Big fat frustrations!

The vein in my forehead is real close to exploding.  Real close. 

I am a good sales person.  Sometimes I'm a great salesperson.  Actually more than most times.  Here lately I haven't been selling.  There is little less frustrating than a sales person who isn't selling.  Other people are selling.  A lot.  Know what I've been getting lately?  Cancels.  Others numbers are going up, mine are going down.  So frustrating.  It's almost laughable how I'm not selling.  If it weren't my livelihood and I need the money. And the sales.  And the satisfaction that comes from closing someone.  Tomorrow I shall put on my highest heels, my biggest sales cap, and sell 5 or 12 homes.  It'll happen.  Because nothing drives me more than being in the middle of the pack. I loathe being middle of the pack.  This girl is going to claw her way to the top of the sales ladder!

I don't even know what to say on here.  Which in itself is hugely frustrating because this is my outlet.  If I don't have this outlet I may possibly lose my mind.  I feel like Satan is attacking us at every turn.  We make the best decisions we can and we are smacked in the face.  We are good people.  We trust in God.  We pray.  We do the best we can.  In a lot of areas of our lives.  Some are a work in progress.  I know without a doubt that we are being tested.  Not often do you get a sign saying "YOU'RE BEING TESTED," however, the past month has been a glaring, flashing, neon scrolling sign that we are, in fact, being tested.

Know what I hate worse than not selling?  Failing.  And I feel like I am failing at every turn.  The IVF/Baby/Financing IVF and Baby has kind of been in the back of my mind lately because we are a few months out from anything.  I'm a planner.  I'm a control freak.  I'm losing control now I'm just a freak.  That is a true story.  Nothing is easy.  In most people's lives, I'm sure.  Feels like every choice and decision I have made is the wrong one.  That's not a good feeling.  That's a big frustration.

So many emotions, so much drama, so many ups and downs.  I'm failing at learning the lesson(S) that God is wanting so desperately for us to learn.  I know that because we're getting knocked on our butts.  God is up to something because Satan is working overtime.  I believe.  I trust.  I know that more than anything God wants us to have His best.  It's frustrating as a Christian to be in a place where you feel like you aren't doing what you should be doing but feel like you're doing all you can do.

Recently some people I know have gone through hard times.  One had a miscarriage and I sent my condolences and asked how she was doing.  I was told she was doing fantastic.  A week after she lost her baby.  I'm pretty sure the husband was speaking on her behalf because if he could crawl inside her for even a second, the void, loss, and emptiness that comes with that loss is a far cry from fantastic.  Another person lost their job so I sent a message that I was sorry.  The response was something to the effect that they were good because God is in control.

I guess these make me feel like failures too.  Because I face hard time, like everyone else, but if I listen to their responses to hard times then I fail.  When we found out we couldn't have a baby how we thought, we trusted that God has a plan, but we cried.  Because our hearts hurt.  When people make life so unbelievably difficult, I get upset, because it's hard on everyone. 

I heard Mary Chapman one time talking on Larry King Live after her child was killed.  It was in the middle of my darkest of days and I was feeling like I was losing at being a Christian as well as at life.  He asked her how she was doing and her response was that it was a good day because she got out of the closet.  He didn't understand so she explained.  After she lost her daughter, she felt lost, desperate, heartbroken.  Of course.  And there were days when all she could do was lay in the closet and cry.  Now this is a Godly woman.  She knows that God has a plan.  She knows that.  But her heart was broken and she needed time to grieve.  She allowed herself that.  She wasn't wearing rose colored glasses, she didn't punch the people that said this was part of God's plan.  She went in the closet and cried.  And when she was able, she got up and walked out.

I guess maybe that is part of the lesson I need to learn.  How I handle my disappointments and frustrations is between me and God.  I am a Christian.  I am trying my best to surrender control of this crazy life to God and follow in the path He has laid out for Jason and I.  Along the way I stumble.  I fall.  I cry.  But I move forward.  And that's what we're called to do.

I'm blessed because tomorrow I will wake up with my sales swagger knowing that whatever frustrations trip me up, whatever disappointments knock me down, God understands our hearts.  And when mine is crying out for understanding that only He can give, He is always, always faithful to give.