🌸 Laurie’s Lesson #015
Have you ever looked back on a season of your life and understood it completely differently than you did while you were living it?
I have. ❤️
Age has a way of giving us perspective that youth simply couldn’t have given us yet.
We begin to understand why someone worked so much.
Why someone seemed distracted.
Why certain decisions were made.
Why somebody couldn’t always show up exactly the way we wanted them to.
And sometimes we discover there were battles happening quietly behind the scenes that we knew absolutely nothing about.
That’s why I’ve learned to be careful when judging someone else’s choices — especially choices they made during a difficult season.
We usually know the part of the story we experienced.
But we may not know everything they were carrying.
Maybe they were protecting someone.
Maybe they were trying to keep everything together.
Maybe they were struggling financially.
Maybe they were grieving.
Maybe they were scared.
Maybe they were doing the very best they knew how to do with circumstances nobody else completely understood.
And here’s something else I’ve learned…
Two people can walk through the same season and experience it very differently.
One person’s memories don’t necessarily cancel out another person’s memories.
There can be room for both.
Maturity teaches us to stop asking only:
“How did this affect me?”
…and begin asking:
“I wonder what they were going through, too?”
That one question can change relationships.
It can replace judgment with curiosity.
Resentment with understanding.
Anger with compassion.
And sometimes…
It can help us look back at an imperfect season and finally see the love that was there all along — even when that love didn’t always look the way we expected it to. ❤️
None of us gets every season right.
Parents don’t.
Spouses don’t.
Children don’t.
Friends don’t.
People don’t.
But as we grow, we get the opportunity to look at old stories through new eyes.
Not to pretend the difficult parts didn’t happen.
Not to erase anyone’s feelings.
But to recognize that perhaps…
There was more to the story than we knew.
📖 “With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love;” — Ephesians 4:2 (KJV)
❤️ Today’s Reflection
Is there someone whose actions you’ve judged based only on the part of their story you could see?
Maybe before deciding what their intentions were…
Ask yourself:
“What might they have been carrying that I never knew about?”
Sometimes understanding doesn’t change the past.
It changes the way we carry it into the future. 💕
🌸 Laurie’s Lessons
Choosing Faith. Live with Purpose.
🌐 LaurieDelk.me
#LauriesLessons #ChoosingFaith #LiveWithPurpose #Grace #Empathy #Understanding #Perspective #Relationships #Family #Forgiveness #Compassion #ChristianEncouragement #FaithJourney
