Choosing your dreams

Dreams die.

It's a fact of life. A sad, distressing truth we each must come to terms with, sometimes many times, in our lifetimes.

And it seems nothing less than heartbreak when it happens, however it happens.

For some, it is the dream of motherhood. Many women have had to let that dream die, only to find it resurrected in unexpected ways. Others have to let that dream die because their own lives are cut short before the dream can be realized. I learned of one such mother last week.

For others, it is the dream of motherhood itself cut short. When my mom died at 49, her children were all adults, barely, and she had at least met all of her grandchildren, our families complete before her passing. For her, it was enough. It had to be. Her time had come.

When I was a stay-at-home mom, I occasionally baby-sat. One of my charges was the 3-year-old boy who lived across the street. His mother had died, quite unexpectedly, when he was just a baby, and his dad sometimes needed a back-up sitter. The lad was no trouble at all, very compliant and easy-going.

But whenever I looked at him, I saw every young mother's nightmare -- the nightmare where they are pulled away when all they want to do is stay. It made me grateful. And it gave me something new to pray for -- that I would live long enough to see my children grown. (Not all dreams die.) This isn't the case for another young woman, as I also learned last week. She has just weeks to live, and will leave her child behind, taking all of those dreams with her to the grave.

Eventually, the little boy I cared for and his dad moved and another family moved in. Husband, wife and two adorable little girls took up residence. One day the mom came over for coffee. We had a passing acquaintance, but weren't particularly close. So, her announcement that morning stunned me.

She was leaving her husband. And her two girls.

My first question was more of an exclamation, "Why?"

She was pretty matter-of-fact. It wasn't anything her husband had done. He was a good provider. He was a faithful husband. He was a good father.

She was just tired. Tired of being married. Tired of being a mother. Tired of her life.

Her husband didn't understand her decision and tried everything he could think of to dissuade her from her chosen course, but she wasn't having any of it.

I put in my two cents, sharing with her true stories of others who had reached a flat spot in their marriage, who had decided, as she had, that this was not what they had expected from life, it wasn't what they had dreamed it could be, or should be and so -- they were done.

In fact, I shared a personal story about a similar situation that had happened to a close family member not too many years before and I shared how the results of that decision had been nothing short of disastrous. Especially for the children.

It didn't matter. Nothing I said was going to change her mind. She assured me that the girls would be fine. Their dad loved them and they loved him. In fact, she said, he was a better father to them than she was a mother, so they'd probably all be better off.

Perhaps I should have told her about the young mother whose dream ended early. How she would have gladly stayed, if she could have, to see her precious son grow up, to grow old herself, her husband at her side. She was not allowed to choose.

Today, I would share with her the heartbreaking stories of these two young women and we would mourn together the dreams that will die with them.

Those with a choice would do well to consider how they would choose if they knew the full impact their choices would have on the lives of others, one year, five years, 10 years down the road. And they would do well to consider how they treat blessings bestowed when so many desiring the same blessings go begging.

Dreams die. It's a fact of life. And sometimes, the death of a dream is a sad and distressing truth. But not always. Sometimes a dream dies to make way for a different dream, a dream with origins in the heart of God, if we will but stay the course he has set, and let his dreams come true.

His dreams for us can only come true, however, when we are willing to let our dreams die. No matter how noble we believe them to be; no matter much satisfaction they promise, no matter how compelling the desire for the dream is within us.

My neighbor, so long ago, couldn't understand God's dreams for her. The last time I saw her, years after her departure, she was back at that same kitchen table, the view from the window unchanged. This time, tears of regret pooled in her eyes as she reported that in leaving, she had gone too far, and now, all was lost.

"This is what the Lord says: 'Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls.'" Jeremiah 6:16 (NIV)