Over & Over

Let the wise listen and add to their learning, and let the discerning get guidance.

—Proverbs 1:5

In my first job out of college, one of the people I worked with drove me crazy. He pushed my buttons and hurt my feelings and twisted my words, and I couldn’t get past it. After months and months, my genius boss Greg said, “You’re not crazy. You’re not making this stuff up. He’s a difficult person to work with.” I exhaled, vindicated, feeling like a deeply discerning person. But then Greg said, “You’re not wrong about this guy, but why does it bother you so much? Why does his way of being make you so crazy?”

Then he added: “It’s okay if you don’t know now. You’ll have plenty of chances to figure it out, because when someone or something taps into your deep emotion like that, God will keep sending that same kind of person or situation into your life over and over until you choose to do the work of understanding it and growing past it.”

It’s absolutely true. You can learn it the first time, or you’ll find that same situation staring you in the face over and over again. There it is, an opportunity to grow, to transcend and transform, to break that terrible pattern.