2019....What’s good?!?!

I’ll tell ya "who’s" good...God. God is good.

2018 did not come to play, but I learned some VERY valuable lessons!

The most important lesson I learned in 2018 is the importance of PRIORITIES. It seems like prioritizing continuously came up each month.

I started off the year just as hopeful as the next “2018 is my year” person. By April/May I’d found out my grandfather had prostate cancer and that was a hard one to come to terms with. It was difficult but seeing my mom, my grandma, my aunts & uncles be so strong REALLY helped to stomach that one. 

From the diagnosis and “treatment” stemmed other issues that put my family through the wringer. I mean death scares and everything.

Although that was tough, God has a crazy way of showing beacons of light in seemingly dark situations. For me, that light came from my family.

During that entire process, my family came together like never before. Don’t get me wrong. My family isn’t dysfunctional, but sometimes we all just get caught up in our jobs and other commitments that we don’t see each other for periods of time. Because my grandfather’s situation changed rapidly, it required all of us to sort of go out of our way to really be there for one another in the most “mundane” ways. Whether it was babysitting or cutting trips short or refraining from going places...we all gladly dropped what we were doing and did what we had to do.

It was a beautiful disaster. It was love. It was everything that “family” does.

It was prioritizing.

In late September/early October of this year one of my classmates lost his battle to cancer. The experience of laughing with someone one day and then learning that they’re dead the very next day is inexplicable. 

I was shocked.

In the following days I started noticing just how much “life” went on for my school. Talks of sending flowers to his family dwindled. Talks of “I can’t believe he’s gone” dwindled. As a school, I don’t even remember having anything as minimal as a moment of silence. Life just went on as usual...

I was shook. 

It was in that moment that I realized that while my education/school was a major priority, it couldn’t be THE priority. There was no fulfillment there (and push come to shove, professors and other students could care less once you're gone...just saying.) What I knew to be true was that my family was always a constant and, therefore, a major priority.

A few weeks later, after not being home for like 2 months, I dropped everything and drove home. It started off as a quick weekend trip, but turned into an impromptu week-long trip to DC and Mississippi. I took a rode trip with my family to the DMV area, took a flight back to Memphis to take a quiz (highest scoring quiz of the semester, btw) and hopped in an SUV towards Jackson, Mississippi with my Uncle, Aunt, cousin to attend the funeral of my father’s aunt, who’d passed away a day before we left for DC.

It was a beautiful disaster. It was love. It was everything that “family” does.

It was prioritizing.

Now at the close of 2018, I am both encouraged and grateful. I am encouraged to, as my father said in one of his old sermons, “keep the main thing the main thing.” I am also so very grateful that God stayed true to his word and never left me this year even when I was maddddd flaky. I’m also grateful that my grandfather is CANCER FREE (I also know 3 other people who were healed of cancer this year, as well..YEAH LAWD!). 

As 2019 approaches, I am excited to see life post-graduation. I am excited to be a better servant with the tools I’ve already been given. I’m excited to spend more time with my family and just belly-laugh about the dumbest stuff (😂😂😂😂)!

2018 was what it should’ve been and God was who he always said he’d be. 2019 will be another load of experiences, but man am I excited about seeing God continue to do that thing he does so well...be God.