Belief:
It has been a week since my last post and I have pondered and prayed about what to post next. In a way I get scared and excited when I think about posting again. Excited because I really want to do this and scared when I think about what I should share, the timing of what I should share, praying that my words would be God’s words and that they would fall on the right ears.
People have asked me many times over the years, “How did you end up the way you are now? How did you…?” I think they are all usually too polite to say, “How did you not end up a total screw-up or mental case?”
While I feel like it was many factors that contributed; faith and hope in the Lord was the key. I am not sure why but I have always felt and believed that there would be relief from pain, hurt and confusion. Why did I have the faith and belief? I don’t really know. I don’t remember really thinking about it specifically. The only thought I specifically remember thinking as a teenager in the midst of my pain was, “That somehow I would help others who had been hurt similarly”. That was it.
I had read enough books and knew that there were other choices I could have made, other paths I could have chosen. I know friends that have struggled with suicide and for some reason that was never a line of thinking that I stuck with me. So I think that my “hope and faith” in the future came from the simple reality that if I had no hope or faith that life could be different than my current reality –then what would be the point. I think it was, “faith and hope” or nothing at all-suicide. All that to say that I never really gave thoughts of suicide much thought.
Control and Choices:
I am sure that I am not the only person to want to control my environment in the present and the future. I often wonder if had been able to respond to my pain in a different way, if my future would be different. I never really planned to have control issues. Control started in the middle of the pain. I thought in a weird bizarre way that I could control aspects of my situations. Hah! I would even make up these little deals in my mind, “If A occurs or doesn’t occur, then I can do B or feel B”
This is an area of my life that has often been an issue. I have learned that there is an opportunity cost to our choices. I look back to the past and wonder how things would have changed if I hadn’t been afraid then. When I was playing the game of Life with my son tonight I was reminded that when I get posed with a fork in the road of life I want to know what the potential outcomes might be before I have to make the decision. Of course I know that we can’t really know or accurately predict the future. I can evaluate with best and worst case scenarios. At some point I have to act in faith and trust.
I hope that for anyone else that is in pain or hopelessness, they remember there is always hope for a different future a different path. Just keep putting one step in front of the next in the next positive direction. Some days can feel hopeless with no end in sight, but “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” Lamentations 3:22-23.
Many blessings,
Shannon
It has been a week since my last post and I have pondered and prayed about what to post next. In a way I get scared and excited when I think about posting again. Excited because I really want to do this and scared when I think about what I should share, the timing of what I should share, praying that my words would be God’s words and that they would fall on the right ears.
People have asked me many times over the years, “How did you end up the way you are now? How did you…?” I think they are all usually too polite to say, “How did you not end up a total screw-up or mental case?”
While I feel like it was many factors that contributed; faith and hope in the Lord was the key. I am not sure why but I have always felt and believed that there would be relief from pain, hurt and confusion. Why did I have the faith and belief? I don’t really know. I don’t remember really thinking about it specifically. The only thought I specifically remember thinking as a teenager in the midst of my pain was, “That somehow I would help others who had been hurt similarly”. That was it.
I had read enough books and knew that there were other choices I could have made, other paths I could have chosen. I know friends that have struggled with suicide and for some reason that was never a line of thinking that I stuck with me. So I think that my “hope and faith” in the future came from the simple reality that if I had no hope or faith that life could be different than my current reality –then what would be the point. I think it was, “faith and hope” or nothing at all-suicide. All that to say that I never really gave thoughts of suicide much thought.
Control and Choices:
I am sure that I am not the only person to want to control my environment in the present and the future. I often wonder if had been able to respond to my pain in a different way, if my future would be different. I never really planned to have control issues. Control started in the middle of the pain. I thought in a weird bizarre way that I could control aspects of my situations. Hah! I would even make up these little deals in my mind, “If A occurs or doesn’t occur, then I can do B or feel B”
This is an area of my life that has often been an issue. I have learned that there is an opportunity cost to our choices. I look back to the past and wonder how things would have changed if I hadn’t been afraid then. When I was playing the game of Life with my son tonight I was reminded that when I get posed with a fork in the road of life I want to know what the potential outcomes might be before I have to make the decision. Of course I know that we can’t really know or accurately predict the future. I can evaluate with best and worst case scenarios. At some point I have to act in faith and trust.
I hope that for anyone else that is in pain or hopelessness, they remember there is always hope for a different future a different path. Just keep putting one step in front of the next in the next positive direction. Some days can feel hopeless with no end in sight, but “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness” Lamentations 3:22-23.
Many blessings,
Shannon