"Don't take tomorrow to bed with you."

Norman Vincent Peale said that.

One of my uncles (we'll call him 'C') called me earlier this afternoon to catch up real quick. Uncle C is another one of my favorite relatives...if I had favorites. He's smart, very driven, successful, a great Christian and has a super-awesome family. C has spent the past few months trying to find me a job, and today he called with another opportunity just in case I wasn't liking my newest arrangement (I told him I am, and he spared me the lengthy pitch).

And then we really got to talking.

I've been extremely blessed to have wise family members. My parents are definitely a few, but I've got some really great grandparents, aunts and uncles. As C asked me how being married, having a new job and life in general was, I confronted him with something I've been thinking about for a while - can life in fact be too good?

I feel like E and I have started off a little backwards. We both have been fortunate enough to land some pretty great jobs, we love where we live, we have infinitely-beyond-awesome families and we have each other. I've heard so many stories of people's first year of marriage that I was quite scared thinking about what mine would be like.

So I told C, a little bit jokingly, that I'm just waiting for something not great to happen - that it feels like things have started off too good. And then C taught me a lesson that neither of us had scheduled in our Outlook calendars.

Life has its bad moments. Some will be minor, and some will seem like there's no recovery. Those are facts we can't escape. But if there's one thing either of us have learned from another awesome uncle, it's that life is way too short to wait around for the downs. I don't know why I'm programmed to stress about things I have no idea about. My husband has assured me that, even though he is a computer programmer, I cannot be un-programmed (something about me not being a computer).

I invite you, dear readers, to partake in a challenge with me. It's more of a life journey (ye-ah, we're that close already). If you're like me, and you like to stress about silly, important things that you have no idea if they'll even happen, don't. Practice with me a mentality that relishes in every day's blessings, a way of thinking that steers clear of worrying about tomorrow, or next week, or five years from now.

*I dedicate this post to all of my fellow college grads, because thinking about the future is scary. And not thinking about can be even scarier.

Potato, Potahto

Seriously, how awesome is this potato? I couldn't resist sharing.

This big-hearted starch was just what I needed to begin my week. I've been feeling down; being unemployed stopped being nice a month ago, and I've rewritten and resubmitted my resume many times past the point of desperation. 

There's gotta be a name for whatever funk I'm in, because I know there are millions of college students hosting the same worries. For way too many of us, we've sacrificed four years of sleep, a social life, and living off the parents to get a degree and hopefully make a name for ourselves. I can only assume if they're like me, one can't help feel they might have chosen the wrong path. The world is scary. 

Looking at the potato picture is a nice reminder that although there are things in life that hurt, there are still a lot of great things. Like, my supportive husband. Or my awesome family(ies), and some really great friends that I miss (check three of them out -  1, 2, 3). Or, the simple things in life...like a heart-shaped potato.