The Sloth and The Butterfly

Sometimes I really don’t like being a human. It’s a lot of trouble. I don’t like change, and that just keeps happening, like, ALL THE TIME. Like for my WHOLE life. It’s ridiculous, really. And then I have to change to keep up with the changes. And I really like to just do whatever I want whenever I want to do it, and for those things that NEED to get done, well, I like to do those on autopilot. Change requires me to think. Change requires a lot of work. Change requires a lot of uncomfortableness. I’d prefer to be a sloth – take lots of naps, wake up for snacks, and poop once a week…perfect!

But I have to keep in mind that OTHER thing about being human: how I feel after I’ve changed. How I feel when I’m not uncomfortable anymore and I know more than I did before. I’m better at being a human than I was before. I’m able to look back at where I was and see how far I’ve come. I’m able to share with other humans what I’ve learned. I’m able to comfort other humans who are drudging through the same uncomfortable changes. So my humanity desires the life of a sloth, but God wants me to be more like a butterfly. He wants me to embrace change and go through it with Him. He wants me to crawl with Him, as a caterpillar. He wants me to grow with Him, as a chrysalis. He wants me to soar with Him, as a butterfly.

Some changes are small, and not really that important in the grand scheme of life. Like when I was 7 and the post office changed all the addresses for our route, so I had to memorize a new one. Or when I was 8 and my parents got a new refrigerator. Both of these things caused me great mental anguish at the time. But they didn’t have a huge effect on anything else (except as being evidence of how much I hated change and that I was terrible at dealing with it).

Some changes are big, and require a lot of work to accept. For me, these changes usually end up with me hitting a bottom and having to crawl my way back to the surface and my new reality. The first bottom I hit was a spiritual one. After many years of searching for God, I finally found Him. But not at all where I expected. After years of smiling on the outside and crying on the inside, of trying to control everything else so that I wouldn’t lose control, I finally gave up and asked for help. And God brought me into a personal relationship with Him. As a caterpillar, I longed for a personal experience with God, and I envied those who talked about their experiences with Him as if He was alive and right there with them. I wanted to believe He was real, but I wasn’t sure because I had never seen Him myself. When I finally cried out for help, He answered. He brought me to a safe place where I could get to know Him, and get to know myself. Reading, praying, sharing with others, seeing His work and feeling His presence. I’m still learning to fly spiritually, but I know God is real, that He is with me, and that He loves me.

The second bottom I hit was an emotional one. It came about seven years later. Even though I had been walking with God, I was still not so great at dealing with myself or with other humans. I was a doormat, a martyr, a control freak, and a complete emotional wreck. I cried out for help again, and God answered me. He brought me to a safe place where I could learn healthier ways of communicating, of living, of being in relationships with others. I learned I had choices. I learned I would be ok no matter what. I learned to set boundaries. I learned how to care for myself. I learned how to say no.

The most recent bottom I hit was physical. I never got back to my healthy weight after having my second child, and I continued to gain slowly over the last six years. I tried to exercise, but that always made me think I had a license to eat anything. Then I started feeling really weak and tired and found out I had low iron, so I cut back on exercising but still kept my terrible eating habits. Instead of making sure I took my iron supplements every day, I’d eat more when I felt weak and tired (even though it didn’t help). I hoped that once we moved to Japan and there weren’t fast food restaurants on every corner, I would drop the weight easily. That didn’t happen, so I signed up for Noom. I have loved the program because it focuses on the mental and emotional aspects that affect our eating habits and choices. I’ve definitely always been an emotional eater, but in the last few years, food had become an idol. It was my go-to for celebration and for sorrow, and every emotion in between. But God brought me to another bottom when none of my clothes fit anymore. My doctor had been telling me for three years that I needed to lose weight, but I disagreed. Once I finally accepted it and was ready to make a change, it didn’t seem so scary or impossible. And God has been with me every step of the way.

As a human, I hate hitting bottom. It’s painful. It’s difficult. It’s uncomfortable. It’s FULL of changes. I wish that life were easy! I wish that there was no drama, no struggles, no changes. But as a butterfly, hitting bottom is the thing that brings me life! How can I hate the things that taught me to fly?

Bible verses to consider:

Genesis 28:15: I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.

Jeremiah 33:3: Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.

Isaiah 43:19: See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.

2 Corinthians 5:17: Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old is gone; a new life has begun!

Ephesians 4:22: You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

Ephesians 4:1: As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.

Ephesians 4:14-16: Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

Exodus 20:2-3: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me.

To the One Who Is Walking Through the Same Struggle

Dear Friend,

I don’t know what your situation is - maybe you have a pretty normal life, but a pretty chaotic brain; maybe you have loved ones with issues; maybe you have issues. (We’ve all got issues.) But I do know what it’s like to live with fear and anxiety, and to struggle to control everything to keep yourself from losing it.

You will get better. You will be ok. You have choices. I thought you might need to hear that.

Are you constantly thinking about how you can fix them? How you can rescue them? How you can save them?

You don’t have to. That’s their job.

Are you worrying about the future? What if they do this, what if they do that, what will happen to us?

You don’t have to. That’s God’s job. He’s got your back.

Are you reliving the past, replaying scenes and conversations in your head and thinking about what you wish you would’ve said or what you wish they would’ve done?

