Are You Forcing the Timing of Your Life?

Show Notes:
The timing of our lives often doesn’t go as we planned. We make plans, create strategies and feel in control of how our lives are gonna go, but often it turns out differently. On the other hand, sometimes our lives turn out exactly as we planned them, but it took more struggle & push to get there and we realize that it wasn’t really worth it. We aren’t as happy as we thought we would be. Regardless, it all boils down to the desire to be in control of the timing of our lives.

We can’t TRULY be in control of when everything happens. It might FEEL like you can because it has happened in the past, but it’s because the Lord allowed it. 

We often don’t trust the timing of our lives when anxiety is in play. The desire for control can develop from traumatic events, negative experiences, or even just moments that impacted how others felt about us or how we feel about ourselves. 

Here are 5 reasons you should trust the timing of your life & no longer try to force things to happen:

1. You’ll Minimize Stress & Anxiety 
   1. Jesus tells us to not be anxious about anything and to seek the Lord in everything & remember 
   2. Matthew 6:34, “So don’t worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today’s trouble is enough for today.” (read the entire section of Matthew 6:25-34 for a full breakdown)
2. You’ll Enjoy Living in the Present Moment More 
   1. We mustn’t disregard what is happening right now for what we want to happen in the future. Right now, these are the moments that lead to those future things and we MUST enjoy them. We MUST live today for today and tomorrow for tomorrow. We HAVE to live life fully, which means taking each day as a gift as we work towards more in the future.
   2. Philippians 4:11-13, “Not that I was ever in need, for I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything. I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.”
3. God’s Timing & Plan For Our Lives is Perfect 
   1. God knows what is best for us. 
   2. Proverbs 3:5-6, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take.”
4. Patience & Perseverance Are Incredible Skills 
   1. Everything we go through shapes our character and helps us become the person we’re meant to be.
   2. Romans 5:3-4, “We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation.”
5. There is a Season for Everything 
   1. Ecclesiastes 3:1, “For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven.”
   2. Ecclesiastes 3:11-12, “Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. So I concluded there is nothing better than to be happy and enjoy ourselves as long as we can.”

Transcript

0:03

This is the Real Positive Girl podcast and I am your host, Sabrina. And I'm here chatting with you about your emotions, your mental health, how to take those first few steps towards being more vulnerable, being more honest, and becoming more self-aware. Because all of those things will help you become your best self every single day. And we do that two times a week here. So if you are new, welcome in. I hope that you will really enjoy today's episode and really find the tips helpful in the way that I chit-chat and uh, my direct approach. So if you are new, thank you so much for listening and I really hope this is beneficial to you. If you are not new, welcome back<laugh>, welcome back to the party. And that is all. I'm so happy that you guys are here. Um, so today we are talking about something I think will be really helpful to everyone. And do I say that about every episode? Yes. Um, this one I think is even more interesting than normally that I have done in a while. Uh, so today we're talking about are you forcing the timing of your life? But before we jump into that, as always, I want to invite you to come say hi to me on social media. I'm at Sabrina Joy Pozo on both TikTok and Instagram. So come by, say hi, follow along, send me a dm, let's become friends online. I would really, really love that. Also, you can take a peek down into the show notes below where you can sign up for the newsletter. That might come back someday soon. I don't know when. Probably in the next like month. I really gotta figure out what's gonna be best for you guys. I don't wanna just have you sign up for something and then you don't like it. You know, I was just looking at the stats and everything of people that actually open it and I'm like, I don't know. So you can check that out. But there's other things down there. You can check out the YouTube channel for the podcast where new episodes are being uploaded here and there. I have this like the biggest urge to just like jump to the last like eight episodes and like upload those cuz they're the better quality. But I'm also trying to tell myself, no, just continue to upload them slowly in order and we'll catch up Sunday someday. If you have a preference on that, like if you look into the podcast regularly and you YouTube channel where you can watch the video version, you have a preference on that, send me an email, the email's down there in the show notes as well if you have a preference. And maybe if enough people are like, yeah, just skip ahead to the really good versioned ones, Um, because if you're not gonna wash the other ones anyway, you know, it's like, you know, I'm, I'm here for you. Um, you also down there you can check out like I have a planner or planner journal on Amazon, submit a topic, suggestion, vent anonymously, all the things. So check all of those things out when you have a moment. But let's go ahead again and jump into today's topic, which is, are you forcing the timing of your life? So one of my biggest worries in life has been not achieving my true purpose before I get too old. Like, to be honest, like that's just straight up before I get too old. I wanna have like, you know, really dug in and lived my full purpose. Do I exactly know what my purpose fully