One thing my husband tolerates about me with not a little protective concern is that I am a very independent and unpredictable wanderer. He can never assume where I am likely to be or for how long and for what reason and I always go alone. I greatly enjoy a good amount of aimless moseying. Maybe I’ll go to the library and read about Objectum Sexuals or the kind of plants that cure kidney stones or the most ruthless female serial killers that ever lived. Maybe I’ll drive there and maybe I’ll walk. Maybe I’ll wear my sandals and maybe I’ll forget them and not notice until three blocks later (true story). Maybe I’ll stay for two hours and forget about lunch. Maybe I’ll stay ten minutes, get bored and wander over to the thrift store to hunt for unrecognized antiques buried amongst the valueless rubble. And maybe, during all of this, I will have let my phone die or left it at home so I am completely unreachable.

When I am wandering aimlessly I tend to never really get lost. I’ve noticed that about aimlessness. How can you feel lost if you have no destination?

When I am trying to get somewhere specific, however, getting lost becomes this thing I do like a predictable disorder, the symptoms of which strike only in certain settings, making you wonder if it is just psychosomatic. And yet, even though I have this pathological history of getting lost, it still so often catches me off guard: What?! How did I get lost?! Or denial: I’m not lost, I know exactly where I am… Wait… 

Like yesterday for example. I had to bring my Jeep to a dealership my husband (who works in the auto hail damage industry) does business with, to have new tires put on it for winter. I have actually been to this dealership a few times already. It is called Metropolitan Ford in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, only a scant twenty minute drive from my Minneapolis home.

I firmly believe one should still use the old memory method of getting places because GPS systems are making us dumb followers that don’t have to figure out or remember our own directions anymore. (If you are still using it to guide you to places you have been more than three times, it is succeeding). But I only vaguely remember the way, so I quickly consult my GPS map to refamiliarize myself with certain vital street names and left-or-rights and then I get on the freeway and start my trek without its guidance.

Somewhere in Minnetonka I suddenly snap to and realize the scenery is all wrong. What the heck? I flip on the A/C because the instant I discover I am lost I get very hot and my back begins to sweat. I grab for my phone and try to look like I’m not one of those people who texts and drives while I frantically pull up Metropolitan Ford on my Google Maps to see how long I have been driving since I passed it, as cars whiz past me, suddenly taking on the form of a threat in my panic.

Okay, I passed my exit only a couple miles ago. I am relieved. It is pretty common that I don’t notice I have passed my exit until I see the sign announcing my arrival in the next city. Having an overly active mind can actually come across looking more like mental retardation at times because it takes you away so easily from the concrete world.

I use my GPS just enough to help me get turned around properly and then click it off and put it away.

I confidently take the proper exit and make the following two turns until I arrive at the dealership on the service road.

But these places are huge metropolises with multiple entrances and garage doors that confuse me. I call Jesse.

Okay I’m here. Where do I go?

Find the big row of garage doors that says Service over them in the back.

I drive around and around, passing big row of garage doors after big row of garage doors. No sign that says Service anywhere to be found. Jesse is getting perturbed. I am getting exasperated. I’m starting to doubt there even is a sign when he says,

Babe… look around you… Are you surrounded by Chevy’s right now?

Yeah. starting to chuckle.

Then you are not at Metropolitan Ford.

You know how car dealerships are like box elder bugs? There’s never just one, there are hundreds all grouped together in these ominous-looking clusters. I had pulled into the one next door.

And that is why my problem for today is called:

The Mystery of Being Lost Without Knowing it

We all have done this. I was so busy believing I was at Metropolitan Ford that I didn’t even stop to consult my actual scenery… Chevy’s? whaaaaa…?

I think that as we all search life for the riches we long for: happiness, health, prosperity… we come across a cluster of car dealerships that all look the same. And we can drive around and around and around looking for the right entrance and never actually find it because we are at the wrong building entirely. And if someone tries to tell us we are at the wrong place we often shrug them off because we see it with our eyes: It’s a car dealership! Filled with vehicles! On the right road! How can I be at the wrong place? You’re the dumby!

I think that when it comes to questionable life decisions that we make and we have people we trust, mentors or parents or leaders of some sort that are trying to warn us that we are not actually in the right place, we ignore them because we so strongly believe we know right where we are. But if we are in the wrong place… then we will never actually find what it is we are looking for. Because it isn’t even there.

If you are sure you have made all the right turns and you are in the right place in life, but something is pointing to the possibility that you might actually be lost without knowing it…

Look around you and ask yourself: Am I surrounded by Chevy’s? Because if so, then you are not at the Ford Dealership, no matter how strongly you may believe you are. 

If you are doing something to try and find happiness but your dissatisfaction is only increasing… you are not at the Ford dealership.

If you are using a certain method to try and extract love or attention from others but people are avoiding you instead… you are not at the Ford dealership.

If you think you’re eating healthy but you still have fatigue that sends you face-planting into your desk every afternoon, an extra twenty pounds that won’t relent, and skin problems… you are not at the Ford Dealership.

If you think your parenting method is awesome but your kids are terrors that frighten away even the most ironclad caregivers… you are not at the Ford dealership.

If people regularly have to cut you out of their lives or unfriend you on Facebook… you are not at the Ford dealership.

And of course by Ford Dealership I mean your true goal destination: a place in life where health and overall prosperity are being properly cultivated. When this is happening you will be seeing the sprouting up of plenty of love, happiness, energy and radiance, healthy kids and relationships, and lots of friends.

Keep a close eye on your scenery and make sure it matches up with where you think you are and the things you are really looking for. If it doesn’t then you’re in the wrong place.

 

 

 

 

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