Having Gratitude for Hardship – A #1000Speak Post

I’ve been thinking for weeks about my post for this month’s 1000 Voices for Compassion link-up. Weeks.

My #1000Speak efforts are most often fall under the umbrella of self-compassion – something I know so many of us struggle with and need to remember to practice. For some reason, I just couldn’t marry the gratitude theme to the self-compassion theme. The one idea I liked, I rejected.

It occurred to me (finally) that I had already written my #1000Speak post – I just didn’t realize it. So this post has already appeared on my blog, but it is also what I want to say for this month’s link-up on Gratitude. It was written last week for Kristi’s Finish the Sentence Friday hop. The prompt asked us to consider the hardship we are most thankful for having experienced in our lives…

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Let me tell you something about hardship.

You are never prepared for it.

You can tell yourself that you are. You can tell yourself that you’ve thought through all the possibilities that could befall you and can handle whatever life hurls at you. But no matter how much you think you’re prepared, when that moment comes – and I can assure you that it will come – the world will grow dark and it will bring you to your knees.

You can believe your own half-humorous claims that your position in life is secure because they’ll never find another fool to do your job for what they pay you. But the truth is they will. Not only will they find someone to do your job, but they will find someone to do it for even less than they’re paying you.

Three and a half years ago, my Husband lost his job. We had no suspicion, no warning. There was only a seemingly sudden decision that his services would no longer be required. We were devastated. He had spent eleven years of his time, energy, and talent on that position – sometimes to the detriment of other aspects of our lives. He worked hard and cared about his work. But suddenly, circumstances beyond our control left us standing, mouths agape, utterly shocked.

You can tell yourself that you have a solid plan in place. You can feel secure about your plan B or even plan C. And you can make decisions based on these plans because you believe things will unfold accordingly. But as is often true, as Robert Burns once wrote, that even the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.

A year and a half ago, I stepped away from a fourteen year career in education. I loved my work and reaped great rewards from it – until I didn’t.  I had actually hoped to start making moves toward self-employment two years earlier, but those plans were immediately put on permanent hold when my Husband  lost his job. We needed a full time salary. We needed benefits. During the next two years, though, my situation became toxic. I needed to move on to something new for my Self, my health, and my family. It was time. We had a solid plan in place and it appeared our plan would fall quickly into place. But it didn’t.

And so it happens that one day after the smoke clears and the shock wears off and that safety net disappears, you’re left standing, wondering how in the world you got to this now and what in the world to do next. You realize that hardship is no longer something that hits close to home, no longer happens to other people, and you can no longer say, “Ah, there but for the grace of God go I…” Because now it is home, it does happen to you, and the grace of God has absolutely nothing to do with any of it.

Losing a job of any kind is devastating. So is staying in one that is eating you alive or leaving one that has become toxic. Having your plan for a new life disintegrate seemingly overnight is disheartening. It doesn’t matter whether you work for yourself or someone else. Loss of livelihood renders us impotent. It is as significant as the death of a loved one and is just as great a loss. It spurs a powerful period of grief, of mourning for the life and identity lost. It creates hardship.

Hardship is relative, I suppose.

To say these last few years have been a challenge is an understatement. Money is tight and resources are exhausted. But at no time have we been without food, clothing, or shelter. We have been blessed with the aid and support of family. Our lives have changed, but not in such tangibly devastating measure as you will find on any news channel any day of the week. But it has produced sadness and self-doubt. It has caused anger. I’ve done my share of shaking my fist and screaming at God, “WHAT do you want from me??” And my faith has been tested like never before.

But in the end I find myself strangely grateful for all of it. My Grandfather was right – hardship does build character.

The truth is that three and a half years ago, neither one of us was truly happy where we were. But I don’t know that either one of us would have taken action to make a change; what we did at the time was all we knew. The events of the last few years have forced us to examine our Selves more closely, to rediscover what we love, what excites us, and what limitless potential is out there. We have learned that we are not defined solely by any one job in life. We find creative, fun, and inexpensive ways to spend time together as a family. We communicate better and argue less. We think more practically and carefully about the ways we spend our money. We more fully appreciate the things that we do have. We have learned humility and how to accept help gracefully. We dream about the future with more confidence and detail than ever before.

This phase of our lives is far from over. It has often felt like a very long and dark path through an unfamiliar forest, but I try to remember that while the trees might block the light, in doing so they provide coolness and shade, relief from the heat. We are still learning, growing, fighting, and discovering. There is so much more ahead for us than we can fathom from where we stand right now – but we know there is great potential. There is a path laid before us and there is sunlight beyond the cover of the trees. We have often felt that we would never see light again, but we are still here, doing the only thing we can do: continue to move forward one step at a time.

And so we march on…

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