is? No, not completely. God is currently like laying that out for me and I thought it was something else and it's not. And so it's currently being fashioned and laying out blueprints are going to be delivered at some point. I don't know. But this has been like one of my biggest, one of my biggest worries in life. And I can't really define to you like what too old is to me. I can't really, but usually it comes down to I laugh because in hindsight it's hilarious but also embarrassing usually comes down to like comparing my age to someone else that I'm jealous of or envious of their life that I would love to have. Just being honest and how they got there at such a young age. So it's like if someone's out there and they're 24, 26 and they already started multiple businesses and they have a family with two kids and I have beautiful home and just living their best life, I'm like, ugh, when am I going to reach my peak of whatever it is? And I really have to reel myself back in and be like, okay, my peak is gonna be different than their peak. Also, when I achieve things, it's gonna be a different timeline season of life and it doesn't need to be the same because I'm also experiencing other things that they're not experiencing. All of those things that you really like, talk yourself down from like freaking out <laugh>, uh, that you're not accomplishing everything at a certain timeline that you press upon yourself. But that's, that's like one of the biggest things though that's been a problem for me for so long. I feel like it's like died down a lot lately, but I still recognize that it's there and it can kind of like catch, just like catch me up and like, you know, hold me captive for a little bit before I realized, oh we don't need this, we don't need to be so super caught up in this. But you know, I never really thought about it too deeply, this problem I have of like really just worried about not hitting my purpose by a certain like not old age, um, until the sexual moment, until the moment of like me writing the notes and really like thinking this through. I talk to you guys about it, but I think it's because I have a fear that the older I get the more difficult, the harder it will be to achieve success. I and, and like do what I wanna do. And I just keep thinking that the older that I get, I, I won't be able to do whatever it is, which is kind of crazy because God like provides a way for us to do what we need to do to prosper and to serve him and the kingdom of God. And so it's like why am I so caught up? But then it's because we're not perfect and we can't always be in that mindset of like, calm down, chill out, chillax. Uh, but yeah that is like, that is like this big thing of I just am afraid that the older I get the less I will be able to do. But this is silly because people achieve amazing things at all ages. There's plenty of people that I follow on socials. That are like in the, they're older, I was gonna say older age bracket, whatever that would be to you that are significantly older than me I would say. And just now like really achieving these really big things and you know, having their moment in the spotlight for whatever they're promoting and building and sharing with the world. And so it's like in hindsight it's really, really silly because like so many other people are, are just now kind of like quote unquote just starting. There's plenty of people that go back to college at my age. I am a prime 37 year old and so a lot of people would even like restart their life like right now, right? But I know there's other people out there that are like me and they're like, oh my gosh, that feels so old. So old. It's just really a matter of mindset for me. I know that I just need to like reel it in. Um, but I also have this sense of like wasting time, you know, when I could be like doing my purpose. I'm like why am I dealing with all this crap? Why am I dealing with all this stuff when I could just be like working in my purpose? That is like a thought that comes through my mind often and I'm like, ugh. You know, you gotta like again reel it back in because it's silly because everything that we go through and every experience that we are forced to go through or we walk through because we've made other decisions or whatever the case may be, actually can be used as like a great learning opportunity. And you know how I say if you're not new here, you know that I always say mistakes and failures are our life's best learning lessons. And I had to take, I I like broke that up in a second cause I was like, I was like don't I, I always say mistakes first, right? And so I do. Uh, so anyway just like rethinking but yeah mistakes and failures are life best learning lessons. I believe in that so wholeheartedly that I made stickers for it so that it's, it's just like I have to reel myself back and be like listen, there are great opportunities for us if we allow ourselves just to continue to persevere and have resilience and continue to go through life because we're gonna get to where we need to go when we get there. And I have to remind myself of that often. But you know, it's all because and I ensure that some of you out there will agree with me that the timing of our lives often doesn't go as we planned, right? We spend all this time planning it out and you know, creating the pretty like charts and calendars and planners and everything and you know, telling everyone our five year plan and get those journals where it's like five years, two years, whatever, where you just write down everything that you're gonna do. And especially since they set you up to do that kind of stuff when you're in school it's like when you're in high school they're like okay, we need you to plan out the next 20 years of your adult life. And you're like, but I haven't even lived yet. I don't even know what's going on. But we make all of these plans and then you know, some of 