Episode 37: Don’t Miss the Life You’re Living
Have you ever caught yourself thinking…
When this changes, then I’ll really start living?
When I lose the weight.
When my health improves.
When we have more money.
When the kids get older.
When the grief isn’t so heavy.
When the prayer is finally answered.
When life slows down.
There is nothing wrong with wanting something to change. There are things worth hoping for, praying for, healing from, and working toward.
But what if the life you’re waiting for isn’t the only life worth receiving?
In this conversation, we’ll explore what happens when we stop treating today like a waiting room and begin noticing the goodness that can exist right alongside longing, disappointment, grief, uncertainty, and unfinished stories.
Featured Quote
“You can deeply want something to change without treating the life you have today like a waiting room.”
Listen or Watch
About This Episode
For eight years, I wanted to become a mother.
I prayed.
I hoped.
We went through fertility treatments.
I celebrated other people’s pregnancies while carrying the ache of my own unanswered prayer.
And without realizing it, I sometimes began looking past the life I was already living toward the one I desperately hoped was coming.
Then the babies came.
Within six months, John and I went from having no children to having two.
The life I’d prayed for became bottles, diapers, sleepless nights, tiny clothes, enormous love—and so much laundry.
Soon afterward, a promotion took John to Memphis while I spent six months working full-time and caring for two babies during the week before our family could finally move together.
Eventually, we returned to Texas just as I was becoming increasingly sick. Not long afterward, we received the Moyamoya diagnosis that would lead to brain surgeries and another life we never could have anticipated.
Looking backward, I can see something I couldn’t always recognize while I was living those chapters:
The hard season and the beautiful season aren’t always two different seasons. Sometimes they’re the exact same one.
In this episode, we’ll talk about infertility, motherhood, adoption, illness, grief, body image, unanswered prayers, and the ordinary goodness we can so easily overlook while waiting for something to change.
We’ll explore the difference between honoring real limitations and postponing our entire lives, why gratitude doesn’t require us to pretend painful things are good, and why joy doesn’t have to wait until everything is resolved.
And yes…
we’re going to talk about laundry.
Because sometimes the ordinary thing frustrating us today is evidence of a life we once desperately prayed for.
Key Takeaways
- You can want something to change without allowing its absence to define everything else.
- Gratitude and disappointment can exist at the same time.
- Celebrating someone else’s joy doesn’t mean your own ache disappears.
- An answered prayer can be beautiful, exhausting, complicated, and difficult all at once.
- Receiving a gift doesn’t mean the gift never asks anything of you.
- The hard season and the beautiful season can be the exact same season.
- Recognizing God’s provision doesn’t require calling painful circumstances good.
- Real limitations deserve to be honored without becoming a verdict on your entire life.
- You don’t have to wait for a different body, greater confidence, or a more healed version of yourself before allowing God to use you.
- Joy is often hidden in ordinary things we’ve stopped noticing.
- Gratitude doesn’t erase pain; sometimes it simply turns our attention toward the goodness that exists beside it.
- Loving someone who is hurting doesn’t always mean fixing what hurts.
- Joy doesn’t require resolution.
- Today’s life is not simply the price you have to pay to reach tomorrow’s.
Featured Resource
💛 Free Episode 37 Reflection
Coming Soon
This week’s free Episode Reflection will give you space to sit with the two questions at the heart of this conversation:
What part of my life have I been treating like a waiting room?
And…
What is already here that I don’t want to miss?
Through gentle reflection, you’ll have an opportunity to notice where you may have unknowingly postponed living until something changes—and begin paying attention to the ordinary goodness already present in the life you’re living today.
Continue the Conversation
Devotional 37: The Gift of Today
This week’s companion devotional will continue the conversation through Scripture and create space to explore what it means to receive God’s presence and goodness while the story is still unfinished.
Continue the Journey
If today’s conversation resonated with you, you may also enjoy:
- Episode 36: Learning to See the Story Behind the Story
- Episode 35: The Story I Never Could Have Written
- Episode 34: When God’s Answer Looks Different
- Episode 33: When Healing Changes Who You’re Becoming
Related Resources
- Free Episode 36 Reflection: Learning to See the Story Behind the Story
- Companion Guide: More Than I Could See
Together, these conversations explore waiting, healing, gratitude, becoming, unanswered prayer, and learning to recognize God’s presence while the story is still being written.
Reflection Question
What part of your life have you been treating like a waiting room?
Where have you quietly decided that the real story begins later?
When something changes.
When something heals.
When something arrives.
When you finally become the version of yourself you’ve been waiting for.
And then ask:
What is already here that I don’t want to miss?
A person?
A relationship?
An opportunity?
A season with your children?
A friendship?
Something your body still allows you to do?
A quiet morning?
A familiar routine?
Something so ordinary you’ve stopped recognizing it as a gift?
You don’t have to stop hoping for tomorrow.
Just notice what is here today.
Final Thought
You are allowed to hope for something different.
You are allowed to ask God for more.
You are allowed to work toward change.
You are allowed to grieve what isn’t here.
You don’t have to call something good simply because God is present inside it.
And you don’t have to manufacture gratitude to prove that you trust Him.
But while you’re waiting… don’t miss this.
The people who are here.
The available laughter.
The ordinary goodness.
The small opportunities.
The version of yourself who exists today.
Because this version of you matters, too.
This chapter isn’t simply getting you somewhere.
You’re living here.
There may be beautiful chapters ahead that you cannot even imagine yet.
There may be prayers God answers in ways you couldn’t have written yourself.
There may be healing, people, places, opportunities, and dreams still to come.
But there is also something here.
Today.
Something worth noticing.
Something worth receiving.
Something you may someday wish you could experience one more time.
So keep hoping.
Keep praying.
Keep growing.
Keep asking God for what you need.
But please… don’t miss the life you’re living while you’re waiting for the life you’re hoping for.
Joy doesn’t have to wait until the story is finished.
And neither do you.