Life is a Highway
“Life is like a road you travel on. When there’s one day here and the next day gone. Sometimes you bend. Sometimes you stand. Sometimes you turn your back to the wind. There’s a world outside every darkened door, where the blues won’t haunt you anymore. Where the brave are free and the lover’s soar. Come ride with me to a distant shore. There’s no load I can’t hold. A road so rough, this I know. I’ll be there when the lights come on, just tell ‘em we’re survivors. Life is a highway; I want to ride it all night long.” - Rascal Flatts
I started with the lyrics to the above song because of a thought I received while stuck in traffic the other night. I was totally thinking it was an original thought, then I remembered the above song, and I thought, “I get it now.”
So, here’s my epiphany. Before driving to an event last week, I looked on the GPS to see how long it would take us. It showed about 2 hours. It was an evening gallery, so we thought we’d leave early afternoon to be able to walk around the town and get a bite to eat. Before leaving I put the directions into the GPS, and it now said 2.5 hours. I looked to see how it was directing us to travel and although it is only 20 minutes from my friend’s home (Denise) it directed us a totally different way through major beltways and freeways that are known for delays. My instincts told me to go the back way to her house then put in the address of the theater, but do you think I trusted my instincts? Nope. We chose to go the original way the GPS instructed us to go. The traffic was crazy. Sitting in stand stills of 10-15 minutes. It was aggravating. Taking us well over 3 hours to arrive in time to get something to go and head to the venue.
I tell you all of the above because while standing in traffic I thought, this is a lot like our lives. Never know what is ahead or behind us. Going quickly through the day and then out of nowhere we are stopped abruptly, sometimes for no apparent reason. You know it feels nice to drive on a newly paved road? No bumps, no tar chips. How nice it feels to drive when no one is around, windows down, music playing, just enjoying the drive? If you drive the same roads day after day, you get to know how to maneuver the potholes, which lane to drive in and when to change lanes. Knowing a few tar chips can fix the hole if the right company is hired to fix it.
The drive made think, how sometimes we know we should avoid the potholes, but we forget about them, or we get distracted and boom we hit one. It takes us by surprise, but we navigate it. Somethings in life just happen to bring us to a standstill, and it is out of nowhere. It’s that boom down into the hole that startles us with the jolt to our being. When you get caught in traffic you have a few choices. You can yell and scream at the vehicles around you and the situation you are in or patiently wait till the way is clear. Thinking to myself, this could have been avoided had I trusted my gut instinct instead of trusting a GPS. Same in life. Patiently wait till it gets better or listen to the bad advice of others? Isn’t it funny that even though we see a way around, we don’t trust that ourselves.
I often think that when my car is in a standstill, it is the work of God and my guides keeping me safe from whatever is ahead of me. I try to say a pray for whatever is causing the slowdown. I pray for all involve and all that will be affected by it. I look to the left and send blessings to the people in the cars then look to my right and do the same. Looking in my rearview sending energy of joy and happiness or healing if needed. Then back to the front to everyone ahead of me. Not knowing anyone’s situation of where they were traveling to or why. I pray peace and guidance for everyone who has no escape from this standstill. Sometimes out of nowhere traffic is moving. We’ve gone from a total standstill to going the speed limit. I see no reasons why we were stopped as we move forward. I just know that we were. God was telling me, someone needed prayer. When I think of traffic this way it is difficult to get stressed or angry.
This happened to us on 3 different roads. It felt like we were never going to arrive. But arrive we did, safely and on time. We could have been driving on a beautiful back road, but I didn’t trust my own instincts. Bad move, right? Just like trusting someone who we know is not trustworthy. There are people and events that we know in our heart we need to avoid. But we don’t always listen to our instincts. Stand still after stand still. Pothole after pothole. Obstacles being placed in the way of where I need to be. Too many potholes are hard on your tires eventually cause a blowout. Guess what? Our body is our vehicle. Sometimes I think I take better care of my truck then I do myself. When my low fuel light is on in my truck, I pull into the gas station and fill it up. But my body, my energy; well, I can handle more till I need to refuel. My emotional, spiritual, energetic body goes until it simply cannot go any more. Sharp curve coming up on the freeway, we slow down. Red light we stop. Why can’t our lives have (road) life signs? I think that would make for a much better day. Caution signs, dangers signs for what is coming towards us. To prepare us. When you get jammed up in your life, let’s face it, we have 2 choices; yell and scream or patiently wait it out. Wait for the construction to be finished before moving ahead with caution. In a traffic jam, there is nowhere to go once you're in it. So, you wait. Will you yell and scream or wait patiently until the obstacle stopping you is removed?
Interesting thought?
So, if your inner GPS has you going somewhere you don’t feel you want to go, change the route. If you get stopped out of nowhere, make a decision of how you want to handle it and how you can avoid it next time.
Because as Rascal Flatts says, “Life is a highway, I want to ride it all night long.”
I pray you live the life you love and love the life you live.
Blessings
Stacey
To watch this episode of Tuesday Talks at 10:30 https://fb.watch/se3IMwbH70/
