Growth

I think life is amazing. The longer I live, the more I see that God's plan to help us learn--life--is really well designed. It is so real, so hard, but possible. Every experience has built in learning experiences, difficulties, and chances to use our agency. He set everything up so that we could maximize our learning time here.
This week I have been thinking about growth. I only understand it on the level I'm at, but I'm starting to get a picture. When I was a little kid, I never wanted to grow up. Being grown up looked so much more complicated and boring. Growing just looked painful and unrewarding. What I didn't understand is that at that stage in my life, I couldn't even comprehend the joys of memories built up, being able to help people outside of myself, and of work well done.
I'm sure you know this, but little kids brains are still developing. Actually, experts agree that a person's brain is still growing and developing until they are around 25. So I'm not even there yet! (and I'm sure that I will continue learning more perspective with my fully developed brain after that.)
When a kid is still a kid, it is physically impossible for them to truly understand abstract ideas (they don't have deductive reasoning skills, and logical stuff is beyond them). They don't have that part of their brain yet. But the thing is, they don't know that they can't think as well as an adult. They feel like their brain is all there and that there isn't any part of a situation or conflict that they can't understand. They know that there is stuff they don't know, but they feel like they are capable of understanding everything. They aren't.
I feel like that is very similar to our relationship with God. Sometimes I feel like I am able to understand the big picture, that I am able to understand the purpose of life and why things happen. But then I am reminded that "For my thoughts are not your thoughts and your ways not my ways, saith the Lord" (Isaiah 55:8). If it all made sense, I would know it wasn't from God because I am not able to think the way He does. It is physically impossible for me to understand everything. My brain is not fully developed--even if I was older than 25, my brain still wouldn't be fully developed. Even if God sat down and explained everything to me in words I understand, I still don't think I would understand it all. I have to wait for resurrection day for a perfect brain, and even then I'm sure there will be a learning curve.
I'm not saying we shouldn't try to understand everything, because we certainly try to teach our children everything that they can grasp. But we shouldn't get frustrated with God when He doesn't make sense in our logic. The "God logic" part of our brains hasn't developed yet. It does make me look forward to learning more and more and someday, in a long time, my understanding will grow to a perfect day.
What I do understand now is that growth is necessary for progression. Growth by definition is change. Therefore, change is required for progression. I just have to be soft enough for God to change me and my perspective and my thinking in the right direction. I also have to be hard enough so that Satan or the World can't change me in the opposite direction.
(I'm not sure that this will make sense to anyone but me, but there you go.)