Anxiety…..
A story I ‘ve shared around my battle with anxiety has come up several times over the past few weeks, so I felt led to write about it. I’ve dealt with anxiety most of my adult life and going back to my teenage years. Not many people knew until recently as I managed to hide it, and at times mask with alcohol. When the car accident occurred, my anxiety was at its highest, ever. I was in constant pain and always on edge, anticipating the next shoe to drop and Xanax became my best friend. Several difficult events unfolded throughout 2016 and 2017 and I was still carrying baggage. In mid-2019, our family began attending a new church in our new neighborhood. A month or so in, our pastor Rob Danz began a new series on anxiety. I took more notes during this series than I ever have in my life. My first plan of action was to take some of the scriptures from the sermons and put them in my phone as daily reminders. Re-reading every day would reinforce the message and prepare my heart for the day. I had 4 different scriptures inside Apple Reminders on daily, recurring times of 4:30am, 10am, 12pm and 2pm. I read each one when receiving the notifications throughout the day. One scripture was Philippians 4:4-7, “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Reading this scripture daily prompted me to be intentional about gratefulness and constant thanksgiving. For the next 30 days, I wrote 5 things I was thankful for. I would thank Christ during my prayer time for the items on my list, And the challenging part: anytime I caught myself complaining about something, I had to give thanks for 5 more things. One other rule: no repeats. I felt my trust in God growing every day.
There is much more to this story, but the most important part is this trust is what walked me through my injury recovery. Although I grew up in church and had rededicated my life to Christ a few years prior, this was the first moment I fully surrendered a difficult situation to Jesus and allowed him to help me grow through the experience. And through that, it was the first time in my life where I truly felt “the peace of God, which transcends all understanding”.
I don’t know where I would be today without it. And the anxiety? I feel like an entirely different person. Praise Jesus! I quit Xanax cold turkey and never looked back. (I don’t recommend cold turkey approach–I learned it can be dangerous after I did it).
This week in church I felt challenged. Current sermon series: “Desperate Gratitude”. Conviction smacked me in the face throughout the week as my heart of gratitude is not where it should be. It’s easy to let the foot off the gas when things are going well and we’ve been extremely blessed over the past few years. It’s time to re-focus on heart on endless gratitude.
The “Daily Gratefulness” challenge is back on…Rachel and I already agreed to be each other’s accountability partner.