forward and this resistance is a gift, an opportunity for growth, change and transformation. 

Since then, I’ve carried that question into everything.

Every argument.
Every stressful season.
Every moment of uncertainty or disruption.

Instead of asking why this is happening, I ask what.

What am I meant to learn here?
What is this moment asking of me?
What needs to change so I can move forward differently?

That night, in a kitchen filled with hungry children and an overwhelmed, terrified mother who could not see a path forward, I learned something I still live by today.

The way is already being prepared. We just have to stop asking why long enough to ask what and  trust God does have a plan . 

And maybe the question for each of us is this:

Where in your life are you still asking why?

Why did this happen?
Why did they do that?
Why did my life turn out this way?

And what might change if you paused long enough to ask a different question?

What might this moment be trying to teach me?
What strength is being formed in me right now?
What might God be preparing that I cannot yet see?

Just like my children sitting at the table, hungry and impatient, unable to see the meal being made for them… we too sometimes cannot see what is being prepared for us.

But what if the chaos is not the end of the story?

What if something is being prepared for you right now, even in the middle of the uncertainty?

And what if the moment you begin asking what instead of why…
is the moment your perspective begins to change?

Rebecca Dawn