uncomplicated

i wonder how long i've been making some things in my life, whether big or small, more complicated than they should be.

i will be the first to admit that i am an over-thinker. oh Lord, am i an over-thinker. only very recently have i tried to reign this issue in and get disciplined. over-thinking makes things complicated.

i also have discovered i spend a lot of time thinking of really complicated ways to do things simply to save a little time or a little money. what ends up happening is i stress myself out because the "saving time and money way" is actually way more difficult and not at all worth it, therefore often making the situation very complicated.

another teacher who has become my mentor of sorts gave me this book called "100 ways to simplify your life," and i've been reading through it. its been good and humbling...because as much as i would like to say that i am not a really complicated person (that may sometimes be true) i also can be very complicated in certain aspects.

today i decided that i would try making an errand i had to run a little more simple. normally, when i have to go to campus, i park in our campus corner which is a bit of a walk from the place i needed to go, but it only costs a quarter to park there for an hour. what has never failed to happen is that i get to campus corner, and i have no quarter. so i spend 10 minutes digging through my purse, car, looking in the street, to find a silly quarter. by the time i do that, i now have to walk half a mile to get to the building i'm going to. so i go there, and inevitably, there's a hitch in getting the things i need to get- i haven't paid my bursar bill, i haven't signed something, etc. etc. then, i usually end up having to go to another office to get something else i need, because everything isn't in one place. now, as i am sitting in the waiting area, i'm stressing because my meter is about to run out and i'm gonna have to book it to get back so that i don't get a ticket.

ridiculous right? especially when i could just say you know what, i will save myself some trouble, not worry about finding a spot or a quarter, park in the garage on campus, and i bet it will be worth the 2 or 3 dollars i'll have to pay to do that.

and you know what?

it was.

i was close to where i needed to be. i wasn't worried about a meter running out. the people i talked to were very helpful (and you know i may have only noticed this because i wasn't so occupied with my own stress levels!!) and THEN, when i went to pay for my parking, the girl let me go through without paying because i'd just barely stayed over 15 minutes (under that is free). so i'm not saying that because i chose to "simplify" that i'm always going to get free parking- no, i think it was just to show me that things don't have to be stressful when they actually aren't, and that i shouldn't waste so much time worrying about stuff that isn't worth worrying over.

the Lord is so kind about showing me these things. love it.