Her boyfriend walks out on her after she was five months pregnant because of his drug addiction.

After separating from my husband, I met someone and started a new relationship. Our relationship progressed very quickly and I got pregnant after about 5 months. All of it came way too fast and stressed us both out. He slowly became despondent with me and took off more and more. We got into more fights and he would leave for days then come back and apologize. It wasn’t until much later after the baby was born that I learned he had a drug habit and all the stress sent him into a relapse. Three days before Christmas when I was seven months pregnant, he left me. He told me he was going to see some family out of town and never came back. He left me with $50 to my name and didn’t even call.

Luckily, I have amazing parents who had me stay with them for Christmas and really helped me out. My mother was my coach during delivery and they had me move in with them for extra support. Through the remainder of the pregnancy, I went from rage and anger to concern for him and an expectation that he would contact me. I called his sister’s house where I found he was living but I could never get him on the phone. There were times where I felt some momentary clarity. This was a test of my will and who I am. It was my job to forgive him even if he didn’t ask for it.

It was about a month before my son was born that I started getting an urge to find him so my son could have a father. I was discouraged by all my friends and family to do that and I listened. I was afraid that the stress could induce labor in a city away from my personal support circle so out of my son and my own safety, I didn’t go. But I kept thinking about this every day. After my son was born, I tried calling where I believed he was staying and spoke to some of his relatives to let them know he had a son – still I didn’t hear from him. I had my family saying to let it go. Eventually, I had to send out his birth certificate and I at first put no father on it but I couldn’t get myself to actually mail it out.

After my son turned one month old, I decided to go to London where he was staying (approx. 1.5 hours away) and introduce him to his son. My thoughts were that when my son grows up, I want to tell him that I tried doing the right thing and gave him the chance to meet his father. If he didn’t have a relationship with his father, it was not by my doing – out of any of my resentment or anger. I was compelled to do what was right for my son. This is where my inner voice would not let go of me. I had everyone in my family against me finding him or giving him any type of chance but I couldn’t ignore that insistent inner voice.

I called his sister who told me that if I met her at her house, she would give me directions to get to him. My family was extremely upset with me doing this and no one supported me on my decision. As soon as I saw him, his first words to me were “It wasn’t your fault, it was all mine.” and he told me the whole story about his drug addiction and relapse. Amazingly, the day my son was born was the same day he overdosed and actually flat lined in the hospital. When he woke up, it was also the day he sobered up.

We slowly started talking again. At first because I had so many questions about what happened, I would call to get answers. Eventually we became friends. It was such a painful time in my life with no one offering me any support at all concerning my decision to contact him. I felt a lot of guilt after my parents helped me out so much about going against their wishes. They hated him for everything he did and refused the concept of forgiveness. I remember sitting with a minister and talking to him about it and he advised me to just follow my heart and do what I believe is best.

It took a long time and a lot of counseling but I found a way to completely forgive him. I knew I had to and knew that everything I wanted to teach my children in life required me to be the living example of it. We first became friends, then best friends. When we both felt strong and whole again, we started dating. Now, we are engaged and through his loving actions to me and my children, my family forgave him too. We have a loving home and now, whenever stress comes in our lives, we use our past as a source of strength. We find ourselves saying to each other that if what we had to go through didn’t break us nothing will and we can battle anything together.

An inner guidance led me through everything I did. I had to go completely against the stream and just follow my heart about what I felt was right. I completely believe that being a moral person is not what you do when people are watching you but what you do when no one is or when everyone is telling you otherwise.

(The following story was submitted by Dan Allen, a member of the Fork In The Road Band in Logan, Iowa. They are a country rock band.  www.myspace.com/forkintheroad)

Fork In The Road Band

Fork in the Road has both a geographic and ironic meaning to us. The obvious one is that I actually live between the forks of two highways in Logan, Iowa. The locals call it “The Fork.” That’s where our band practices and writes music.

