When Life is Harder than Expected.

Real talk: I’m a pretty confident person.. or so I thought. Like most of us it seems, high school was a fun, exciting, and breezy experience for the most part that left me feeling high on my horse! Coming into OU as a freshman, I had the perfect ideal of what my college experience would be like. I would ace all my classes, join the sorority of my choosing, have tons of sweet friends, meet a cute guy who loves the Lord and doesn’t talk to 15 other girls who look just like me, get immediately plugged into a church, join every leadership committee available, the list goes on and on.. and honestly, it’s embarrassing!

My list is embarrassing because it really highlights my not-so-humble nature to strive for things that aren’t meant for me, and also because not one of these came true…!

College is FUN, EXCITING, & a huge BLESSING, but honestly, it’s also extremely overwhelming, a boatload of pressure, and makes me feel pretty inadequate most of the time.. not to mention homesick.

I’ve always been a pretty idealistic and optimistic person, but when faced with the reality of my not-so-glamorous college experience so far, I struggled with some depression from being let down by my own unrealistic expectations.

Everyone around me seemed to have everything all figured out, and I felt as if I was flailing, unable to catch my bearings. I didn’t feel worthy of the opportunities I’ve been given. Fear of failure, being disliked, and letting people down completely trapped me in my own brain. I was crying every night to my mom, doubting if college was the right path for me, desperately wanting to come home. The thing is, no one here knew I was feeling this way. I kept all of these dark and negative thoughts in my own head, posing as the confident girl I was known as in high school.

This is when the perfect grace of Jesus comes into play, for He opened my heart to help me realize that this “picture-perfect” life I had envisioned for myself was not from Him. To me, faith means that I trust the Lord’s plan for my life more than I trust my own, and I had completely disregarded this belief in hope that I was the exception! I was so focused on the ways I was insufficient that I forgot that grace means that I am sufficient in Jesus.

Sweet friends, I’m beginning to understand that what’s meant for me will find me because I have a perfect inheritance as a daughter of the King. I don’t need to strive for more, different, or better. Neither do you.

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ.

Colossians 3:23-24

God has truly blessed me with health and ability, a small but growing community of family and friends that love me for me, and the opportunity to learn at a wonderful school filled with wonderful people. I don’t know what your blessings are, but I pray that you count them today instead of adding bullet points to your wishlist. Take your blessings and steward them well, working heartily and cheerfully in whatever endeavors, relationships, or experiences that God has placed intentionally in your hands. And I pray we can all lean into the Lord when life is inevitably harder than expected, expecting Him to fill our cup in only the way He can.

To tell the truth, I am still working through many of the struggles I’ve opened up about, and I know that it’s a longggg work-in-progress! But this progress is beautiful in its own way, not by my own actions but because anything that is formed by the good hands of the Lord is beautiful. Opening up about this kind of thing is difficult for me, but oh-so freeing.

Simply,

Sydney