The "But this isn't where I want to be," seasons.

I can’t tell you how many times I told God that: “But this isn’t where I want to be.”
 
~

By my sophomore year in high school, I was convinced that if I was at any other school, life would instantly be better, and my problems would magically disappear .
 
I didn’t want to be in that season of life; a season riddled with friend problems, insecurities and pain. 
 
Even as a graduating senior, I thought nothing good would come from this time. I told God that all I got from that period was lots of tears, deep wounds and trust issues, loneliness and bitterness.
 
But when I look back now, I see him at work. I see that my tears drew my family closer together.
 
I see now that he has turned my wounds and trust issues that developed in that time, into a deep appreciation for the friendships that do and will last.
 
I see that he used my loneliness to draw me into him. He used my bitterness to really show me that my heart needed a lot of work.
 
Fast forward to the middle of my freshman year of college, and I was saying the same thing.
 
“God, I don’t want to be here.”
 
I would look at that view of UF and feel sick.
 
I was again convinced of something false. I was convinced I had made the biggest mistake of my life coming to UF.
 
The transfer applications open in my browser on any day that spring screamed what I thought was the truth: I didn’t want to be here. This wasn’t the place for me. I needed to get out.
 
But I didn’t leave for some reason. I stuck around, despite my attempt to convince God that I needed to be somewhere else.
 
Looking at the present, I see why he put me through that and kept me a Gator.
 
My freshman pain is the reason why I appreciate and seek true community so much. My freshman pain gave me perspective and showed me how much I blew small issues out of proportion. My freshman pain showed me truly, that God’s plan is always greater.
 
Sometimes I just have to wait it out, even if “I don’t want to be there.”
 
Just two days ago, I caught myself saying that again.
 
At the beginning of this semester, I had a dream of a summer planned with one goal in mind: to not be Orlando this summer. Circumstance after circumstance happened, and my “dream of a summer” completely fell through.
 
And guess where I’m 95% sure I’ll be this summer?
 
You guessed it: home. In Orlando. The one place I said, “No definitely not,” to.
 
Right after my plan exploded right in my face, I stomped my foot, and hit God with that whiney statement: “But God, I don’t want to be in Orlando this summer.”
 
With no other choice, I sat back and waited. I prayed for something to come up, so I wasn’t just sitting at home all summer.

Without giving too much away because I have nothing secured yet, something did come up.
 
In a completely chance way.
 
A dream of an opportunity if it works out, in the one place I didn’t want to be this summer.
 
Sitting here today, I’m face-palming myself and smiling.
 
Because who am I to ever say that where God is placing me isn’t the place to be?
 
Learning slowly but surely to stop telling him that I don’t want to be right in the middle of his glorious, perfect plan.
 
Because in the end, it always works out better than I could have ever planned.
 
Know this: it is so cool, freeing and humbling to just be wherever God puts you in life.
 
“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”
 
Ecclesiastes 3:11
 
God’s timing is so sweet, friends. Lean in, and trust it. 

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