Are there things in your life that you swore you would never do and later landed up doing? I know that I've had quite a few of these moments, and I think life has a funny way of showing us "You want to bet?" Down below, you'll see a list of my five things that I swore I'd never do... and did.
1.Be a nurse
I come from a long line of nurses and doctors. My Grandma was a nurse for 40 years and I remember staying home from school with her when I was sick. She would always ask me, "Sarah do you feel like vomiting?" I would tell her, "Grandma, first it's called puking
not vomiting, and second why do you care so much?" My brothers and I would cough once and Grandma would immediately ask, "Are you coming down with a cold?" No Grandma, I just swallowed something wrong. I still remember her giving my Dad penicillin shots in the back bedroom, and the stories she would tell were
absolutely revolting.
I swore that I would never become a nurse- gross!
{this was my first day as a real nurse!}
15 years later and I am a registered nurse that uses the word vomit on a regular basis and tells my fair share of gross stories at the dinner table. Alex starts sniffling and I ask him if he's catching a cold. I became my Grandma, even though I swore I never would be. {More on nursing
here}.
2. Get married before I was 28
One of the
first blog posts I ever wrote talked about how I had my life planned out from the time I was 18 until I was 28. My plans included going to nursing school, working as a nurse overseas, going to grad school to become a nurse practitioner, and getting married
no sooner than age 28.
Once again, God showed me that he had different plans for my life and I found myself tying the knot when I was barely 22. This six year difference was a
huge change that both my parents and I had to accept. My prior planning and set wedding age partially explains why Alex and I dated for 3 years and knew each other for 4 before getting married. I don't regret getting married at 22
at all, and when the day came I was absolutely ready for it. A series of miracles (that you can start reading
here), served to show me that my wedding day was chosen and ordained for me long before I was even born. I laugh at my 18 year old foolishness in thinking that I could plan my life down to the year, and I try to remember that when I get ahead of myself now and try to put a timeline on kids, graduate school, and houses.
3. Never play the piano {again}
Y'all I was a rebel. I had started taking piano lessons when I was 5, and somewhere in the next 6 years gotten good enough that my parents (especially my Dad) really enjoyed it when I played. However, when I turned 11 (my rebellious year), I swore off playing the piano ever again. Not because I didn't enjoy it- I did enjoy it. But my Dad enjoyed it too, and in one of my biggest acts of rebellion to date, I swore off playing the piano so that my Dad wouldn't be able to enjoy me playing.
Terrible right? I held true to that promise and for an entire year our piano stayed untouched. But then I got the wisdom of a 12 year old and started playing again and haven't stopped since. I was lucky enough to accompany my high school choir on certain pieces and even got paid in college to accompany a couple of plays. Now, I spend a lot more time blogging than I do playing the piano but I know it will always be there when I decide to come back to it {you can hear a clip of me playing
here}.
4. Live in a big city
I grew up in small town Colorado. The town I grew up in was about 15,000 people and I lived 45 minutes away from there on 35 acres with a driveway that has made more than one grown man cry. Growing up I loved the stars and stillness that came with living in the country, but hated how long it would take to get home and how hard it was to get together with friends. Despite my love-hate relationship with rural living, I could
never ever see myself living in a big city. When I moved to Colorado Springs in 2009 for college, I figured that this would be the biggest I would get. 440,000 people and traffic jams {not caused by tractors} took awhile to get used to. The thought of living in a bigger city never appealed to me and I swore I would never do it.
Fast forward five years later where I found myself moving to Denver, the capital of Colorado, and a city of 650,00 (not including surrounding suburbs). In a matter of years I had traded stars for skyscrapers in my night skyline and the smell of exhaust for the smell of sagebrush. I used to barely be able to get the Denver Nuggets basketball games to come in on my radio as I did my homework at home, and now I lived half an hour away from the stadium. While I will say that living in a big city has been an adjustment, moving to Denver has been a really good move and Alex and I have enjoyed ourselves a lot. While I don't see myself settling down in a place this big, it has been really fun for this stage in our lives and once again I learned to never say never.
5. Go camping or hiking by choice
As a born and raised Coloradoan, this may surprise you but I hated hiking and camping when I was younger. My family did it a lot so you think that I would have learned to love it. I usually found myself lonely on camping trips- my brothers would do their thing, my parents would be old and nap, and I would be left on my own to read or find something else to do.
I didn't get the point of hiking- I saw it as a lot of walking for nothing. Then one summer, my family went hiking, got caught in the pouring rain, and my mom and I got separated from my Dad and brothers. Several hours later, we reunited and made it back to the car soaking wet and hungry. That was the last straw for me. I vowed I would
never ever choose to put myself through the misery of camping or hiking.
{this was me at the top of my first 14er- a mountain over 14,000 feet}
Fast forward a decade and camping is one of my favorite things to do. There is something about the smell of pines and campfire smoke, the rawness of not showering and sleeping on the dirt that I love. Last summer was the first time I had gone camping without my Mom and I realized how much hard work it is (trying to remember to pack soap, paper towels, and cooking utensils is exhausting!) Maybe it's because I live in the city now or maybe it's because now I have a camping buddy (Alex), that it's grown on me. Maybe it's because I've traveled the world and come to realize that Colorado is just as pretty as almost any other place out there. Regardless, I'm now a camper and the hiking part of me is coming along. Never say never my friends.
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My whole life has been full of my plans that have changed and redirected in ways that I could have never expected. The Bible says that "the mind of man plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps" (Proverbs 16:9). Ain't that the truth? Be careful with what you wish for or don't wish for friends- you might get just the opposite :)
What things have you swore you would never do and did? Have you learned (like I have) that life doesn't go as planned?
