A few days ago, I had one of those travel days where absolutely nothing went according to plan.

I was flying home from a business trip in Nashville after three long days away from Anniston, the kids, my home, and my own bed. By the final afternoon, I was more than ready to get back.

Then Anniston messaged me to say she was not feeling well and had taken herself to urgent care.

Now I really wanted to get home.

I even left the event two hours early and spent the next hour searching for another flight that might get me there sooner. Nothing worked, so reluctantly, I stuck with my original itinerary.

The next morning, I woke up at 3AM and headed to the airport for an early flight.

Except we did not take off.

We boarded around 4:30AM and sat on the plane until after 9AM.

A two hour flight became almost seven hours.

Then my connecting flight was delayed.

And delayed again.

By the time I finally sat down in the Chicago airport, I had already been traveling for hours, with more waiting still ahead of me.

If you travel enough, you probably have your own version of this story.

The missed connection.
The cancelled flight.
The traffic jam.
The plan you were certain would work, until life had another idea.

Thankfully, I rarely have days like that.

But when they happen, I have learned something that changes the entire experience.

I trust that somehow, it is serving me.

I cannot see around corners.

I do not know what would have happened had my original plans unfolded exactly the way I wanted them to.

But if I have set the intention to move through my life with ease and grace, and then something appears that seems to contradict that intention, I have a choice.

I can decide that life is working against me.

Or I can ask:

What if this is part of the ease and grace?

What if I was being delayed from something I did not need to experience?

What if the longer route was actually the safest or fastest route to where I was ultimately going?

What if something that felt mildly frustrating was protecting me from an alternative I could not see?

I may never know.

And strangely, I do not need to.

That is where trust comes in.

One of the challenges of being human is that we naturally view everything from our very limited vantage point.

We see the delay.

We see the inconvenience.

We see what is not going according to plan.

What we cannot see is everything else moving around us.

So often we decide something is “bad” simply because it is different from what we expected.

But what if the detour is guidance?

What if the closed door is protection?

What if the thing slowing you down is actually moving you toward what you asked for?

I believe we are always being guided.

And if that is true, then even the delays deserve a little curiosity.

None of this means I enjoyed sitting in an airport all day.

I would have much rather been home.

But I also refused to give an airline delay the power to determine the quality of my day.

That part still belonged to me.

Inevitably, we all get to choose how we experience what is happening.

And more often than not, especially when circumstances give me every reason not to, I choose joy.

Not because everything went according to plan.

But because I trust there may be a bigger plan than the one I made.

So if something has not unfolded the way you expected lately, pause before labeling it a problem.

Ask yourself:

What if this is somehow serving me?

You may not get the answer immediately.

But you might get your peace back.