on my story…

MY STORY

I think telling your story and letting others hear it is one of the most important things to do. 
I have told my story before on my blog but just this past weekend I realized everything became full circle and how I got to where I am today. 

The summer before my junior year of high school, I went to the first youth group I had ever been to. It was Sunday nights in our parish community room. I don’t really remember all the details but I pretty quickly became friends with the leaders of the youth group. Who quickly became the best people I have ever met. I call The Crew. I have blogged about them many times but they are just that great!

So I’m actually going to pause this part of the story really quick to mention what happened a few months later... 

In April of that same year, the one best friend that I had for two years prior started dating a not-so-good guy. I warned her about this and she then started only talking to the friends she had that supported her new-found relationship. She dropped me very quickly and I was then left like I was nothing. She told me many times that I was a terrible person and I was never going to go anywhere in life and so much more that I have blocked out of my memory. I couldn’t be more proud of myself because that turned out to be completely false.

Okay, we can now un-pause my first story, I feel like God put The Crew into my life at the exact moment He did because He knew I would need them at a time where I was going through a hard season of my life (and for the rest of forever honestly.) He knew I needed to fall back on and rely on these friends. See, The Crew is not at all like the girl I was just talking about... they 
would do anything for me. They drop everything when I text in the group chat 

that I need prayers. They call me just to catch up and ask how I’m doing. My parents trust them more than I think they trust me sometimes. They push me closer to Christ in every way and have extremely strengthened my faith in the past four years.

The craziest thing is if the girl I was describing never stopped being friends with me:

I would be nowhere. I would be in the same season of life I was in.1

I would not be as strong in my faith as I am now because I probably wouldn't have created a friendship with The Crew who help me to be the best version of myself daily.

I would not have gone on the retreat I did this past weekend because

I wouldn’t have any desire to. These past four years of knowing them, 

I have become such a better person and Catholic. 

Here’s a list of many many things in my life that I would have never done 
if I never stopped being friends with that girl... 

-I would have never taken 2 (about to be 3) trips to Washington DC for The March for Life each January.
-I would never have gotten invited by The Crew to multiple movies (where there’s like 20 of us in the movie theater and we take up the whole row!)
-Or to Cincinnati for a weekend trip (we even went to Kentucky and I got to cross that state off my list!)
-Or to bowling nights- which are always a blast and a competition!

-Or many many many concerts!! I love Christian Music now and Country Music even more

-Or to game nights with lots of laughter and popcorn and ice cream
-I would have never gotten to experience my best friends getting married
and having a baby! (Which I am very thankful I got to be there for those!)
-Or go tent camping for the first time!
-Or have an extreme support system behind me through the good and the bad,
-Or just any other crazy adventures we take together…

I am extremely thankful and blessed that I get to live life with my best friends in the entire world. God is so good for giving them to me. The coolest thing is, wherever we are when I look around, I know each one of my friends care about me and want to see me succeed which I have never had before. I am endlessly blessed to be able to confide in each one of these people and
keep meeting even more people they know! I have never had friends like this, my only regret is if I could have met them sooner! It still blows my mind everyday that they choose to keep me around, even when I don’t deserve them at all. 

A different part of my life I was reflecting on this weekend was,

I would have never gone on this retreat if I never had dropped out of the organization I was apart of for almost two years. 

I left that organization in March of this year, and I was totally looking for some other way 

to use my extra time. You know, I have been involved in something that I chose to participate in at school since I was in 8th grade, or even since Kindergarten if you want to think about things I had to do and didn’t choose to. At that point, I was almost a junior in college who woke up one day and was suddenly not involved at all. So I sat around and thought about it, went to my university’s club  fair and nothing really stuck out. I knew I just had to get more involved in the Catholic Student Association on campus. I was looking for those friends and that part of my life to be full again. I am very glad to have found both of those this weekend. Life has a crazy way of working out for the better. 

Everything is going to turn out the exact way God planned for you. He is in complete control.

Your situation is going to get better and I pray that each one of you can find God and your people to completely fall back on when you are struggling like I did.