If I made a different decision, could I have avoided it all? \u00a0Avoided the pain? \u00a0Avoided the breakdown? \u00a0Avoided the trauma? \u00a0<\/i>I ask that question of myself many times. \u00a0For a myriad of reasons, I am confident the answer is no. \u00a0Perhaps I could have staved it off for a time, but my landslide was coming. \u00a0It had to come. \u00a0My date with destiny had arrived.<\/p>\n
The time was early fall 2014. \u00a0I sat in a meeting at the girls’ school. I am part of the marketing team, a volunteer group of staff and parents who advise on ways to promote the school internally and externally. \u00a0We had a problem on our hands. \u00a0No one had volunteered to chair the school’s annual auction. \u00a0Held in the spring each year, the auction is the primary fundraiser for the school. \u00a0It is a big deal. \u00a0The event raises anywhere from $80,000-$100,000 and a large portion of that income is included as a line item on the budget. \u00a0Without an auction, we were in trouble.<\/p>\n
At this time of the year, the planning should have been picking up steam, but without a chair person, we had nothing. \u00a0And the clock was ticking. \u00a0That’s when the little voice in my head piped up, You could do that, Laura. \u00a0You could chair the auction.<\/i>\u00a0 I admit that the idea was equally intriguing and\u00a0frightening. \u00a0Ironically, I distinctly remembered sitting at the auction the previous year and thinking, I’m so glad I have nothing <\/u>to do with the planning of this event! \u00a0<\/i>It is a complex deal with as many logistics and moving parts as a political campaign. \u00a0And yet, there was this part of me that suddenly\u00a0wanted to take on the challenge.<\/p>\n
The achiever\/perfectionist\/people-pleaser in me was quickly giddy with the potential of leading such a huge endeavor. \u00a0I could take this on and do it as it had never been done before. \u00a0The soft-spoken voice of reason, on the other hand, had a few concerns. \u00a0I knew my husband, Justin, likely would not be on board. \u00a0I had taken on too much responsibility in the past, and it always put a strain on our relationship. \u00a0But for every yield sign that cropped up, a creative idea also sparked in my mind. \u00a0In fact, it was as if the creative portion of my brain was lit up with flood lights. \u00a0Without any effort at all, a theme came to me, Mission Possible. \u00a0<\/i>I could already see the James Bond imagery reflected in artwork and other visuals. \u00a0Your mission, if you should choose to accept…<\/i>from there the ideas just kept flowing. Almost too quickly for me to keep up. \u00a0If ideas were coming THIS freely, it had to mean I was meant to take this on…right?!?<\/p>\n
I initially pitched the idea to Justin as a team effort. \u00a0He can rock a spreadsheet like nobody I know. Without a doubt, he would be an excellent co-pilot. \u00a0The problem was, he didn’t bite. \u00a0Justin had recently started a new job that involved international travel. \u00a0Lots of it – being gone for three weeks at a time, several times a year. \u00a0The girls and I had survived his first two trips the previous spring and summer. \u00a0While we missed him terribly, we had held our own and made the best of it with special treats like the girls sleeping in my bed and dinners of popcorn and ice cream. \u00a0Justin knew his limits and co-chairing an auction with me definitely did not fit within them. \u00a0He knows me well enough to realize that it didn’t fit for me, either. \u00a0But frankly, I just didn’t care. \u00a0The challenge of being responsible for something as big as the school auction had taken hold of my ego and wasn’t about to let go. \u00a0The voice of reason didn’t stand a chance.<\/p>\n
The next thing I knew, I was sitting in the next marketing team meeting telling them about my idea for a theme, exciting new possibilities, and volunteering to chair the auction for one year. \u00a0I don’t know what made me so emphatic about telling them it was for one year only<\/i>, but the team was just so relieved that someone <\/i>was crazy enough to volunteer, they didn’t care. \u00a0Crisis averted, or so I believed…my husband wasn’t happy about my decision, but he also knew that when I make up my mind about something, I’m like a steamroller with no brakes.<\/p>\n
The commitment was made. \u00a0The die was cast. The fun was about to begin.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
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If I made a different decision, could I have avoided it all? \u00a0Avoided the pain? \u00a0Avoided the breakdown? \u00a0Avoided the trauma? \u00a0I ask that question of myself many times. \u00a0For a myriad of reasons, I am confident the answer is no. \u00a0Perhaps I could have staved it off for a time, but my landslide was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":226,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1],"tags":[2],"class_list":["post-8","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-anxiety","category-uncategorized","tag-date-with-destiny-series"],"yoast_head":"\n