'em don't work out, maybe 50% of them don't work out maybe a lot more, maybe a little bit less, but not everything that we plan to do like really goes forward fully in motion how we would want, you know, we make plans, we create strategies and we feel in control of how our lives are gonna go. But often it turns out like so, so much different than we expected. Which I will say from the top isn't always a bad thing. Uh, because I mentioned a lot where God will lead us to something different than we expected or that we thought that we wanted and actually is better cuz he knows what's best for us. But at the time of getting something different than what we asked for <laugh>, we are like riding the struggle bus in our mindset of like this is not what I wanted and I wanted what I wanted and we're acting like a little spoiled brats children when we finally realized oh my gosh this is so much better or are we being protected from what could happen or this, that and the other. And it's just like, uh, a hindsight 2020 thing as so many things are, especially when we're stubborn like me, I am a stubborn person but so it often like turns out differently. But on the other hand, on the other hand of timing and things working out in your life, sometimes our lies will turn out exactly as we planned them. You know, you just have like all of these steps. I know people that have like such particular steps in their life and they're just like check all the boxes. But when you think about it, it took more struggle and push to get there and we realize that it wasn't really worth it. You know, sometimes, not all the time but there is like times where you're just like, oh my gosh, I really wish I didn't have to go through so much struggles, so much work to get to where I wanted to be. Why is this happening <laugh>, why are we riding the struggle bus, right? And and then sometimes we realized that it wasn't worth it. It's not what we wanted, right? We aren't as happy as we thought we were gonna be. When we are going after all these things, we're really forcing breaking windows and doors open to get to those places and you know, regardless of the results that you've rendered in like whatever you're doing and trying to like force things to happen, it all still boils down to the desire to be in control of the timing of our lives. A lot of us want to be in control of our lives and dictate everything. A lot of us think that we are and we're kind of delusional over the fact that we can do whatever we want and you know, kind of like we're playing a game of chess or like GI Joe's or like I don't know, where we're just like putting all the characters up to where we want and making the ways to where we wanna go and we think that life can be like that and sometimes we purposely will forget the times where we had to push through and struggle and make things happen where it's like why would we wanna endure so much struggle of forcing things to happen? But, and like just now thinking about it, I didn't even think about this, it wasn't even in my notes, but that making things happen is such a hustle culture kind of thing that's alive in the world and people are encouraging you to make things happen. You gotta make things happen as opposed to trying to find the best way and asking God to lead you to the appropriate way to allow something to happen and get, because I feel like there's like this line where people believe that as a Christian you can just pray for things and they will happen. But actually I'm like right on the other side of that. It's like you have to pray and then actually attach action to those things. But then there's also this barrier of like, but you can't try to do everything in your own strength and think that you need to put like 10 times worth the action into it. So you can like force things to happen. There's like this middle ground where you like pray and you take action but not too much action and then you also have to rely on God, but you're not over here only just praying and hoping it just drops in your lap and you're not over here trying to force things to happen. Do you know what I mean? This would actually be better seen if you were able to see the video. Just an FYI on that. And so anyway, just to kind of bring it back, we have this desire to be in control of the timing of our lives and when we get married, when we graduate from school and you might think Sabrina, that's a terrible, that's a terrible example. Like you're gonna graduate in school in however many years but that's not true. A lot of times you can get tripped up and you have to leave school early or or whatever. That happened to me and I know other people that happened too and then now they're just now getting back into school and like finishing their degree. So it's, it spans like decades sometimes, you know? So you can't just say that it's just gonna happen when it happens. And so we just wanna be in control of everything because we feel more confident of knowing what's gonna happen next and we have less fear and anxiety that we know what's gonna come up and we can try our best to not allow bad things to happen. And it's really just like this pretend world that we live in in our mind because we truly aren't really controlling everything. We just tell ourselves we are to dampen the anxiety a little bit. But yeah, we wanna be in control of everything but we can't, we, we truly just can't can't when everything happens, we can't be in control when things happen, when things don't happen and how we're affected. And it might feel like you can because it has happened in the past, maybe you're thinking no Sabrina, don't worry, I have actually done it. Let me tell you all the things that I've actually had control over but it's because the Lord allowed it. I'm just gonna put that right there. And I like thought about whether I should say this or not and I was like ugh, I don't wanna scare