When faith and fear meet at the rickety bridge

When I am creeping up on making a decision, a life-changing one, I can feel my anxiety rising, my heart races a bit more. Doubt, the second, third and fourth guessing, zigzag through my mind. The closer I get to crossing that bridge, the more I wonder if I had taken into account all the pros and cons; all those what-ifs. Is this what is best for me; for my family? What if I make a terrible mistake? What if I can’t turn back? What if I get shamed for being so stupid? I have been thinking about what to do with my work and volunteer situations and where I want to go with the next stages. Just like that old Peggy Lee song, “Is that all there is?”

That bridge may look like a short one until I get to the edge. It looks a lot different. That short, sturdy bridge morphs into one that looks like one of those rope bridges across a wide gorge with wood slats some of them missing while swinging in the winds with raging water below. I go from deciding I was going to run headlong across is now met with trepidation. Can I make it across or can’t I? Keep my faith or sink into my fear?

Funny how I process the decision, make it firm in my head and in my resolve only to get shaky when I am getting ready to take that first step across. Sometimes I chicken out. It gives me the time to reconsider and potentially talking myself out of it. Then I re-experience what it is I did not like about being in that space. I ask myself if I can continue to tolerate the situation any longer, if these have run its course; are there other options or is it time to take a deep breath and make the trip. It may take me several tries to finally go forward with commitment and persistence.

When I do embrace the new decision and let go of the old one belief, I feel a combination of grief from letting go of the familiar and exhilaration of being free from something that kept me stuck in the past or was painful to be around. Crossing over that bridge means releasing the hand of the past I was holding onto while reaching for the hand toward the future on the other side.

Steadfast faith is a noble place to be. My fears run up against my faith. No matter how much time I spend on trying to control the current situations and control the outcomes, I cannot and it clouds my decision. Even though I have some ideas of where I want to go, I am still processing my potential decisions.