You don’t have to. All you can do is learn from it, forgive them and yourself, and move on.

Are you playing detective? Watching for signs and clues, piecing things together like a puzzle, trying to decide whether you want your greatest fears to be realized or squashed?

You don’t have to. You will find out anything you need to know at just the right time you need to know it.

Are you sweeping things under the rug? Pretending everything is great? Pasting on a happy smile and going through the motions of life?

You don’t have to. The truth will set you free. Talk about it and ask for help if you need it.

Are you walking on eggshells? Tiptoeing around them? Doing your best not to rock the boat?

You don’t have to. You can express your feelings with love. You can choose a new response. You don’t have to keep repeating the same unhealthy patterns.

Are you trying to prevent yourself from feeling anything? Pretending you don’t have any emotions other than happy ones? Or any emotions other than sad ones?

You don’t have to. It’s ok to feel sad, mad, happy, and anything in between. Feel your feelings and keep going.

Do you feel like you just can’t keep going? Like you might explode with anger or implode under the pressure?

You don’t have to. Do something good for yourself. And take things one day, one hour, one minute at a time.

Do you feel like every decision you have made up to this point has been wrong?

You don’t have to. You are right where you are supposed to be.

Do you feel responsible for everything and everyone? Are you letting everyone treat you like a doormat?

You don’t have to. You are responsible for you. Put up some boundaries and figure out what your responsibilities are.

Do you feel like you can never measure up to all the expectations?

You don’t have to. Start by figuring out what God’s expectations are, and then yours.

Friend, if this resonates deep inside you, know that you are not alone. Know that you can find peace and contentment. Know that there is help and hope.

Walking With God

At almost 37, when I think about all the things the Lord has helped me walk through, I have a pretty long list (even though I didn’t always realize He was with me at the time). But all of these obstacles can be boiled down to one issue that God continues to help me chip away at: anxiety. We hear this word a lot now, but it is still easily dismissed and hard to explain. I do not have a clinical diagnosis and for a long time I didn’t even realize that anxiety was what ailed me. I could attribute my issues to many different things: low self-esteem, perfectionism, people-pleasing, worrying, controlling, etc. And these are all definitely things I struggle with. But now I would say they are all symptoms of my anxiety. Underneath all of that has always been a feeling of differentness, of loneliness, of always wanting to do the “right” thing but also never knowing what the “right” thing was; an intense struggle to find peace through my own correct actions rather than through God’s infallible sovereignty. As a kid, my brain understood God as a judge who sat waiting for me to screw up, and then punish me accordingly. So I thought the best course of action was to stay off His radar. The less mistakes I made, the less attention He’d pay me. The closer to perfect I could be, the better for my life and everyone I knew. Rules were made for following, right?! So I spent the first 25 years of my life trying to live up to everyone’s expectations of me. And I attributed those expectations to God. I decided at a very early age to bottle every emotion inside so I wouldn’t rock the boat and so no one could tell me my feelings were wrong. I always had a hard time filling out those “About Me” sheets at school. My identity was so wrapped up in what others thought of me, I had no idea what I liked to do in my spare time or what my hobbies were. Since I was spending so much time and energy trying to do everything right, I didn’t understand my need for a savior. I was constantly trying to save myself. In my teens, I started my addiction to rescuing people. For many years, if you were a stable person and a good friend, we probably wouldn’t get along well. I couldn’t see myself as a valuable person unless I was helping you out. But if you were a basket case or an emotional train wreck, I would stick by your side till I was crying myself to sleep every night. I thought it was my duty as a Christian to “help” those who were “lost.” (This is not Christianity, friends. This is codependency.) The harder a relationship or a situtation got, the more I strived to bend it to my will. I was constantly trying to save everyone else. At 25, I found myself in total shock and disbelief at the state of my life. I went to therapy for the first time, because, of course, that was the “right” thing to do. Thankfully, in the midst of me blaming my husband for every problem I had, our therapist told me I had some things I needed to work on too. She suggested I attend a 12 Step group. I went to my first meeting because, of course, it was the “right” thing to do. But at that first meeting, God brought out those underlying issues that had plagued my mind for so long. At that first meeting I was no longer different, I was no longer lonely, and I soon learned that many times there was no “right” thing to do. I began to accept the fact that I too made mistakes, and that that was ok. I began to see God as a loving parent, rather than a harsh judge. I started to have a personal relationship with Him, instead of trying to stay off of His radar. I learned how to take care of myself well, and how to trust God to take care of others. I learned how to ask for help, and how to offer help without losing my sanity (this is boundaries). I learned what my hobbies and interests are! I learned that I too need a savior. Anxiety, for me, is like a hamster on a wheel in my brain. It is the constant chatter in my head about worries, fears, tasks, and faults. It is a spiritual battle for my brain between peace and chaos. Ultimately, it is asking me to choose between grasping for control and accepting that God is in control. Choosing God’s peace over my chaos isn’t always easy in the moment, but it does get easier over time. Each time that I recognize He is with me, it strengthens my faith and my ability to trust Him. Each time I choose to be thankful over being fearful or complaining, it strengthens my ability to let that hamster rest instead of putting him back on the wheel. God has been with me every step of the way and handpicked the people that helped me crawl out of my pit of despair. He knows my deepest worries and fears, and He knows how to help me overcome them. My journey isn’t always easy, but I am never alone.