DEVOTIONAL: GETTING UNSTUCK FROM MY THINKING RUT

DEVOTIONAL: GETTING UNSTUCK FROM MY THINKING RUT

Tuesday, January 15, 2019

Well I will say that last week I got so much love and feedback from my devotional post that I now feel this huge weight of needing to live up to that each week.

Thank you, thank you for everyone that read, shared, liked, sent me a sweet message, or even talked to me about my post after the fact. I loved reading and hearing what everyone had to say, and it warmed my heart to know that my words resonated with some of you. 

I will try not to disappoint as we move forward. 

With that being said, I will say that I felt a lot of pressure last week, and couldn't quite figure out what I was feeling. I kept thinking - is this what I should share next week, has this been the hardest part of this week - but then, that's not why I am here. I started this series so that I could honestly share the good and bad moments of my life as they happen. If I feel myself starting to "plan" a weekly devotional, well, that's when I will skip a week. 

But for now I still have some things to say. 

Although the week started wonderfully, and I felt lifted up by each of you after sharing my thoughts on Devastated but not Destroyed, it didn't continue so well.

I had a lot of frustration follow me through the week.

There were some things that happened both at work and at home, and I was overall frustrated. I couldn't wake up and get out of the house on time, I couldn't say the right things, I couldn't keep my feelings in check when I heard some not so great things, I couldn't control multiple situations, and so on and so forth. 

I found myself letting the negativity and frustration from the day before continuously bring me down. By midweek I was ready to throw in the towel. Do y'all ever feel that way? 

I tell ya, there was a moment one day before work where I literally wanted to turn around and go back in the house before I ever got out of the driveway. It's like when you feel everything in the world is against you... everything. 

I always know when I am in a funk because I let the smallest of things send me over the edge. I can't remember which day it was, but I had my hands extremely full as I was trying to get into my car. I dropped something over and over and over again, spilled coffee and got tangled in my jacket and purse. I felt like my life was crumbling. Dramatic, yeah? But seriously. Last week was just that kind of week, and every. little. thing was digging into me. 

That same morning when I finally got in my car and threw all of my belonging to the passenger seat, it hit me. It was just a moment. One of "those" moments nonetheless, but it was just a moment that like everything else, would pass. 

And it did. 

Let's be honest, not before I screamed some profanities though. But it did pass. And then I felt guilty for being so obnoxious and frustrated. 

The point of today is that we all have frustration and uncertainty in our lives. The question is though, are we going to let that form who we are and who we're meant to be?

Insert this weeks devotion from Lysa TerKeurst's book, Embraced: Getting Unstuck from my Thinking Rut. It pretty much sums up the sentence above when I ask if we (you and I) are going to let our thoughts/bad moments/frustrations shape who we are. Romans 12:2 - "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - his good, pleasing and perfect will.".

Again, Lysa said it best - "I have a choice to have destructive thoughts or constructive thoughts right now. I can wallow in what's wrong and make things worse, or I can ask God for a better perspective to help me see good even when I don't feel good". Those words, they dug deep into my heart. They hit the nail right on the head.

Early in the week I was wallowing, no doubt about it. Had a bad night, woke up pissed the next morning, and blamed the fact that I had a bad night. Had a crap day at work, felt like crap going into work the next day. All of that because I decided to keep negative thoughts circulating in my mind over something that had happened minutes, hours, days prior. What a waste of time. Right? When you think back on it, yeah. Such a waste of a perfectly fine day. I mean, it's okay to have a bad day - we're human. But why waste your life worrying about that one bad day.

Changing our thoughts will change our perspective.

We're here, we're alive. We have a God that offers more to us than we could ever imagine. Let's just be happy. Y'all in? 

Until next time.