The Cost

It never occurred to me that going to India would cost me something emotionally. Saying good-bye to my friends and family is something that you just accept. It will hurt but it's inevitable. But this last week I had to give up my puppy Gretta. I knew that I would have to leave her behind and I would miss her but circumstances changed and I had to let her go 7 months early. The two weeks leading up to her leaving, were emotional and difficult. I picked her out of 9 other cute, snuggle puppy and chose her @ 2 1/2 weeks old. I prepared for her, picked her name, brought her home, cared for her and loved her for 10 months. During the long, horrible, depressing winter she was my joy. She never rejected me in my crabby moods. She just wagged her tail and waited for me to play with her. She was a good friend to me. Not to mention cute and adorable.

But now she's gone with another family who will love her and give her everything she needs. My heart is broken but I know that it was the right thing to do.

So India is starting to cost me something. I never thought it would. My... was I naive. Because I love India so much I just assumed that it would be easy to go and leave people and things behind. Not so much. This is painful. I'm packing up pieces of my life and sending them to other people. I'm giving things away that I love because I can't take them with me. This is costing me something.

Going to India is a huge leap of faith. There's no security there for me. I'm going to a place where people know who I am but they don't know ME. It's exciting to think about the new relationships that will be built, but all the comforts of home and relationships that I can lean on will not be there. I won't know how to cope with that until I get there, but I need to realize that I will have times when I'm lonely and want the comforts of home. I hope that I can do this. I hope that I can be the person I know I am and be confident. I'm scared and unsure of how it will be but I have to trust that God knows what he's doing with me. This is all him. I wouldn't be making any of these decisions if I didn't know that I had a green light from God too. I will learn so much and transform into the person that I'm trying to be all the time. I hope I have enough grace to see me through.

In the end, my dream of India is costing me more than I anticipated. I believe it's worth it.