You wonder how you got here. How everything spun so wildly out of control. Everything’s spinning so fast and somehow along the way you lost everything that held you down so now you have nothing. Where did your anchors go? You thought you’d been holding on to them all along, but suddenly you’re floating and feel all alone. My God what happened… My God, where did you go? God what are you intending here? I was trying so hard… where did I go wrong? What am I supposed to be learning here? What do I do God?! I don’t know what to do…
I’d been in this state my whole first semester of college and seemingly about three to four months before then. I had lost touch somehow because I was so in the practice of being in touch that I was just going through the motions. The issue with this is that I was lost it without even realizing. I prayed emptily, not knowing what I really should have been praying for. I stayed this way till suddenly I was spinning so out of control, the ground dropped from under me and my mind and emotions went wild. Academically I was doing well, but I was slammed with thoughts, emotions, situations and relationships I had never dealt with before. This is God’s specialty, and I did not turn to God in the way that was truly going to help me. Also, because God wasn’t finished. What seemed like weeks and months of tears, confusion, mental and emotional breakdowns, I had to experience one final blow. The instrument of this blow is not important, but it pushed me to the edge. It seems like I had been jumping through the same hoops I set for myself for years now and you know what? God was just gonna let me. God let me, so that I would finally find my limit, and with God’s grace be able to change it around. This final blow caused me so much mental and emotional turmoil that I pushed away my friends, I stopped eating for a short period of time, I kept crying with a sunken press on my chest day in and day out, and I heard an ugly voice whisper demons in my ear like I never have before. My God, what do I do? Time passed and that helped. I started eating regularly very soon, and although it was awkward and difficult, I reconnected with my concerned friends. About a month and a half after the initial blow, for no seemingly significant reason at all, I prayed in the way I really needed to. Now a lot of my high school life I wrote in a journal and I journal things that are just in my head and tend to only do it when things were really important; normally the bad times. I had bought a journal months and months ago and despite all the things I’ve talked about, I hadn’t written in it yet. I did that night, and it seems my soul just reached out to do it because it needed a rest and a change. In my own writing, I wrote. Praying to God and to feel God’s presence, but little did I know that God reads just as well as listens.
In the morning I felt better. Now I don’t need to hear how cheesy this all sounds and how much of Bible-thumping touchy feely Jesus story it sounds like. When I pray, I don’t expect immediate results or noticeable reactions, but I got them. They say the intent of prayer isn’t to change God, but to change us. By God is that true too. When I woke up in the morning I felt happy, and there was no longer a weight on my chest. My parents were coming down from home that day to have lunch with me and I told them about it. Even in my objective observation, experiences like this are what keep me a believer. I prayed to feel God’s presence and I did. I have been graced with a small miracle.
Since then everything has turned around. With this experience along with other inspirations and promises to improve my semester, I’m happier and more changed and more ME than I have ever been. My situation’s not perfect now, I have simply improved as a person to better handle this imperfect environment. In this transition, I have come to realize a few things. I had gotten knocked on my ass because before, my castle had been built on a pillars of sand; a sandcastle if you will. God kicks down sandcastles… so that you can begin to build a kingdom of stone. With God, you can begin to build your mighty empire, stronger than you ever thought before. This is exactly what I am doing. I needed to be knocked off my rocker and have my whole world crash and burn so that I could rise through the ashes, and God was the flames. I see that now, so I will begin to truly build my empire and focus on me. How am I doing it?
You have the power to be happy every given moment you choose. Varies books, readings, music and lyrics reminded me of this positive aspect of myself. A friend once told me, during one of my emotional breakdowns, that “when you close your eyes, you are alone, and people are only there if you let them in.” Any time I get really stressed out, I close my eyes and remember it’s just me. Me, are you good? Yeah I’m good.
The second I realized that having been blessed with this miracle turn around, I am obligated to share it with others. I am now constantly on the mission to make people feel good and being a light to their life the same way God and so many other inspirations have brought to mine. Keeping God at the center of my being helps me to act more God like, more Jesus like to be more accurate. This change had so little to do with my environment, just the me that was in it.
Keep in mind the next time you feel knocked off your rocker, this it probably more about you and your human condition that it is the world around you. It isn’t God trying to punish you or make things hard on purpose. It might not be what you’re supposed to learn, but what you’re supposed to change. Who and what can you turn to to really recenter yourself. God is always there to guide you back.
Lastly, have the discipline and open mindedness to do it. It wasn’t easy to break some of these habits and mindsets. No human likes to do that at all, but that stubbornness is why there is struggle. The inability to adapt and change into the butterfly God meant for you to be is only going to keep you from flying.