I broke a nail

So I was thinking about an injury I acquired a few weeks ago and the life's lessons I gleaned from it. I have had these thoughts in my head all day today, so I pray that the Spirit will be with me to put it to words. A few weeks back I went to put a little extra air in my bike tire, using one of the pumps at a gas station. I was pushing the handle down to pump the air in and somehow managed to bend my thumbnail back somewhere in the middle of my nail bed. It hurt in that moment, but I was so busy putting air in my tire (since it is one where you had a limited time before it ran out) that I didn't even look at it until I got on my back to head back home. By then, it was bleeding pretty good and I could see where the nail had snagged and the crease in my nail all the way across. I had never experienced that before, so I was semi fascinated with it and in shock at what a day it had been (a series of unusual events occured throughout the day, this being one of them that was the icing on the cake). I thought FOR SURE I would lose my nail and I even had nightmares afterwards about this nasty, broken nail with the exposed portion black and encrusted with blood where my nail had been-while it was healing. I was waiting for the day that my nail would fall off and my dream would become reality, I was even afraid to trim the nail (partly because of the pain) where it had snagged (hadn't ripped of any nail) that it would snowball and turn into me trimming my nail down to nothing. So I left it, but a few band-aids on it and went on about my business trying to use my thumb as normally as possible. I realized how much I used my thumb for and how grateful I was for it.

You know I waited for the day that my nail would fall off...but it never did. The sensitivity subsided and I was able to use my nail normally. The nail continued to grow enough that yesterday I was finally able to trim the nail across completely where it was uneven from the snag without having to go deep into the nail bed. I never had to cut it off, and the worst I imagined was far from the reality that happened. I was so grateful. I was grateful that my vision that was limited was not what occured.

So, what does this have to do with anything, you might ask? Well, it reminded me of some pretty profound truths that I will try to share here-as much as the Spirit will allow anyway. I mentioned a few days ago about how I have been feeling lately and how I have felt broken trying to make sense of certain events that have happened over this past year that have really tried my faith. I had kind of been in a grove of growth, if you will, where I felt I knew how to overcome each obstacle that I had in front of me. These that happened over this past year were ones that I wasn't sure how to deal with, that caused me to be in a position that I hadn't been in before. I had been praying for understanding and healing so that it would not be a series of stumbling blocks for me in my life-that I would not become as those recorded of in the book of Alma-who after a very long war and continued affliction had become hard in their hearts-bitter-because of their afflictions and the duration of them.
As I was walking today to school, the Spirit whispered truth to my mind and heart in the reflective time I had without the noise of the world. (How VITAL that time is!! In order to understand the things of God, we NEED it!!) I wasn't consciously looking for symbolism or understanding through what happened with my finger, it just came in the quiet. I won't go into all the details as some I hold sacred and personal, but I will share a few. Just as it was a new thing for me to have my nail broken like that, so was something that happened this last year to me that left me dumbfounded. It broke my heart and left me thinking a lot of things, but mostly left me feeling a little hopeless and not sure how I was going to overcome or how things would work out, I thought FOR SURE that I knew how things would turn out from all of this, imagining the worst. Just as I didn't have to cut off my nail and expose a black blood encrusted mess, I know the worst I imagined is my own lack of vision for my future. I cannot see what God sees, that is why I need Him so desperately: to help me to have ears to hear and eyes to see. God can see the end and knows why I need to experience what I do and when I do. He knows what I need, as He does for each of us, that will cause us to stretch and grow as we never have experienced before-to stretch us to new heights. How grateful I am for such a Father and for this knowledge that brings me hope and peace that surpasses ALL mortal understanding and vision. When we tend to lose perspective, we are yoked to the ONLY source of complete understanding, that can guide us to gain understanding to ALL life's quandaries...AND their joys. Suddenly I see and am beginning to realize WHY I needed to go through what I did and am currently going through. For that I am grateful. I know the healing will continue to come, just as it did with my nail, and I will be more like our Savior-like our Heavenly Father-if I let this trial pass through me.