Monthly Musing – January 2018 – All aboard!

“Sorry, you’ve just missed that train, but don’t worry – there’ll be another one in an hour.”

These are never the words you want to hear after a long and busy day, so when the station manager said, “but you could get the next train and change”, I felt my spirits rise.  For a fleeting moment, I remembered the words from our favourite Christmas film The Polar Express: “The thing about trains … it doesn’t matter where they’re going.  What matters is deciding to get on” but that sentiment could have sent me anywhere and not necessarily in the right direction, so I headed back to the information board.  There was indeed another train due in just ten minutes that would mean an extra change but given the choice between sitting on a cold platform for an hour or sitting on a warm train that going in the general direction that I wanted to go in, I decided to get on the next train.

You’ll be pleased to know that I got home in one piece, twenty minutes earlier than I would have done if I’d waited in the cold, and with the experience of seeing people and stations that I wouldn’t have done otherwise (Manchester Piccadilly station on a Saturday night is certainly an experience! 🙂 ).  It didn’t really matter that I’d missed the train that I’d planned to get; nothing was spoilt or lost and it just added to the adventure of the day.  It doesn’t always work out like that but if you choose to believe that things happen for reasons then my detoured journey was just a metaphor for the way life works.  We might all have an end
in sight but sometimes we don’t take the route that we intended to get there.  Often, though things might appear to be lost or spoilt by the change in circumstances, the end result is the same or better and something has actually been gained along the way that was completely unexpected.

Whenever things don’t seem to be working out the way I want them to, I have to remind myself to “take my hands off the steering wheel” and funnily enough, as soon as I do that then something happens to make everything start to go forward again.  I don’t know how that works, but it does. There’s usually more than one way to do something and sometimes it’s only by taking your hands off the steering wheel to give yourself breathing space that you can see the other ways.

I’m going to rewrite the phrase from The Polar Express; as much as I love that one and I think that there are times when it is very relevant, I also think that we should remember that we don’t necessarily have to worry that our plans have left the station
before we were ready  because who knows what adventures we might discover if we take a different route – and you’ll usually get where you’re supposed to be in the end. 

“The thing about trains … even if you miss one, there’ll always be another soon enough.”

 

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10 Responses

  1. Bethany says:

    I absolutely needed to read this today 🙂

  2. Lenore says:

    I agree Christine. Often when things don’t go exactly to plan, we discover the ‘gems’ we may have missed. X

  3. Christina says:

    If I take the hands of the steering wheel I tend to crash into the next wall 🙂
    But of course you are right, there are many avenues to explore in any given situation and it is good to sometimes be forced to rethink and adapt. Thanks for a thought provoking post. x

  4. Sara says:

    Wise words…and so fitting for me at this moment. Thank you Christine! You frequently touch me me from afar with just what is needed, inspiration,wisdom, laughter,motivation,xoxo.

  5. Unknown says:

    What a wonderful post, I – for once – have nothing to add :))) Thank you from the depth of my heart, Christine, for taking the time and making the effort. I love your kind voice and mindfulness.

  6. nese says:

    food for thought this morning. Thank you

  7. Knoah says:

    We often call those "a God thing" because it becomes obvious there was actually a purpose to what at first appeared to be an annoying detour

  8. luluknitts says:

    As Confucius says, "Roads were made for journeys, not destinations." Glad you got home in the end… xxx

  9. Susan Zarzycki says:

    So well put. You have given me something to chew on this morning! Thank you!

  10. Julie says:

    You never know what's round the corner and what unexpected and happy moment might await you that would have passed you by had you taken another route/turn.

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