“The future influences the present just as much as the past does.” Friedrich Nietzsche

If I ever wondered how the future effected now, these two quotes contained at least part of my answer. 

“Stop waiting for Friday, for summer, for someone to fall in love with you, for life. Happiness is achieved when you stop waiting for it and make the most of the moment you’re in now.” Unknown

“If you’ll be happy ‘when,’ why not be happy ‘now’?” Tim Fargo

Tricking ourselves into thinking we have plenty of future makes it tempting and easy to procrastinate. It also makes us miserable. We set ourselves up for an unhappy future when we don’t do anything productive now. 

Until I walked across the street to a church that taught clearly our lives are about sacrifice and service turned happiness when we think about others first, I thought, When’s it my turn?

It’s my turn NOW – my turn to stop thinking about when I’ll be happy and start helping others with theirs, and not in the way I helped before. 

I served before because I wanted to feel good about myself. Now was my turn to serve because God served and saved my family and me. I wanted desperately to pay it forward and still do. 

If I wanted a different future, I had to choose a different present. And if I wanted a different present, I had to decide on different plans for my future. 

God designed the predicament of past, present, and future being dependent on each so we’d be dependent on Him for all time. 

In This Together, 
Kim 

FYI: I’m blogging my book titled On The Other Side of Trying Hard: Healing, Happiness, and Holiness. Because the blog posts will eventually be an entire manuscript instead of stand-alone stories, some posts may leave you hanging. I hope you’ll hang in here with us anyway ‘cause a happy ending is coming. Each blog post title includes the chapter title first. The phrase in parentheses is one subheading within the chapter. I’d love to hear your reflections, questions, and suggestions. I’m over-the-top grateful you’re here.