How we came to be a band involves a lot of fateful events, timing and locations. The guys in the band are all from the small town of Logan, Iowa. We went to high school together, played music, sports, and hung out a lot. Ryan Michael (bass player) and myself (Lead Guitar, vocals) have been playing together in bands since our early teens. We continued to play together throughout high school and college.

After college, we decided to try our talents in the Nashville music scene. We met up with high school friend Andy Makey (lead vocals/guitar) in Nashville. He was scheduled to be out of the Marines by the time we moved to there. That day came and we all were in our place. At first, it was great because we discovered we had similar taste in music. In high school, Andy was never a part of our band, but was an accomplished singer/actor in the school musicals. In the Marines, he picked up the acoustic guitar. We were impressed. This all had the makings of a great start for our band but it wasn’t meant to be.

After a fallout with another band member who wasn’t from Logan, the band split up and we went our separate ways. Andy moved to Northern California briefly as he was recalled to Marines when the Iraq war broke out. I moved back home with my tail between my legs and not a penny in my pocket.

Back in Logan, I played around with some local cover bands in the Omaha scene, nothing more than a little spending money. Andy was released from the Marines a few months later, and Ryan moved home from Nashville within two weeks of that. We reunited as friends at “The Fork” where we all shared stories about our experiences. At first, it was just great to get back together with my pals.

We really didn’t set out to play music again until we decided to have an “open jam” at one of the local bars. We invited all of our musician friends to come out and jam with us. After a couple of these sessions, we started to call the jams Fork in the Road productions. Soon after that, we knew the core of these jams had been established…we really were a band again.

Andy, Ryan, and I then set out to find a drummer. On New Year’s Eve 2004, Fork the Road  Band was born. We have since replaced our old drummer, who was not from Logan, with one who is. We are now an all Logan band. This last New Year’s Eve we celebrated 5 years of the Fork in the Road Band. It’s amazing how many forks we took that all lead us back to Logan and back into a band together.

When we set out to do this, we had to make the choice of sacrificing our lives yet again for music, or choosing the common direction of any stereotypical small town person. We’ll needless to say we feel we made the right decision!

(Esmerelda is a fictitious name selected by the person who submitted this story so she remain anonymous.)

When I was 19, I married my high school boyfriend. At the time, it seemed like a wonderful idea even though my parents and his parents were a little trepidatious because we were so young. That decision was made out of what seemed like the obvious thing to do. I don’t remember any debate or internal voices.

Life got more complex over the next few years.

Fast forward to me at 28. We had separated once before at that point and it was happening again. We were not meant to be married and both of us had known it for many years. Whatever inner voice I had, I had smothered repeatedly in hopes that I could continue on my current path without having to go through any major upheaval even if I knew eventually it was coming.

When it did finally come and there was no way to get away from it, I more or less froze up. At the time, I was working very part time. I had some savings, but was afraid to get an apartment on my own in case I couldn’t pay my own rent. I was afraid to change everything I knew. I was afraid I would lose a lot of people by divorcing and separating from a family I had been a part of since I was in my teens. I was afraid of just about everything. Still at this point, if there was an inner voice, I couldn’t hear it. I curled up on the couch and went dormant for a bit (actually, I got mono so I didn’t have much of a choice).

My then husband was moving along anyway. He had a new girlfriend already and rather than getting mad at him, I was still just feeling more broken down and unable to make a change or move on. Things were getting to the point where I would have to make a decision, a series of decisions, about how to 1) Move, 2) Work and 3) Get over it.

The first step in the process was getting away. At first, I did not want to leave town, but then I decided to anyway. At that point, I began to take on a philosophy of doing the opposite of what my instincts told me to do. My instincts had led me into a situation where I knew I had been unhappy and did nothing about it for 10 years. So to hell with my instincts for a bit. Someone told me once that sometimes you have to let the universe hold you and so I did. I decided to take on a policy of saying yes to anything that would change me and have faith that what came my way was better for me than what I had.

