Here’s the situation: We make so many decisions a day without even thinking about it, because most of them seem insignificant.  But did you know that every choice you make and the habits you’re forming right now actually play a larger role in your future than you might realize?

If I had to identify with a TV character, it would unfortunately be one of the crazy ones, like Annie from Community or Leslie Knope from Parks & Rec.  They’re anal, organized and they love their binders!  Since I was engaged once, I’ve dabbled in a little wedding planning and I too had a binder!  It was ‘Martha Stewart’s Keepsake Wedding Planner’.  It had different tabs and dividers for dresses and flowers, and special pages to write out your guest list and plastic inserts to hold business cards, etc.  One of the pages was a checklist.  Martha gurl, you are speaking my language – I LOVE LISTS!  At the top, you wrote your wedding date and below was a list of everything you needed to have done 6 months before the wedding, 3 months before the wedding, 2 weeks, 1 week, the day before, the day of…you get the picture!

This backward design process is actually how I plan most things in my life now.  If I want to save a specific dollar amount by a certain date or if I’m leaving for a holiday in 2 weeks and need to get a bunch of stuff done before I go; I always look ahead to the goal and plan the steps to get there in reverse.  Doing things this way keeps you on track and saves you from forgetting anything or running around like a maniac at the last second!  I never used to be like this though.  Why would I plan for the future when it was so far away?

I YOLO’d Before YOLO Was Cool

The acronym ‘YOLO’ really only became a thing in 2011, but long before people were making poor decisions and passing them off as “you only live once”, I was making poor decisions and passing them off as “being in my 20s”.  I was raised in a Christian home and went to a Christian school, blah, blah, blah.  It was as boring as it sounds, so when I finally became an adult and could make my own decisions (whilst hiding those decisions from my parents because I still lived at home and they were scary!), I decided that partying was way more fun than church, so that’s what I did. 

When one of my best friends and I first met, we bonded quickly once we realized how much we had in common!  We had the same cultural background and were familiar with the same traditional foods.  We discovered our moms actually grew up in the same province, in towns 10 minutes apart.  We learned that we’d both been raised in Christian homes, but not just that, we were raised in Christian homes, but neither of us were living as Christians for the time being.  We were young, on the cusp of emerging from lengthy awkward stages and ready to paaaartaaaay!  We moved out of our parents houses and in together and from there we started to kick @$$, take names and break hearts!  Over the years we talked about how we knew we’d go back to church…eventually…but not quite yet, because we were having too much fun!

‘Eventually’ came when we all started to age out of the club and my friends were getting into serious relationships.  I figured that was a good time to get my life back on track so that I could meet that Christian man I’d always wanted, but knew I wouldn’t find at the bar.

That’ll Teach Ya!

Years after being back in the church but remaining single, I wondered if God hadn’t been withholding from me.  Perhaps if I hadn’t quit going to church…?  Perhaps if I didn’t party so much…?  Perhaps if I hadn’t done      (whatever)     , things would be different?  Instead, God must’ve been punishing me for my past; there was no other explanation for it! 

While other Christians know a loving and gracious God, I feel like I’ve always known “lesson God”.  Perhaps you’re familiar with Him too?  The God who lets you fall on your face to learn.  The God who will delay something you really want to teach you patience.  The one who will give you a physical ailment to show you that you shouldn’t judge others or to teach you humility.  I know these things can happen, but purposeful spite isn’t a characteristic of God, and as much as I’ve matured in my faith over the years, when things don’t work out the way I’d hoped, my default always goes back to wondering what God is punishing me for this time, or what lesson I’m supposed to learn now.  (I’m still a work in progress people, get off my back!)

I think it’s because of this, that I feel responsible for some of the delays in my life and now that I’m older, I really strive to make the best decisions for my future and not hold up the process any longer!  Let’s say that my 20s did, in fact, affect my 30s.  How is what I do today going to affect me a week from now, a year from now or even 35 years from now?!

Papa Don’t Preach

When I was a kid, my dad would go to the mall every Saturday morning as soon as it opened and head straight to the lottery kiosk to check his tickets and buy new ones.  This is the routine he kept as far back as I can remember.  He was also an avid “donor” to our local fundraising lotteries.  You know, the ones where a portion of the ticket goes to charity, but more importantly, you have the chance to win a brand new home or other prizes!  (Spoiler alert, we never won the lottery!)

Around 8 years before he died, he started showing signs of confusion.  I would go to my parents house for a visit and he would ask me a question and a few minutes later, ask the same question again.  I found it rather annoying because I just assumed he hadn’t been listening.  One summer he decided to do a cross Canada road trip to visit his family back home, a province he was very familiar with.  On this trip however, he got lost multiple times, followed another vehicle for about 6 hours in the wrong direction and I could swear someone told me he ended up on a private military base and got in trouble for it.  It was at a doctor’s appointment during these years that the words “early onset dementia” were first mentioned.

About 2.5 years before he died he was officially diagnosed with dementia.  Until that time my mom hadn’t shared any details with me about what had been happening at home; probably not to worry me.  I would eventually come to find out that my dad had been pulling garbage out of the garbage can in the middle of the night and flushing it down the toilet.  Or forgetting to take his diabetes meds throughout the week, then taking a week’s worth in a day.  His temper would flare and he’d slam doors or threaten to jump out of the moving vehicle if my mom wanted to drive.  He would pay bills twice or miss payments altogether and he would lose money; either actually physically losing cash or spending it and not remembering where.  Because of this loss of awareness, now when he went to buy lottery tickets, he would buy all the tickets or spend double the money he would’ve had he still had his wits about him.

I often think about this.  Even as the rest of his mind was failing, the habit of buying lottery tickets was so well ingrained, that it was that part of his routine that stayed in tact, and to the detriment of my parents finances.  It really makes me consider, or reconsider, any habits I may unknowingly be forming right now!  If I want to have the best future possible, what steps can I plan in reverse to achieve that?

Choose Wisely

We live in a YOLO culture, that has become addicted to instant gratification.  People act on every emotional whim and we encourage it with inane sayings like “follow your heart” and “live your truth”.  Depriving ourselves of anything or practicing self control is so contrary to the norm, that it can feel like the wrong choice!  Why would we deliberately subject ourselves to something that doesn’t make us immediately feel better?  Unfortunately, every decision we make today will affect our future in some way, we just don’t often think about that!  I know I never used to!

When I quit my job to go back to school, but continued to spend money like I was working, I didn’t think about the debt I was racking up!  How could I have known it would take me 8 years of tight budgets and hard work to pay off?  I never considered that while I was out “being in my 20s”, the Christian man I hoped to one day find, was probably already in church finding someone else.  Or that when I’d go back to church, my options would have greatly dwindled because I wasted all of that time!

The saying is true – you do only live once, so how do you want to live?  I want the next half of my life to be better than my first.  I don’t want to be 60 years old and winded after walking up a flight of stairs because I didn’t bother to get in shape when I was actually physically capable to do so.  I don’t want to carry a bunch of emotional baggage into my future because dealing with it made me too uncomfortable.  I don’t want to look like a piece of leather when I’m older because I enjoyed the sun too much when I was young!  (That’s shallow me talking.)  On top of all that, I’ve waited so long to find someone, that when I finally do, I want to give them the best years of my life, not make them deal with my dying decrepit years!

The past is in the past and we can’t do anything to change that.  The consequences of those actions might long be set in motion, but we can instantly redeem our future by considering our decisions today!  So think about where you are, where you want to be and how you plan to get there.  And for the love of all that is holy, make good choices!