His Plans Are Better Than Mine

"In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity."
~ Albert Einstein ~

One of my favorite movies, a series actually, is Anne of Green Gables. The main character, Anne, a very bright girl with a vivid imagination, lives most of her childhood in an orphanage. She is finally adopted and becomes best friends with her next door neighbor, Diana Berry. Anne loves to refer to Diana as her kindred spirit.

When my children were small, they watched this series as often as I let them. Whenever my daughter wrote me a note or drew me a picture, she signed it kindred spirit. Soon, this became my pet name for her. (I might add that each child has a pet name, so no, I did not actually name my children Sweet Pea, Kindred Spirit, My Buddy, and Lovie.)

From the time she was a toddler, K.S. loved sports. When she was 4, she announced one day that she was not coming in the house until she had made 100 baskets, using the goal over the garage. It was June, very hot, and there she was, dripping in sweat, making one shot after another…granny style.

In school, she made average grades, played all sports, but lived for basketball. After middle school, she was invited to play with an elite club team that traveled all over the state. The summer after her junior year, her team went to the nationals; that summer she was nominated all American. Colleges from all over the country were calling. Her senior year looked to be a great one. She was the leading scorer, the go-to girl on a great team that had a shot at winning state. Then the unthinkable happened early in the season. She stole a ball mid-court, dribbled to the basket for an easy lay-up, rotated, and completely tore her ACL, MCL, and medial miniscus. I will never forget that scream as she fell to the floor, clutching her knee. In one short moment it was over.

She spent the rest of basketball season in rehab. The calls stopped, except for one. Her former high school volleyball coach was now coaching at a Christian college and offered her the opportunity to join the team on injured reserve. She spent her freshman year in college traveling with the team while undergoing another surgery and continuing rehab. At the end of that first season, she decided to quit the team. She wanted more from the total college experience than playing volleyball was going to provide.

She called one night in tears to tell us of her decision. There were many nights that her dad and I had cried in the privacy of our bedroom, and now we were all crying together. This part of her life in which she had invested so much time and energy was over, and now she didn’t quite know what to do with herself. What would her identity be, if not an athlete? What was left for her?

As time wore on, she became increasingly more certain that she had made the right decision. She made friends at college who were not athletes for the first time in her life, and worked very hard at her major, exercise science. Shortly after her sophomore year, she announced that she wanted to be a physical therapist. However, this meant taking extremely challenging classes to prepare for acceptance into grad school, and studying like she had never studied in her life. She approached this with the commitment that before had been reserved for athletics.

What God did from this point on was truly amazing. Some time had passed since she had quit the team and I was trying to get a feel for how she was dealing with it. She said, “Mom, I used to think that I wasn’t very smart, that all I was good at was sports. God had to take that away from me to show me that He has given me other gifts and that I can do anything I put my mind to.”

That was five years ago. Today, she is nearing the completion of her doctorate in physical therapy, will graduate at the top of her class, and her favorite scripture is.

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Jeremiah 29:11

Happy 25th birthday, Kindred Spirit.