As a new year approached, I was reminded that we’re not just witnessing another year gone by, but we are entering a whole new decade. Thinking about where my life is now, and how I’ve changed not just over the past decade, but over the past 20 years, several things flooded my mind, and opened my heart…

I am now 35 years old, and a lot happened between the ages of 15 to 25. It was an amazing time on my journey of this experience called life. I learned to drive, got my first car, graduated high school, started college and decided on a major and a path that would mold my life and define my career at the same time. I also lived on my own for the first time, turned 21, and learned a lot about freedom, enjoying life, and all the beauty and turmoil that can come with both. I graduated college and turned my major into a job, and that job into a career. It was a time of many changes for me, especially from the outside looking in. Ten years, a decade of my life, had gone by and it was an amazing, fun, exciting time on my road to adulthood. It came with an enormous amount of changes and experiences, and in defining a career, in a sense, I was defining myself. I wasn’t just a talented kid who was good at art, I was now a professional graphic designer.

As I drove along, I then thought about the last 10 years that sailed by. From ages 25 to 35, I had a few new residences, a few new jobs, a few new friends, and a few new loves. Sounds like a lot of change going on, but looking at how much life changed before now, it seemed like a lot of the same lifestyle, with a little change of scenery along the way. It seems like we spend the first quarter of our lives going through such life altering changes, physically and emotionally, learning to live in the world, but as we get older, do we stop changing? For me, from the outside, it felt that way, especially over the last 4 or 5 years… no new car, no wife, no kids, no house, and no white picket fence. I had a twinge of regret and remorse wondering if I’ve squandered the last ten years, but I quickly realized something did change over the past decade, especially in just the past few years… something more important.

Someone entered my life who helped me see things from a new perspective, and my life began to change in a different direction. The changes I’ve made in the last couple of years were changes not outside of me, but inside myself. I thanked God for the time and opportunity to finally pause and open my eyes not to the outside world and all its distractions, but to a better world. I opened my eyes to the life inside, the life I share with God and in return, the more I look, the more I see the life He shares with me; the life I ignored for so long. I looked back and found something. I found gratitude for the life I’ve lived, for the people who have loved and supported me, for the people who have touched my life, and for the people whose lives I’ve touched.

From ages 15 to 25, I created a foundation for my life, a way of supporting myself, and paved a path out into the physical world. Over the last ten, however, I was moving away emotionally from my parents, my brother, my girlfriend, and in some ways, the world. I’m now on a path back into myself, and into a better relationship with the people close to my heart. Over the last few years I have had the opportunity to create a new foundation. I am paving a new road that leads inside to grace, to peace, to love, and to God. The past few years have been both fun and trying at times, but I’ve taken big strides to change my life, set myself free of old patterns, and forge a new way of living life for the next decade, and for the rest of my life.