anyone away. But it is like it truly is things that you feel like you've been in control of in the past are because the Lord has allowed it. He has allowed you to just like be blessed and have these opportunities and have. These things that you've wanted and you feel like you've done it all in your own strength but you really haven't. And a lot of times you think that you've accomplished great things when again when we were talking about before where you were pushing through so hard, you were riding the struggle bus but you're breaking windows and breaking open doors because you thought that's what you had to do to get the thing that you think that you needed and wanted. Notice how I said you the thing you think you needed and the thing you think you wanted but you know, just like the Lord allows us to make mistakes and go endure dark times and learn to lean on him, he will bless us and allow us to have amazing things and you know, it's really just us needing to realize that it's not in our own strength, it's just God like truly blessing us. So maybe you feel as though you orchestrated everything happening up until this point, but do you think it could have been easier if you relied on God to help you and align you with his will, like if you were being aligned with his will? I think so. I think it would be so much easier. But you know, I recognize that not everyone listening to this podcast is a Christ follower really like have come upon that season of life where they look into that or or what have you. But I do want you to kind of consider it like God is so amazing and is so beneficial to our lives that it's really important for us to seek him and gravitate towards him and know that he can do so much for us. But it's just important for us to ask us ourselves those questions like don't we think it would've been easier if we didn't have to like push, push, push so much and how much did you have to push to make everything happen? I want you to ask yourself that question too. Was there any point in which you wondered why you needed to force this to happen so hard? Why do you feel like you had to continually like push the door to make something happen and force that like misshaped piece into the puzzle spot and think that everything is like perfect and dreamy now? Like really ask yourself do you really feel like it was worth it to like force it in? And you know, often we like don't trust the timing of our lives when anxiety is in play. That's like one of the biggest reasons why we get so caught up in needing that control is because we are being led by anxiety and a lot of anxiety produces the need to be in control of everything and even things that we really can't be in control of but we think that we can, you know, we kind of like lie to ourselves and the desire for control actually can develop from like traumatic events or negative experiences or even just moments that impact like how other people see us or how we see ourselves and just feeling really uncomfortable and not wanting to be seen like that again in the future. Maybe it's like embarrassing you know, or just feels like you have lost respect or whatever the case may be. But whatever it is, we try our hardest to prevent ourselves from like experiencing any of those things again. And so we're just like yeah bring on the control freak tendencies. Let me try to be in control of everything and have my whole world feel like it's just burning down when all the cards start to fall, the things that I'm trying to control or force or make happen. So it's just tough. It's just tough. And I wanted to talk about this topic. Uh, for one I, I asked God in prayer, I was like God please lead me to like what I should talk about cause I'm not quite sure where I'm landing on a couple topics. And then this was brought to me and I was like this is perfect because I definitely have a lot of experience with this and I know a lot of people are going through this right now where they feel like they need to do everything in their own strength and need to force things to happen. And so if you don't know quite, if you're like in the boat of forcing things to happen, here are a couple ways for you to know if you are forcing the timing in your life first you try to make other people change. Often when people wanna be in control of everything around them and things that they can't really control, they want to control people so that they will, they think they know what's best so they want them to change and mold to what they believe will be best. Also, when you try to change other people it you think that it'll prevent you from having to make any change cuz you're making everyone adapt to you. You know what I mean? And so it all works in perfect harmony with your little control freak behavior, lifestyle. Uh, another one is you spend a lot of time trying to prevent bad things from happening again, I kind of mentioned that before where you're like, okay, well if I'm in control of everything then I know if something bad's about to happen and I could try to prevent it or stop it or you know, swerve a different way in my life and try to get away from it. But unfortunately you're not gonna be able to prevent every single problem that's happening in your life. You're just not. And you're probably like, yeah well at least I'm preventing less happening. And then yes, but you're also pro you're trying to prevent other opportunities from not being able to learn from or go through that might produce some other amazing fruitful opportunity for you. You know what I mean? You have to keep those kind of things in mind when you're trying to avoid things that you don't think would work out. But really you might struggle a little bit but it might be like the best blessing that you could get in that season right then. And then the last one I wanna share with you is you lack compassion for people that fail and make mistakes. And