Cannonball
Depression is this deep dark bitterness and fear that holds your heart captive, keeping you numb. Antidepressants, they help lift you up, but still, there is this strain, this sense of control. Sure, I can feel more then utter sorrow, but I also can't feel intense joy either. I'm stuck on this even keel level of emotional living. I can't cry without my throat feeling tight and sore, I can't laugh long without a strange stab of bitterness tainting my joy. Instead, I laugh in short bursts, cry silently, and sing as loud as I can, hoping the deep stirring of emotion will come if I can just fill the room with sound, hoping to fill the void left by my feelings.
At Come to the Fire, I was off my antidepressants. Not by choice, really, I just ran out the day before the conference and didn't have time to fill it before my mother and I left. But the last night and the next morning, when the medication was fully out of my system, never have I felt God's presence so deeply, or heard His voice so clearly! Was it my clear mind that opened me up to God's glory? Was it an abnormal intensity brought on only in my body's reaction to no pills? Are my antidepressants a wall between me and my Father? Or am I just fighting myself?
I ache to know God, to go all in, but everytime the spirit stirs, I feel this wall. My heart beats strongly and rapidly, when I come to moments of choice, do as the Spirit moves, or just continue on. I even sat at a stop sign for 10 minutes today, feeling God pulling me one way, but my home being in the opposite direction. When a car pulled up behind me, I immediately drove towards home. What scares me so? Is it fear? What have I to lose from following the tugs on my heart...and today, every instance, has been a trial of pride. I'll look like a fool, if it isn't as God says. My trust wavers, and I feel so heavy hearted afterwards.
In those moments, I try to forget myself, think of God's glory. But my whole life has been about my staying safe, staying out of the spotlight, pushing the attention elsewhere. Being out in the open, being vulnerable, especially with strangers, feels like it should hurt. So I pray, learning to give thanks even in my moments of weakness and confusion, fear and selfishness. Our God is good, and so I look to Him, praying that what I've learned from the world, will vanish, so that I can learn a whole new way of living in Him.
The world aches as we do... Thank God He loves us.
Blessings,
~Andrea Christine
At Come to the Fire, I was off my antidepressants. Not by choice, really, I just ran out the day before the conference and didn't have time to fill it before my mother and I left. But the last night and the next morning, when the medication was fully out of my system, never have I felt God's presence so deeply, or heard His voice so clearly! Was it my clear mind that opened me up to God's glory? Was it an abnormal intensity brought on only in my body's reaction to no pills? Are my antidepressants a wall between me and my Father? Or am I just fighting myself?
I ache to know God, to go all in, but everytime the spirit stirs, I feel this wall. My heart beats strongly and rapidly, when I come to moments of choice, do as the Spirit moves, or just continue on. I even sat at a stop sign for 10 minutes today, feeling God pulling me one way, but my home being in the opposite direction. When a car pulled up behind me, I immediately drove towards home. What scares me so? Is it fear? What have I to lose from following the tugs on my heart...and today, every instance, has been a trial of pride. I'll look like a fool, if it isn't as God says. My trust wavers, and I feel so heavy hearted afterwards.
In those moments, I try to forget myself, think of God's glory. But my whole life has been about my staying safe, staying out of the spotlight, pushing the attention elsewhere. Being out in the open, being vulnerable, especially with strangers, feels like it should hurt. So I pray, learning to give thanks even in my moments of weakness and confusion, fear and selfishness. Our God is good, and so I look to Him, praying that what I've learned from the world, will vanish, so that I can learn a whole new way of living in Him.
The world aches as we do... Thank God He loves us.
Blessings,
~Andrea Christine
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