Move On with Your Life
by Dr. Polly Cooper Brown
Moving on is a phrase often used to encourage acceptance of the current reality. In your situation, you no longer have the life you once had with your husband. Moving on may mean giving up your expectations that life will be similar to what it had been before his death. It may mean that you will be open to new and different things that can fill your life and make it meaningful.
Moving on means that you make a great effort to live in the present and not in the past. It also means that you do not live in the future, simply waiting for that time when you will join your husband in heaven. The healthy thing to do is to regard each day as a new day and an exciting gift to be explored with thankfulness and joy.
How do you do that? It is a decision you must make. When you consciously decide to move on in healthy ways, you will see things differently and you will recognize opportunities you have not seen before. You may find new opportunities to do things that have had meaning for you in the past. Though you no longer can share those things with your partner, you may still find joy in them. If those activities don’t bring you pleasure, let them go. Try new things until you discover what is right for you at this point in your life.
Is there some major change you need to make? Some other place you need to be? Something you need to do? Sometimes we don’t move on because we are reluctant to give up some things. It is often true that we must give up something in order to gain other opportunities. Are you missing the joy of moving on because you are unwilling to give up certain things? You might want to consider why you are clinging to those things.
You probably have heard it said that my husband would turn over in his grave if I did this or that. Could it be that you are letting that kind of thinking limit you? I would encourage you to free yourself from those thoughts. Of course, you want to be respectful of your spouse’s memory, but this is your life to live in a new and different way. God’s plans for you extend past the point of your husband’s death. Take all the time you need to wonder and explore what His future plans are for you.
