When Things Don't Go As Planned

A lot of times in life things don't go as planned. You don't get into that school you want to get into or that party you've been planning for ages has been cancelled or you're not where you thought you'd be in life years ago. And this was one of those times for our family: it rained during our vacation to the beach. Pretty minor in comparison of all of the horrible things that could have happened, I suppose, but it still was a major bummer. We decided to go home early.

Sometimes, these things happen. They've happened over much more major things. And they seemed really, really bad when they've happened but sometimes, they've turned out to be really good things. For example, because we've left Ocean City early, we're going to our own shore house which is predicted to have good weather. Smaller I know but possibly beneficial.

This applied to the past too. When I was younger, I very much wanted to go to this private school. Very, very badly. I was bullied quite badly in my middle school and the idea of going to have to endure public high school horrified me. When I went to this private school, I happened to be greeted by a very nice girl. I hadn't been treated with that amount of kindness in a long time and I associated the private school with that. Never mind the fact that it didn't have any resources for the literary minded and would have been much too structured for my tastes: I only noticed the kindness. So naturally, I wanted to go to this school despite how ill-suited it was to me because I saw it as a way away from bullying. There was another private school better suited for me but it was rife with the same sort of bullying I was trying to leave, not to mention that the kids were even richer and snobbier than those at the public school. Essentially, I didn't belong in either although I didn't know it at the time. I didn't make it into the private school I wanted to get into although now, with time and distance, I see it was for the best. I went to my local public school and though it sucked also, I managed and saved my parents some money. And I'm sure there can be similar other cases.

So when things don't turn out as planned, you have to think of another plan. The only thing you really can do is move forward with life and see where it goes. Only sometimes, it truly is better. To put it in cliche terms: when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

At the very least, it might teach you something even if it isn't better. Even if it just sucks in general. Because life throws curveballs and sometimes things really don't turn out as planned for better or worse. But it's always better to be optimistic about things.