it's because you're really just projecting your insecurities onto them. You're like, oh my gosh, I would never wanna make a mistake, I would never wanna fail and I can't believe they are and I, I cannot feel empathy at all or sympathy for you because you should have done the work like I did try to control everything so you didn't have to go and experience failures and mistakes. So those are really good classic examples of you trying to force the timing in your life trying to really like clutch that sense of control like a tight, tight fist my friend. And you know, that is part of what I wanna talk to you about today is to share with you the top reasons why you shouldn't force the timing of your life and how it benefits you to just kind of like release that control and let it go. But first as always, I need to give you my quick disclaimer. So the tips and advice I am about to give you are all based on my own knowledge and research and the knowledge, uh, sorry the all my own knowledge and research and the research of others that I am able research and experiences my own ex. Oh my gosh, you know what you guys, I'm not even gonna cut it out because I'm not even gonna cut that out because I am vulnerable and honest that I just flub things up despite the fact that I literally have written notes in front of me that will help me just to, just to know exactly what I'm saying. Okay? So the tips and advice that I'm about to give you all based on my own knowledge and research and my experiences and the experiences of others that I'm able to share with you, if you find that what I'm about to share with you and what I've shared so far does not align with what you think would be most beneficial in determining are if you are forcing the timing of your life that I encourage you to seek a counselor or a therapist and have that one-on-one time to really figure out um, what would be best for you to decide like what would be the timing or what what, what what you are doing to force the timing in your life. If you feel like that is not going to work for you and you don't wanna seek a counselor or a therapist, then I encourage you to go to our best friend Google and type in like forcing the timing, trying to control my life being a control freak. And that will help you to maybe find blog articles, podcasts, social media posts, blogs, like other things that will really help you figure out what would be best to figure out why you're forcing the timing in your life. So we are going to talk about five reasons that you should trust the timing of your life and no longer force these things to happen because it's really super important to know what to do. And I wanna share these with you. Oh and just so you know we got some heavy bible verses coming up. I'm sorry if I sounded a little distracted during my disclaimer, it's because my kiddo text me and I needed to text her right back because she is not home and I needed to help her quickly. But five reasons that you should trust the timing of your life and no longer try to force things to happen here is number one, you'll minimize stress and anxiety. Of course I came out the gate with a big one, an easy one, a very simple one. You'll minimize stress and anxiety if you are able to just let go and allow the timing of your life to work out as it will. So instead of being like a mess of anxiety and you might be offended by me saying that you are a mess, but I know that I'm a mess when I'm super overly anxious and wanting to control everything. So I think that extends to most people, okay? And we should opt for more like peace and comfort in knowing that we will make it through whatever is coming at us because we made it yesterday, last week, two years ago, whatever it was. So what is telling you that you won't make it through this because you think that this is more difficult, more tough, you don't have the same support system, you don't have the same like financial like support or whatever or or you don't live in the same place near your family or you're having more struggles or health problems or whatever, okay? But you're still gonna get through it. I'm telling you, I am promising you you'll be able to get through it. You just gotta like believe that you can have the faith do the work and lean on God. That will definitely help. And also Jesus tells us not to be anxious about anything and to seek the Lord in everything. In everything. And remember that his promises that to keep us safe and to prosper in the kingdom of heaven and under his name are true always and forever. Okay? So we just need to not just be anxious and I know it's easy, it's easy for me, it's easy for you to read it even in the Bible like don't be anxious. But if we're able to tell ourselves, okay, Jesus doesn't want me to be anxious, he wants me to like be comforted in his peace, how can I do that? Okay, I'm gonna go pray, I'm gonna cry out to God, I'm gonna read my Bible, I'm gonna listen to some worship music. I'm gonna ask God to give you the biggest hug and then maybe I will start to come down from the anxiety and the need for control. And maybe you need to do that every day for a while until you're able to just easily like drape yourself in the peace from God. In the book of Matthew chapter six verse 34 it says, so don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today. And I also would encourage you, I didn't write the whole verse out here cause I knew it would be a lot to read, but I encourage you to read the whole section of Matthew chapter six versus 25 through 34. And it really just like gives you a fuller breakdown of like, don't be worried about this because of this and don't be worried about this because God has got this covered and everything and if he has got that covered, of course he's got you covered, right? He's talking about the birds and the flowers and everything. And so I would encourage you to go look online for free even