When the Cosmos Is Against Us

Daddy died, and I thought the universe owed me a break. My mother was terminally ill. And I had a chronic illness. I deserved a pass on all other trouble – or so I believed.

And thus, understandably, I blew my top six months later when the guy I adored walked all over me and out the door. I yelled at God for the first time since my daddy’s death.

I experienced an unbelievably chaotic, bizarre week, which reminded me of that period a dozen years ago. I would put this past week into the top five crazy weeks of my life.

What happened? And what can we do when the cosmos seems to be against us?

Check out this list with the tune Livin’ La Vida Loca (Living the Crazy Life) in your head:

• I ran over a huge yellow jacket’s nest while I was mowing Sunday the 16^th. I was traveling so fast, I escaped with one blow. An army buzzed the nest for an hour.

• My neighbor, guardian of her two grandchildren, was admitted to the hospital on Monday. The kids looked to us. I met the school bus for the first time. 6 a.m. sucks.

• I slipped into the hospital hallway to confront an authority figure on the phone about a work issue on Tuesday. I want us all to get along. But sometimes you gotta speak up.

• On Thursday, the girl got sick. I cut an interview short and rushed home from across the county to assist. We put the kids to sleep in our dining room on blow up mattresses.

• A detective left his card in the gate. Chalked up to a misunderstanding, the incident was unprecedented for me. I’m used to asking cops questions, not them asking me questions.

• And later that Friday, I was chewing my last bite of sandwich at a popular fast food restaurant when I felt as though I’d been cut along the roof of my mouth. An emergency room visit later, I’m OK but still don’t know what was in that sandwich.

All this happened against the backdrop of tight writing deadlines and a sick dog. We may feel one big stressor in our lives at a time is fair. Manageable maybe. We’ve got all hands on deck. The worse we have it, the more we may think we’ve earned a pass. That it’s our right. We are exempt from any more trouble.

And then it doesn’t happen that way. And we explode.

With me, the accusations flew in the face of God. I figured since he’d taken my daddy from me, I deserved a husband. Thing is, God never told me that. I came up with the idea all on my own.

Instead of listening to what I wanted – what I thought I needed – God in his superior wisdom saw I required building, chaotic circumstances to get me to where I would trust him. Where I would curl up in his lap and seek comfort there – not from external things or situations – but from him and from our relationship. The anchor analogy may be well worn but is so spot-on. This week, as my external world ran amok, my internal world was moored to God.

I do not say this as praise to me. I say this as praise to him. If I’d had my way, I’d have still been stuck in my old attitudes and actions. And it’s a possibility I may again meet something that rocks my world, that causes me to pull at that anchor and try to toss it onto something else.

Thing is, God isn’t a one-chance God. At any time in our chaos, we may turn to him. He will hold our internal world together while our external world spins on unpredictable axis.

As we reach out to him each day, we are like children who grasp for the hand of a parent to cross the room – or the street. It’s the spark of trust. Of faith. The beginning of a relationship that will get us through the hectic and bizarre – and will carry us, even through bitter, life-altering loss.

Is life pounding you with one thing after another? What helps you hand the chaos to God?

 

Copyright © 2018 by Toni Lepeska. All rights reserved. www.tonilepeska.com