Sometimes I wonder why negative things happen to good people.
Sometimes I wonder if, when bad things happen to good people, they’re not actually good people at all.
I’ve discovered that when bad things happen to ANYONE, it’s not because they are not good people, it’s because they are being led down a different path. Nothing is good nor bad, it’s just something that happened.
How you choose to react to the situation is what really matters. And if you really pay close attention as to why something seemingly “bad” has happened to you, you may find that it happened to lead you down a much better path, thus stopping you from continuing to do something that may not be what you SHOULD be doing.
Over the last day and a half, after something “bad” happened to me, I’ve understood that this is EXACTLY what was going on for me. I’ve realized I have been playing at a “safe” level, and haven’t been allowing myself to truly play at the big level I know I’m meant to play at.
It’s something that, now, after having time to really think about WHY it happened, it was actually a blessing in disguise for me. Something that NEEDED to happen in order for me to realize what I was doing in terms of the level I was playing at.
After an amazing day and night celebrating my sister’s birthday with her in Paris, I just so happened to set foot into the worst Uber of all time, where, after forgetting my phone/wallet in the backseat, thought my life was pretty much over (yeah, I can be quite dramatic). The stupid driver refused to check in his car if the phone/wallet was there (it was), and refused coming back to us to drop it off (we offered to pay him a bunch of money to come back, but he kept saying no and that he was busy).
I was up most of the night worrying about it. The photos and videos of my kids on that phone, my IDs and credit cards in the wallet, all of my apps and social media content saved. I was certain that the universe was fucking with me because things were going so good for me, for so long.
The next day, I got on a plane to come to Ireland without my phone. Without my credit cards. Without my IDs (I did have my passport though, thankfully!).
Now, as I sit here typing this in the courtyard of a 100+ year old home, while all of my new Irish friends are sitting around talking about business and life in their awesome Irish accents, with a country dog snuggled up on my lap, with no internet connection (I’ll have to walk into the main house to get very slow wifi so I can post this later), about to get dressed and ready for a big Irish wedding, I get it now –
The universe WAS fucking with me. But in a much better way than I expected.
The universe wasn’t punishing me for doing so well, knocking me back down when I was feeling so high, like I originally thought .
The universe was sending me a message that it’s time to up-level. It’s time to expand.
You see, I’ve been meaning to get the new iPhone for almost a year now, but kept denying myself, saying “my phone works fine, it would be wasteful of me to get rid of it and get a new one”. I obviously still have some frugality thoughts in my head that I need to bust through.
I also have the wallet/phone case (or HAD, I should say!), that was really worn and falling a part and did NOT make me feel high-vibe at all, but I didn’t allow myself to get a new one because “one day I’ll get the new phone and then I’ll have to buy another one” (as if buying another one soon after buying a new one would somehow hurt me financially, ha!).
And my credit cards? Well, that’s annoying. But one of them I was meaning to get rid of so I could switch to a new one that would give me much better rewards and I just kept putting it off. My IDs is the least of my worries, surprisingly, as my health card was actually 7 months expired anyway (oops) and I was going to need to get new cards in the next few weeks because of our home address change.
So all of that to say –
This was all supposed to happen.
It sucked.
It hurt.
It made me hate Uber and that stupid, mean, douchebag driver.
But I now know it happened for a reason. It happened exactly as it was supposed to. It made me realize a lot about myself and how I was holding myself back. It also reminded me how GOOD people are (so many people stepped in - complete strangers - and tried to help us when I lost my phone and couldn’t communicate with the Uber driver, who spoke only French, as well as with other issues that followed).
As much as I hated that this happened, I’m happy that it did because I learned a pretty valuable lesson.
Life is going to throw you curveballs. It’s going to make you scream. It’s going to infuriate you. It’s going to make you break down and cry. And can I just say? As much as it will suck in the moment, I can promise you that it will be worth it. What doesn’t kill you truly does make you stronger.