Strangely, not much of what happened to me next had to do with my own decisions other than saying yes. I had been writing freelance for a website and was offered a full time job without even asking for it. I was offered a cheap place to live with someone I knew. I went to visit my mom and step dad and ended up being given a free vehicle (I needed one). Later, I went back to visit them so I could drive my free truck home and brought a friend along with me.

This friend asked me to drive through her home town on the way back, to which I said yes. She also decided on the drive up that she was going to fix me up with her cousin. Her cousin lived 800 miles away from me and I had never met him, but I told her to go for it. That decision came from a literal voice in my head that said “yes.” Her cousin and I met. We soon began to talk regularly on the phone, over email and visit each other. This last summer he moved to my area and we now live together.

In conclusion, I think we often make decisions based on fear or what seems like the most practical thing to do, but really we know what we often should do. We sometimes don’t want to do it or are afraid to do it, but if you can get rid of those feelings and get to the core of what you know is good for you, the world really does hold you and shuffle you along a path that will lead you to better and happier things.

Webs of Fear by Carolyn Jones

I fall into the category of hearing the voice, following where it took me, and discovering great beauty in myself and others. By following my bliss, I passed through the gates of my heart.

I am a photographer. Several years ago, I discovered a community filled with wrought-iron entry gates. I grew to love these gates and could not stop photographing them. That is the voice I listened to initially, the one that said to keep shooting them. Drawn to their beauty, they began to represent the ways in which my heart was closed – to myself, to others.

I kept photographing the gates and soon I had a collection, a series. I listened to the voice that said to name them, naming each gate using words from lists I had made. My lists included feelings, both positive and negative, principles of living, and ways to treat others and myself. The titles of the “Gates of the Heart” series can be found on my website at http://www.carolynjonesphotographs.com.

After naming these gates, I had an epiphany. One day in my journal, I wrote: “I have spent a lifetime spinning webs of terror and shame that stand as sentinels to my heart.” This was very powerful, as not three days before, I had named an image of spider’s web on a gate “Webs of Fear.” I realized that my journal entry described the image and its title.

I followed the fork searching through my journals for anything that could be used to match with a gate. With few exceptions, I found prose that paired with each image.

Then the voice told me to compile a book of the paired prose and photographs. The result has been “Opening the Gates of the Heart”, a book about my journey through the gates of despair to peace and joy. I am currently following the voice that is encouraging me to tell my story, and I am blogging my way through the book. You can follow along as I journey through the book at http://www.gatesoftheheart.wordpress.com.

Not only have I been willing to listen to that small voice that has progressively led to my book which I am told is filled with hope and inspiration, I have been able to heal, as I have gone through the gates of my own heart, as well.

23 year old Derian King was returning from a party one evening . A snowstorm blanketed chilly Chicago that evening and road plows had only cleared the major roads so far.

At 1 AM in the morning, she stopped at a traffic light. A voice inside of her told her to turn left at the signal. She couldn’t figure out why she would be thinking such a thing since that was not the way to go home. Home was straight ahead. And she wanted to get home just as fast as possible.

At first, she ignored the voice. In an unemotional, matter of fact manner, the voice kept repeating “Turn left at the signal.” This just didn’t make any sense to Derian. The signal seemed to stay red for a long time while she battled back and forth between just taking her normal way home and turning left for no reason at all. Then she began to feel hunger pains.

Ah hah, she thought, there was a 24 hour chicken restaurant down the road if she turned left so she figured that was what the voice was about. She decided to turn left at the signal and get some chicken.

A short ways down the road she saw a car that had plowed into a snow bank. There was a man and woman standing outside the car and the woman was holding a baby. Derian stopped. They didn’t have a working phone to call anyone. The couple had kept the car running so they would have heat to protect the baby but now the car had run out of gas. It was very cold and there was no one around to help. They had been praying for someone to come along and assist them.

Derian called a tow truck and had them stay in her car to keep warm until the car could be taken care of. Then she drove them home.

So where did the voice and the hunger pains come from? Why did the light stay red for so long? Some people, upon hearing this story, immediately think that maybe ESP is at work here. Could Derian have picked up this couple’s message or energy or something and translated it in her own way?