if you don't have a Bible and go to bible.com and look it up. And I would encourage you to look up, like if you're new to the Bible, look up like the NIV V version, the NLT version, uh, God's word version. That's really good version too. Uh, the message version is okay, but it's not gonna be as fluid. It's gonna be more fluid but like less broken down by verse which is helpful when you're actually studying scripture. Anyway, side note. So go and read that because it'll definitely just reinforce the fact that we don't need to be anxious, we don't need to worry, we just need to lean into the comfort of God and just focus on what's happening today, deal with that and then deal with tomorrow when it comes. So you'll minimize stress and anxiety if you are able to just no longer feel the need to control and force the timing of your life. Number two, you'll enjoy living in the present moment more. So we, I wrote, okay, so okay, I wrote this very like passionate, you know, couple sentences for you. It's interesting because I feel like it was heavily influenced by <laugh>. I think reading like the new King James version of the Bible a little bit here and there I have and cuz the way that I wrote it and I just wrote it from my heart directly and I just, the way that I wrote it just sounds so very like proper, like not like I would normally write. Anyway, let's read it to you cuz I just found that in regards to enjoying living in the present moment. This is like, this is straight from my heart as everything is, but this is like I needed to write it for you. We mustn't disregard what is happening right now for what we want to happen in the future right now. These are the moments that lead to those future things and we must enjoy them. We must live today for today and tomorrow. For tomorrow. We have to live life fully, which means taking each day as a gift as we work towards more in the future. And so I wrote that because I think I'm probably gonna end up sharing it on socials at some point cause I think it's a really encouraging thought, but it is true. It's like you gotta really just focus on living for today and stop like going into the emotional baggage of your past and focus on like wanting to enjoy the beautiful day or even the rainy day that God has given you today where you get to sit inside and drink cocoa and you know, pet your dog and watch a movie or do whatever you're gonna do. And yes, I still drink hot chocolate in the summertime. Okay? Do not come for me born and raised in Alaska. Sometimes it's cold in the summer, okay? Um, actually it's not cold, it just feels just right, just right for me. But it's important for us to recognize that we do need to just enjoy what's happening today. You know, we, we allow so much of our life to pass us by by trying to be in control of what's going to happen in the future and how we're gonna like line everything up and force the things that we want to happen. When if we just like took a step back and we're more calm and have more peace and comfort and just allow things to flow as they're going to go, we would enjoy life more and it wouldn't be this like fury and like anguish and like race to get to these things that we think that we want and what we wanna do. And then, and then we're like, okay, well now what? Like, you know, you gotta enjoy the journey as cheesy as as it is in the book of Philippians chapter four, verses 11 through 13. It says, not that I was ever in need for, I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty with plenty or little now count on Paul to let us know that like he's like Listen, I have got it on Locke. Okay guys, like listen here, model this because I am like, you know, doing what Christ and God is telling me to do. And so he is just really like really exasperating I said that word wrong, exacerbating the, the picture of how he is just fully in the present living for now and relying fully on God for everything and not really worrying about his need for anything. He's just like, I have learned how to live with everything and how to live with nothing because as long as I got God I'm good and it's gonna be fine and he's gonna take care of us. So it's just a reminder that God's always there. He will take care of us. And that enjoying the day that you have today and the blessing of a day that you have today cuz we're not promised tomorrow that's what we should do. And that will help you not focus so hard on needing to force everything to happen. Don't force the timing. Number three, God's timing and plan for our lives is perfect. God's timing and plan and God's timing and plan for our lives is perfect. So God knows what is best for us. It's just a fact. And he also knows how to plan things well. Like really well. Like think about how everything like went down in the Bible and how things just like worked out the way they did. It's incredible. Um, so you know, he's great at planning things. What with like sending Jesus to be with us on the earth and then later die for a sin that we could be saved and forever be in a relationship with him. And it's just, it's incredible. So he knows what he's doing and if you don't wanna use that as an example, go through. There's so many stories in the Bible where he's just like aligning things up and there seems like there's trouble and then he just figures it out and it just like, but he's already figured it out. It's not like he's like, okay in the moment what are we gonna do? It's like he already knows and it's just incredible. Like we, like as humans, we can't even like completely understand the amazingness that is God, but as much as we can, it's incredible that he's just like, okay, I know how it's all going to go and it's gonna look so beautiful And sometimes it feels like it's a train wreck but it's working out cuz it all comes together in the end. Everything comes together for good in the end. Think about that. Also consider