Difficult Road, Beautiful Destination

So the other day I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed, as I do WAY too often, but hey, I'm super lonely!!  Anyway, I came across a few quotes that really hit me hard and deep.  One of those quotes said, "Difficult roads often lead to beautiful destinations."(Toby Mac)  It really got me thinking.  Do difficult roads really lead you to beautiful destinations?  So I sat there for a while, totally in my own little world, really pondering how I felt about this.  And then I remembered a very difficult road I recently traveled with one of my best friends.  We were camping and decided to go to a lake that has a pretty difficult road.  Super bumpy, full of pot holes and washboarded from the elements.  But it takes you to a beautiful lake that has wonderful fishing.  If you keep traveling on this road, that becomes even more difficult, it leads you to even more beautiful forest and lakes that are not seen by many people.  We had never taken that road further so we didn't know how difficult it was actually going to be.  Which ended up being even more difficult that the road we had just traveled.  But after traveling it, we found out that it was well worth it!  So I started to think even more about my own personal situation.  I am traveling a road less traveled.  Just like the road my friend and I traveled.  My road has a lot of deep pot holes, is super bumpy and washboarded like crazy.  It has it's smooth spots, but most of it is not easy to navigate.  Do I know if my difficult road is worth it?  No, not really.  But if it is anything like that road my friend and I took and it ends up leading me to a beautiful life, I am more than willing to travel my difficult road.

 

The other quote I found is from my most favorite member of the First Presidency of the LDS church.  The quote reads, "Sandwiched between their Once Upon a Time and their Happily Ever After, they all had to experience great adversity." -Pres. Dieter F. Uchtdorf.  This quote is very much like the first one.  But it got me thinking on an entirely different level yet again.  I had a "Happily Ever After" which was fulfilled when I married Dustin, had our four kids and got sealed in the temple as a family.  We then continued our "Happily Ever After" which did not come easy.  We went through some very trying times but those trying times are what continued to create our "Happily Ever After."  I never knew that my "Happily Ever After" would be destroyed in the blink of an eye and become a "Once Upon a Time," though.  But wait, was it really destroyed?  No, it wasn't.  I still have that.  I am sealed to Dustin and our kids.  I will be with him again some day and he will still complete my "Happily Ever After."  But I will be able to have a man one day that will help me create an even better "Happily Ever After."  So, mine didn't end when Dustin died, I gained another chance to add to my "Happily Ever After!"  I know without a shadow of a doubt that Dustin loves me deeply and I love him deeply too.  But I get another chance at love!  I get another chance to welcome another man into my crazy life who loves me for me, loves my kids for who they are and who understands our "baggage" and still chooses to be there for us.  What greater love is there than that?  That love is a choice and is even deeper because of what all we will have been through.  It will become a love story that will astound so many people.  But it definitely won't happen without adversity.  But that adversity will continue to add great strength to my "Happily Ever After."  Pres. Uchtdorf's quote doesn't mean what it might mean to you.  I have an actual "Once Upon a Time" and a new yet continuing "Happily Ever After."  All in which is not going to be easy, but all of it will be worth it.  And the difficult road that I will travel will lead me to the most beautiful destination I've ever seen.