Whether you believe in ESP or not, the facts don’t seem to support this theory. Notice that the voice she heard wasn’t one filled with worry or concern. It gave no indication of danger, emergency or other feelings that would typically come from a couple in such a situation. The voice spoke in a matter of fact way which gave no indication that anything was wrong. It just told her to turn left without any emotion at all.

These facts tend to support the notion that the voice came from someplace else other than the couple. So whom or what was observing this couple in trouble and told Derian to “Turn left at the signal?” Is someone upstairs watching over us if we would only listen? And if we don’t act on the voice, does it cause other things to occur such as hunger pains to help us make the right choice?

Like Derian shared her story, share your own story

If you’ve ever listened to your inner voice or feelings to make a choice, please share your story on this website. I am collecting 1000’s of stories just like Derian’s for the book I am writing “Life Is A Fork In The Road.” Your story is important because it will add something unique from all the rest. What I learn from all these stories added together may help us better understand how we can make better choices in the future and learn more about how the universe works.

Kelly Ketelboeter shared this story:

It was 2002 and I was completely miserable in my job. Prior to this realization I didn’t see my work as a job I saw it as a career. I loved what I was doing and felt I was making an impact. That was until one fateful day when I was confronted by the CEO and the EVP along with my boss. I had been home sick with pneumonia for a week and got a call from my boss that I had to come in for an important meeting. It took everything I had but I pulled myself together and went to the office.

As I entered the conference room, I had a very uneasy feeling and had no idea why I was there or what the meeting was about. The CEO and EVP began by berating me about a training session that had taken place 4 months earlier. They continued spewing verbal vomit all over me about things that did not happen. They had no facts, where talking about something that had happened months earlier, completely discounted all my hard work and effort and did it all with the conference room door open. I sat there in complete disbelief, feeling sick to my stomach and completely blindsided by my boss. That was the day that changed my life.

After that fateful meeting, I completely checked out from my work, lost all respect for my leaders and wanted to get out of that company as fast as I could. As fate would have it I received a call from a consultant I had hired to provide some training for our company. He asked if I would be interested in working with him to deliver sales and service training to his clients. His business had grown so much and he needed extra help. There were no guarantees for work, I would be a self-employed consultant, there were no benefits and there was absolutely no security.

I had met this man two times in my life but this opportunity seemed like a gift and the timing was perfect. My friends and family thought I was crazy to even consider giving up a secure job with a bi-weekly paycheck and benefits galore. Something inside me though said those things didn’t matter without respect and trust for your leaders or from your leaders.

So I took the plunge, quit my secure job and said good bye to steady paychecks. It was the best decision of my life. Seven years later I am still working as a consultant for the man that rescued me from hell. I have never worried about a steady paycheck. The money came and it came fast. I still don’t have benefits but that doesn’t matter at all to me. I am happy, I love what I do and I have been given opportunities I never would have had if I didn’t take the plunge into self-employment.

Did I hear a voice that told me take the plunge? I did. It was my inner voice telling me I could not work where I was not appreciated, where I did not trust my leaders or have respect for them. I also think that if the events of that fateful meeting with my previous CEO and EVP hadn’t happened I wouldn’t have jumped at another opportunity with absolutely no security. The voice in my head and heart told me go for it. To create my own future instead of leaving it in the hands of others. To go blindly into a new relationship without many facts and no guarantees.

I also believe the decisions I made are part of a larger plan and grand design for my life. I have met one of my best friends, started another consulting company and I am in charge of my life. I have met so many unbelievable people in my journeys that I would not have met had I not listened to my inner voice.

Like Kelly shared her story, share your own story

If you’ve ever listened to your inner voice or feelings to make a choice, please share your story on this website. I am collecting 1000’s of stories just like Kelly’s for the book I am writing “Life Is A Fork In The Road.” Your story is important because it will add something unique from all the rest. What I learn from all these stories added together may help us better understand how we can make better choices in the future and learn more about how the universe works.