Making plans

I like to make plans. I like to know where I am going to be in 5 years, and crucial steps that will need to be taken between this point and that one. Usually once a decision is made, I find myself completely at peace and purposefully striding toward whatever goal I have given myself. For example, when Kevin and I got married, we had a five year plan. I wanted to be married for 5 years before we started a family, to give us time to just be married. We were young after all, and I wanted to make sure we had time to do the things that having a family would have made more difficult. Like travel. Or pay off debt! Judah was born about 4 and a half years into the five year plan, so we got close to seeing that one through. Not all my plans are so easily achieved. Actually, most often I think the Lord gets a big kick out of showing me who is really in charge of my life, laying waste to my best laid plans in a breath. You would think that by now I would have learned to trust Him more and stopped trying to plan out my life in such absolute ways. But I haven't. So here we are again, at the start of a new year. And I find myself making plans. I think the thing that troubles me about not having a plan, or a map for the next set increment of time (whatever it may be) is the "limbo" factor. I loathe being in the "in between" stage. Whether that means in between big decisions, or in between seasons, or even in between dress sizes! I'd just rather be on one side or the other. Probably due to this disposition of mine, I make decisions too quickly. Based off convenience, impatience, logic, emotion, or even knowledge, I can rush the decision making process, thinking that a quick prayer and no clear cut answer is an invitation to take matters into my own hands. Kevin tells me that I shoot before I aim. Touché. Though Kevin will aim all the live long day and never pull the trigger, so it all works out. (God paired us together so very well)! So, the plans for 2012 are tentative -- I cant help but make them, it is how the Lord made me. But I am praying that God enables me to hold them with an open hand... Because if I have learned anything in my walk with the Lord, it is that His ways are higher than my ways, and His thoughts are higher than my thoughts. And in retrospect, each time I saw my own will crumble to make way for His...His was better.