Things I can't change

Sometimes I fret.

I fret over all the things I can't fix, but would like to. You too?

Life is full of these unfixable things, and they increase in number as we age. At the moment, for example, both my adult kids are having difficult adjustments to independence. I could give advice, but I'd be interfering. My husband is also going through a prolonged and exhausting job search, which has resulted only in anger and frustration. I could advise him to step back from the process, to take a good, long look at the way he has invested so much of his self-esteem in this zero-sum game of finding a job at 58. But he's not ready to hear that. 

Oh, did I mention that I now seem to have osteoporosis? Yippee-ki-yay! Now I have to get that shot that rots your jawbone. Can't wait.  I hoped lots of dairy products and calcium pills would prevent this. But no. 

So, in the face of things you can't change, what do you do? Back in the day, I'd have drowned my troubles in various fermented beverages. These days, I turn to my Creator instead, offering one of Anne Lamott's favorite short prayers: "Help!"

Maybe help will come in the short term. Maybe it won't. Maybe help for the people I love will come in the form of wisdom after a great mistake. Maybe it will come, incrementally, in soldiering on day by day through the difficulty. 

Maybe help will take the form of self-forgiveness, if needed, and a new life-path. Maybe clarity will come in our brief, human scheme of reference, or maybe in God's. 

I need to admit that I can't fix these troubling family situations. I need to stand back, take my ego out of the way, and wait for God. 

No harder thing for a "fixer" than that!

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