Messy

Sometimes things get messy. You clean the house, then somehow things get messy. You cook, the kitchen gets messy. You do your work, your workspace gets messy. I don’t know about you, but it seems impossible to continuously keep things neat and orderly.

Sometimes a mess, a really big mess, can be the sign of progress. It seems to me you can’t really accomplish something big without creating a bit of chaos in the beginning.

When I have the chance to choose what we watch on TV, I enjoy watching the home improvement shows. My favorite is the part where they show how the home is currently and then they show the rendering of what things will look like when the improvements are complete. Perfect, right? 

And what comes next? We all know the answer to this one. If you have ever seen “Fixer Upper,” then you know the next step is “DEMO DAY!” Right? They just go in and tear everything apart. Talk about a mess!

For me, this is the part of greatest angst. I don’t love demo day. Okay, when I am watching the shows it’s not so bad, but big jobs and home improvements in real life, this is not my favorite part. When we painted the inside of our house, the hardest part for me was getting started, making that first mark, committing to that color, and to continue working until it was completed. I knew in between the first stroke and the finished job, the room we were working on would look terrible. But we kept moving and got the job done knowing what the room would look like once it was all painted. 

The same thing happened recently when we started on yet another home improvement project. We knew what we wanted, we planned it all out, we got all excited…and then I nearly lost my nerve. It’s because the starting of the project means things will be messy, uncontrollable, uncertain between the start and the finish. For whatever reason, that’s just hard for me. Do I want the change? Yes. Will it be better than it was before? Yes. Does that make it any easier? Not really.

I started thinking about how true this is in life in general. I started thinking about times I feel most anxious, times I feel most out of control. I can say without a doubt, it is when areas of my life are undergoing some type of change. It is when my life first gets messy before it gets better.

I thought about the times things get “messy” with our plans, our current reality, our relationships, our today, and what we perceive will be our tomorrow. The times we see things a certain way, and we know we want them to be better, but we also know that between here and there it can only mean one thing… “demo day.”

It means we have to tear down walls, it means we have to unearth what is already planted, it means we have to remove what is already there. It means we have to see the need for change. It means we have to admit we want something different. It means we have to have a vision of something better. 

It means we have to be willing to say, “I am sorry.” It means we have to be willing to work on relationships that we may have been neglecting. It means we have to work harder and put in more hours. It means we have to look at things we have been ignoring. It means we have to say this is not the way I want things to be.

In this respect, “demo day” can be difficult.

When you are working to repair a relationship, there’s the messiness of apologizing, processing, and working through it with the prayer things will get better.

When you are ready to make lifestyle changes to better your health, there’s the messiness of waking up earlier to exercise, the soreness from your workout, the initial struggle to avoid past temptations with the vision of reaching your goals.

When you decide it’s time to change jobs, change homes, change trajectories, there’s the messiness of saying goodbye, trying something new, and being vulnerable to a new situation with the faith you are doing the right thing.

When you are working to overcome hurt or disappointment in your life, there is the messiness of facing those feelings and confronting the chaos as you keep your focus and hope for healing. 

The truth is, we really do not have to fear the mess. We often have to do things we have never done before in order to achieve that which we have never had before. For example, one cannot just imagine or hope a house renovation into existence. Rather, it is out with the old, in with the new, brick by brick, until the mess is gone and the project is complete.  The truth is, change happens in the mess. Strength is built in the mess. That which is our hopes and dreams rises out of the mess. 

When things get messy, look for what will be. Look for progress over perfection, see the moving parts and feel yourself moving in the right direction, forget about the discomfort and focus on the final outcome. The truth is, you should cling to that vision and you will not get lost in the mess!