a time when something came together for you that you were surprised that it actually did come together. Or actually Warley wasn't supposed to happen, wasn't supposed to come together, wasn't supposed to be anything good like that. I want you to know that that was God, that was God. I can tell you without a hundred percent accuracy, maybe 99%, but I'm pretty sure a hundred, that was God. He knows what we need and what our lives should look like. And the more that we actually like, you know, press into him and we actually commit our lives to him, it's gonna be even better. And yes, there still will be struggle and pain, maybe even a little bit more, but it's because his love and commitment and faithfulness shines through those problems, those struggles, those things that we are able to persevere through with his strength. It's absolutely incredible. Um, Proverbs chapter three verses 5 36 says, trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will with all you do. And he will show you which path to take. He will show you where to go. Don't lean on your understanding. Don't really focus in on like things that you know because you don't know it all. We must rely on God and what he tells us that we should do and how we should go about life. And sometimes we get scared cuz we're like, oh my gosh God, why would you tell me to do that? Seems like really bad plan. No, he's already figured it out. He already knows like all the steps ahead. You just have to trust him wholeheartedly. You have to trust him. I have to trust him. I, I'm not, I'm not saying I'm perfect at this either. Definitely not, definitely not. And you know, this first tells us to like not lean on what we know because we don't know anything compared to God. God knows at all. We only know like ooh little bit. We only know a little bit and then we think we know things because we go around assuming things which is like the one of the worst habits in the entire world. But we don't have to worry about what we know and what we don't know when we lean on God and we allow him to lead us and guide us and tell us what we need to do and to move in faith and take action in faith of what he is telling us and just continue to do the work that he is telling us to do. And have trust and faith that he's going to lead us and wind us in the direction that we need to go. It's just amazing. It's incredibly amazing. And I understand as a former control freak, sometimes still struggling with that thing, it's hard to give up the reins. But once you do the burdens that are lifted, the chains that fall, I'm telling you it's absolutely incredible. I'm telling you. And if you really wanna work on your control issues, like if that's truly what your goal is in life, let everything go and lean on God for everything. Give yourself to Jesus if you haven't already and demonstrate your faith to him by relying on him and not your own strength. And he He will. I promise he will. Cuz he's promised it. He will. God's timing and plan for our lives is perfect Joe. Number four, patience and perseverance are incredible skills. Patience and perseverance are incredible skills. No one wants to learn them cuz you learn them by going through things you don't want to go through. Allowing these lessons to come in is a whole lot easier than finding against it. Again, you don't really wanna try to get in the way of preventing struggles and problems from happening because you're not really gonna damper like all of them down. Like you'll still go through them and it might be worse the ones that are left over than the ones you're trying to like stifle off. And again, like I said before, you don't even know the opportunities that you're missing out on when you try to avoid all negative things. There could be so many opportunities and positive blessings, positive things and and blessings that happen if you just allow, just, just allow yourself to go through those lessons. It's, it's, it can suck in the moment. I'll agree with that. But it's worth it. And you'll have more patience and perseverance and as you shift your mindset into understanding that these things are not the end of the world and God is always there to, to you know, comfort you and help you and provide you with strength, it'll be easier for you to like let go and be like, oh, okay, I will learn so much from this. This kind of really sucks that I have to go through this. But hey, I am so glad that God has got me right here. So you gotta, you gotta like stop fighting against it. We can't stop all the bad things from happening. We just can't. It's impossible. And the things that we allow ourselves to endure struggles and push through, we learn valuable skills of patients and perseverance. So also remember everything that we go through shapes our character. It helps us become the person that we're meant to be and who God has destined us to be. That goes along with our purpose in the book of Romans chapter five, verse three through four. It says, we can rejoice too when we run into problems and trials for we know that they help us develop endurance. And endurance develops strength of character and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. So yes, you know, dedicating and giving your life to Christ isn't all sunshines and rainbows, but there's a lot of peace and comfort and fulfilling work that you're doing for the Lord. And it's absolutely amazing. And yeah, you will learn to be patient and persevere and n you know, not repay, meanness with meanness and repay it with kindness and all of these different things, but it'll strengthen you for the better, for all the things that are to come in the future. And it's worth it. It's just, it's absolutely worth it, I'm telling you. And again, we're not gonna be able to prevent all the bad things that ever happened to us in life if we're out there trying. It's just not possible. And wouldn't you want someone else