David McElroy

“Man plans and God laughs.”
— Yiddish proverb

Helen had been divorced for about a year and didn’t plan to get involved in another relationship for awhile. Her marriage had been unhappy and abusive. This short and skinny woman had started eating too much and became overweight for the first time in her life.

She felt lousy about herself inside. She felt unattractive on the outside. She didn’t trust anyone. Her plans were to stick to her own business and get her life in order. She didn’t want to fall in love with anyone.

About 18 months ago, she had worked all day and then spent an hour working out at a gym when a friend called to ask her to have a drink. She told her friend she was tired and that she was in workout clothes, but her friend persuaded her to meet at a bar for a few minutes anyway.

And that’s the night she met Michael.

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It happened again today. I was at the office trying to work when the panicked voice started screaming inside.

“I’ve got to get out of here — right now!”

There was nothing unsafe around me. Nothing suddenly changed. But the inner voice that knows me and tells me the truth was in full panic mode.

This has been happening off and on for a couple of years, but because the conscious, rational part of me hasn’t yet listened and obeyed, something inside me is yelling louder. It’s more urgent. It’s sounding an alarm more frequently.

A few weeks ago, I sent a friend an email to explain what’s going on inside about this. I told him that something in me was so insistent on major change that I was concerned — well, half concerned, half hopeful — that I was about to just say, “I quit,” and walk away from life as I know it right now.

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