Wednesday Word: Shake It Off

In my experience there are four kinds of mornings: the kind of normal rush to get out of the house to make it to work/school/wherever on time; the kind where things come together just right and you get all the green lights; the kind where nothing goes right; and the kind where things are going right but then something happens to ruin it all.

This past Sunday was a morning of the fourth kind.

I was getting ready to head to the office for Sunday services and everything was falling into place. That is, until I was at the garage door and realized I left my glasses laying upstairs. I ran up to get them and . . . no glasses. They weren't on the bed. They weren't on the dresser. They weren't on the sink. I was sure that's where I left them. So I ran downstairs. They weren't on the couch. They weren't on the side table.

Back upstairs. They weren't on the dining room table. They weren't in the living room. They weren't in the kitchen. Back up to the bedroom. Again. Not there. In fact, they were nowhere. And to top it off, today was Rite 1, so I couldn't even fake my way through service. Back downstairs with my frustration rising ever faster.

Until Joelene hollered from upstairs. I had, for some unknown reason, decided to hang them on the back of the door while brushing my teeth. Things hanging on the back of the door don't get seen when you pop in to look for them.

Off I went. Frustrated. Annoyed. Late. And ready to stew the whole way into town and wonder what else would go wrong today.

As I started to drive out of the garage in a less-than-holy state, Taylor Swift's “Shake It Off” came on the radio. In short, it's a song about not letting outside influences control your behaviors and/or reactions to things you can't control, so just shake it off.

Sometimes things don't go exactly as planned, and sometimes little things can set you off. But we have a choice as to how we are going to react. In the end, my misplaced glasses weren't worth the overreaction on my part, so on my drive into church I shook it off.

What are some things in your life that you might want to shake off?

Blessings,