on your side to help you be there, swoop in, do the heavy labor. Yeah, God is amazing, can be your best friend to accept him into your heart, into your life. Okay, number five. And the last one that I have to share with you is there is a season for everything. There's a season for everything. If you follow me on socials or you've listened to this podcast long enough, you know that I often talk about different seasons of life and if you thought that I was talking about the actual like weather seasons, I apologize, that's not what I was talking about. It's definitely seasons of life where one season will just like end and you move on to another. And I feel like recently I shifted from a different season because I got like a different job and like different things are happening in our life and we're kind of just like shifting to a different point in our lives. At least I am. And I believe that we're all going together and it's just like, like by all I mean my family <laugh> and there's just different seasons of life where we do different things. And I definitely think that I shifted in a season as well for this podcast because it's more by based on like the Bible and leaning on God and having scriptures to you know, come up, come up, um, come up with, you know, answers to how we can have a better mindset and strengthen things like that. And I feel like that has been a definite season of life and also me really focusing on sharing the Bible and God's truth. That's definitely been a new shift season of life for me. And so I think that if you like take some time to look back, you can see like the edges of where things shifted in your life and that became like a new season where it's just things were just a lot different or a little bit different or moderately different. You know, just to kinda give you an idea in the book of Ecclesiastes it says in chapter three verse one for everything there is a season a time for every activity under heaven. And if you actually continue to read down like until verse 11, cause I'm gonna read to you from that same chapter, chapter three verses 11 and 12. But if you read between like one and 11, it will literally like do like a breakdown of like, there's a season for this and there's a season for this and there's a season for this and there's, and they're like opposites, like polar opposites of all the things. And you should go read it. I think it'd be really encouraging for you. But in verses 11 through 12 it says, yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planned eternity in the human heart, but even so people cannot see the whole scope of God's work from beginning to end. So I concluded there is nothing better than to be happy and enjoy ourselves as long as we can. We just, and that's, that's it. Like, you know, God has made everything beautiful in its own time. So wherever you're trying to go and get in force, just allow God to take you there. It'll be a lot easier and you'll be more equipped and ready to take on whatever the things are in that season of life. Also, you know, he is, he is already planned it out. He knows how it's gonna go. So stop trying to like skip steps or cut parts out or you know, fast forward through things where you, you might try to fast forward through a part that's really, really important that'll fulfill something else that's, that you want in your life. And you know, he's not gonna like make you miss out on blessings or anything like that or, or that's not necessarily going to happen but like things aren't gonna like quote unquote pass you by but you need to just give it all to him if you are gonna commit your life to Christ. I'm just saying. And yeah, and I like at the end of this verse it's like, so I concluded there is nothing better than to be happy and enjoy ourselves as long as we can find comfort and peace in God. Enjoy day to day. Just live it up. Don't try to force anything. God will take you where you need to go and he will lead you and guide you on what steps you need to take. And you need to like, there will be times where we have to step out in faith based upon what he's already told you and do things where you're not completely sure of and maybe it wasn't a direct tell you to do this and he will lead you and guide you in that like good of you working in good faith to continually do the work of God. So there's a season for everything. And I know that kind of sucks cause you're like, ugh, but I don't know what season like this is gonna happen. Like where you're gonna get that job or you're gonna move to that place or you're gonna get married or have kids or whatever. And that can be really disheartening and disappointing. But ask God to comfort you and to take away the worry and the anxiety and the the need for control and really lean into the amazing things that are happening right now cuz you don't wanna. Miss miss out on those things. You wanna just like breathe them in because there will that next thing that you really want, but you may not be able to have another time with what's happening right now, you know? But that's it. Thank you so much for listening to The Real Positive Girl podcast again with me, Sabrina. I hope this has really helped you and if you have any feedback, please feel free to always email me at real positive girl podcast gmail.com. And I haven't checked that in a little bit. So if you view 1 million in the last 30 days, I may be behind, but I'm gonna go check that this week. And again, look down there in the show notes to go to the YouTube channel for the podcast to suggest a topic to come visit me on socials to do anonymous, uh, venting if you need that. If you don't have anyone that's emotionally stable to do that, emotionally available to do that in your life, do that cuz it's anonymous. Oh, so was a topic suggestion. That's anonymous too. But until next time, have a good one and I'll see all of y'all next time. Bye friends.