This I Believe: Accepting what you can't change sets you free

Editor's note: This I Believe is a nationwide essay project that aims to inspire public discourse about belief. For the third straight year, the R&L is publishing one local essay every day of February. For more information, visit www.thisibelieve.org.

I will always remember that, when I was a little girl, I was terrified of bad storms that would roll in constantly during the summer. The big back yard we have would always cause big gusts of wind. I can still hear the sound and the howling. I hated the flash of the lightning and the extremely loud crash of the thunder that would rattle the house. I would cry and beg my mom to make it go away. She would always tell me that she was sorry and she couldn’t control it. I would ask, “But Mom, you’re not scared?” She answered, “Not at all.”

She would tell me that the rule in life she would always follow was, “Never worry about the things you have absolutely no control over.” Being as young as I was, I never thought anything of her advice during the frightening times. I was squeezing my stuffed animals too much to pay a bit of attention to her. She would say this every time I would go running into her room to hide in her closet with my little animals. I did not want to hear what she had to say. I was too terrified to think or pay attention to anything. My mind was elsewhere.

            Until recently. I was stuck in one of the hardest situations at school that I have ever been in. I was struggling to get up every morning because I was scared to face their pointing and laughing. I was not brave enough to even go to school. I never knew it could, or would, ever happen to me. It was hard to get through, and it reminded me of the hard times I had in my mother’s closet, crying over the chaos outside the windows.
            I believe, metaphorically speaking, storms can easily build up and I have absolutely no control over them. I can easily get caught up in situations where the only thing to help me out is time. I can only depend on breathing and waiting for a storm to calm. There is sunshine after the rain, and there always peace after pain. God will always show me everything happens for a reason, and it does not matter how hard the situation may be. Believing in Him is the only way I can get through the bad times. No matter how big my storm may be.

The way I saw the disaster was the best way I could have viewed it. I wanted to take everything back that I had done and I regretted what had happened. I watched the countless number of people smirking and laughing, and all I could do about it was break down. I was at that breaking point that I had never thought I would reach. Instead of begging my mom to make the storm go away I begged her to let me move away, and go some place new. She told me that that would not help the situation. Running from it would only make it worse. Again, I did not pay attention to her. All I could think was to go far, far away from the people I saw every single day.

I believe my mother was right from the first day she ever told me this. When I had my first breaking point from a thunderstorm to my latest because of a storm of situations. No matter what is going on, like my mother always said, never worry about the things you have absolutely no control over. I cannot control the fact that it rains. It pours. Lightning will light up the sky a couple of times at night. The loud vicious thunder will do its job as well. I cannot help that my old peers said those things to me. They never looked at me the same and I honestly could not control what they felt about me anymore. I had to watch some of the closest people in my life walk right on out of it, and it was honestly one of the hardest things I have had to overcome. I had no control.

I will always remember a few months back, seeing my life come tumbling down. I believe He has everything for me planned out. The past is the past and I can’t turn back now. I will always see obstacles I do not think I can overcome but He promises me that I will always make it through the storm. I cannot worry about the things I have absolutely no control over. Thank you, Mom.

Patricia Brown is a junior at Statesville High School and is a member of the Youth Leadership Iredell Class of 2012.