Making It Work

Sometimes I need to go deep with my posts and this one is no exception. Bear with me...

So my wife and I have been sleeping on this sofa-bed for over two years now. This might sound depressing, which it was at first, but my attitude has totally changed. It all started when we bought a fixer-upper to "flip", which I ended up tearing down to the studs and completely rebuilding over a two year period. By the time I finished the house, the market tanked, my wife gave birth to our first son, and we used up all our money. I was hoping to take the proceeds from the house to put more money down on one of these overpriced expensive homes in the SF Bay Area. Since the housing prices went way down, we decided to rent out the house and wait for the market to come back. And wait, wait, and wait...

Fast forward 3 years and now our family of four is still living in the same one bedroom cottage on my father-in-law's property. When I talked my wife into giving up our bedroom for our son to have a bedroom/playroom, she asked where we were going to sleep. I told her we would find the best sofa-bed on the market for her (I'm such a romantic). She graciously went along with my plans, but it was not easy for us, especially me. For the first year as I removed the sofa pillows before unfolding the bed, I spent about every night thinking to myself, "loser, loser, loser, loser". I was so disappointed in my lack of providing a larger house for my family. I would say to myself, "Why did you quit high-tech sales and start a freaking landscaping business? Why didn't you sell most of your company stock when it was at $70 a share and now is at $1 a share? Why didn't you get the house completed 2 years earlier when the market was hot?" It is never healthy, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually to look back on past mistakes that can not be changed. Now my mindset has changed and it is amazing what a few years of character building can do.

Now after sleeping on the sofa-bed for three years, I don't beat myself up anymore. I'll tell you what keeps my head up. First of all, I try to keep in my mind the trips I took in high school with YoungLife to build homes for impoverished families in Mexico. I remember building a 200 square foot home for a family of 7 people. This is about the size of a master bedroom in most homes. These families we built the houses for were so grateful for their new homes. They had been living in makeshift shacks built out of pallets and garbage. I still remember the excitement on their children's faces and the tears from the parent's eyes. There is so many people in the world living in shacks with no water, electricity or a bathroom. If we gave a needy family in any third world country our house, they would think it was a mini-mansion. I've realized I need to be more grateful for a roof over our heads, electricity, running water, and a bathroom. Our essentials are luxuries in many other parts of the world.

Second is I focus on the many wonderful things in my life. I love my family so much. God has blessed me with a great wife and kids. Once I keep this in my mindset, who cares about the size of our house and sleeping on a sofa-bed. Knowing they are safe, healthy and happy are my number one priorities. Plus, I'm so busy enjoying my family, the material surroundings do not become as important.

Lastly, I know we are going to be more appreciative to whatever house we do move into whenever that time comes. I used think a 2 bedroom and 1 bath house would be too small for my family to ever move into, but now I realize that would be doubling the amount of bedrooms we currently have!

Life is an ongoing experience of challenges and problems. We can either respond by feeling like a loser, inadaquate, and regretful over our current state of affairs or we can decide to make the best of our situations. We could focus on the positives (shelter, food, health, access to healthcare, opportunity, democracy, family, friends, faith, or whatever other blessing this country provides). With the right outlook and attitude, life's challenges make oneself a better and stronger person more capable to overcome each new problem that comes ones way.