A Blessed Journey

Depression crept in like a thief around November and cast its pall on Christmas and the new year for several years. New Year’s Eve was always the worst. It seemed to highlight all the things I didn’t do, all my failures I experienced throughout the year. I didn’t want to reflect because, when I did, I returned to the same question that haunted me every year…

Is this all there is to life?

Which led to:

Why am I still here?

With each passing year, I ruefully gained momentum towards fifty. When I considered the years I had left versus the years I had left behind, the cruel reality hit me. I don’t have a lot of time to accomplish what I want and the knowledge of that taunted me. I knew I wasn’t where I wanted to be. And no matter how I tried, I couldn’t seem to make any headway in getting out of the rut I was in. At almost fifty, I was more broke than I’d been since my twenties, making less than I had since my early thirties, and felt like I had absolutely nothing to show for the years of hard work. 

Then, jealousy set in as I watched my peers flourish. Then, I became angry at God. I questioned what I’d done wrong to deserve to be cast so low. I tithed. I served at church. I read my Bible and prayed. I worked hard and gained no traction. I held on to Luke 6:38 where it says, “Give and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full–pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.” (NLT)

I saw nothing running over. Ran out? Yes. Ran dry? Absolutely.

But, during that desert time, when I was desperate for a breakthrough, I found an answer and then, as I was ready to receive the truth, I received more answers.

The first answer came on New Year’s Eve in 2018. I had played hooky from church because I couldn’t muster a cheerful face that day. In fact, I wasn’t sure I even wanted to live. I wasn’t suicidal, necessarily, but I just didn’t want to live anymore. As I sat in front of the television, watching a sermon, my chest felt like it was being ripped open. My desperation had reached a physical manifestation. I cried out to God, “please help me! Tell me what to do.”

I turned off the television and listened. One word kept repeating inside of my head. “Write. Write. Write. Write.” 

I felt let down by that answer, in all honesty. Write? I hadn’t written since my early twenties. How was writing going to get me out of the pickle I was in?

I’d heard what He said, so I was going to try it. I started a blog titled She Rose Up and it went well for a while, gaining a small but growing following, but after six months, I hung it up. I wasn’t receiving any responses from readers and viewership was going down, and I took that as my writing wasn’t resonating with anyone. Maybe it wasn’t good enough. Angry again, I deleted the blog account and let the vanity domain expire. She Rose Up would be no more.

The following New Year’s Eve rolled around, and I found myself in the same place. This time, I rented an Airbnb, with money I didn’t have, to have a retreat with God. In my heart, I declared if I didn’t get answers; I was walking away from my faith. (By the way, it’s never wise to bargain with God this way. It’s manipulative. But that’s where I was‌. A very broken person.)

The Airbnb owner was a Christian life coach, so I scheduled a session with her while I was there. I don’t know what I really expected to happen, but what happened was unexpected.

The first day I was there, I sat next to the little pond at the rear of the property. It was an unusually warm day. The views of the Blue Ridge Mountains from that little Adirondack chair were stunning. I sat there for probably two hours. The only sounds were of nature–the ducks on the pond, the geese flying in formation in the cloudless sky, the wind as it brushed through the evergreen trees. While I sat there, I just existed.

The next day, I woke up to snow. God had given me the most beautiful scenery to view. It felt like a gift just for me.

Now, I’ve had coaching sessions before, but Christine was unique. She had short, spiky, red-streaked hair (when I say red, I mean red) and she spoke with a voice of authority. She knew God and His character and knew her place in His kingdom. Christine asked me poignant questions, she prayed with me, and she shared the second answer I received to my original question "is this all there is?" Prayerfully, she told me, “I believe God wants you to know that He is going to reintroduce you to the desires of your youth.”

I honestly did not know what that meant. I didn’t remember having any desires when I was young. Seriously. Nothing came to mind. Did “youth” mean as a child, an adolescent, or a young adult? I overanalyzed it, like I did with a lot of things, and felt stymied. 

I didn’t leave the retreat feeling neglected, though. I knew God had met me there. It was a quiet meeting. There wasn’t sky-opening moments. I didn’t even cry. If I had to sum up the experience, I would title it “stillness”. And that was what I needed. I needed to be still–stop striving, stop trying to make things happen–so He could do His work (Psalm 46:11).

Another year went by and I didn’t have any better idea of what “desires of my youth” meant than the day Christine uttered the words. I faced another New Year’s Eve, frustrated and disenchanted. But January 2023 came and with it, an online Bible study based on the book of Proverbs. I attended the daily Bible study online and began genuinely seeking God. Every morning, I shut myself in the walk-in closet in my bedroom. I attached poster boards to my wall, wrote my thoughts and prayers.

Do you know what happened? I began looking forward to my mornings with God. He changed my heart during those morning sessions. He gave me unspeakable joy that had nothing to do with my circumstances. I realized I was seeking the wrong things. In Matthew 6:33, Jesus said, “But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” (NIV) I learned that seeking God should have been my first step. Not seeking what he could do for me, but seeking HIM regardless of whether He gave me what I wanted. Because, ultimately, His presence was what I needed.

A few months later, while I was sitting on the futon in my office doing my daily devotional, something profound happened. Bear with me; this is going to sound strange. I felt as though someone poured knowledge into my open head. I suddenly understood what Christine had shared with me two years beforehand when I wasn’t thinking about it. My mind was engaged with my devotional studies. But out of nowhere, understanding was there. And it was what God had told me back in 2018.

Write. Write. Write. Write.

You see, when I was a child, I wanted to be a writer. I wrote my first full novel when I was eleven years old. I wrote poetry, songs, and books. As a senior in high school, I wrote a poem that my creative writing teacher urged me to submit to Harper’s Magazine. With her help, I sent it (and I received a nice, little rejection letter to go along with it). At the end of the year, my school held a speakeasy event, and they asked me to read that poem. I did it, although my voice trembled with fear the entire time.

I studied English in college and my English professor, Dr. Lovelace, encouraged me to pursue writing professionally. I told him I couldn’t make a living that way. I didn’t want to be poor. (I’d been there and never wanted to go back to it.) He told me I was being lazy.

So, I gave myself over to a career that would make the money I wanted and I shoved all my passions and hobbies into a closet for over twenty years as I climbed the career ladder. The rungs of that ladder broke in 2017 and I lost my job. The job that I had wrapped my identity, my self worth around was gone. That’s when I started feeling there was nothing left for me in this world and started the vicious yearly cycle of despair.

By the end of 2023, I wrote and published my first novel, Picking Up the Pieces. In 2024, I completed a second novel, Doing the Hard Things, for publication in early 2025. I’m currently writing two other novels. 

What God said has come true. Trust Him!

As I approach the new year, I no longer dread it. It’s not like I’m accomplishing monumental things. Good things, yes, but not earth shattering things. I still see failures, things that have gone undone. But rather than allowing them to define me, I now see them as opportunities.

I’m not at my final destination, but I sure am getting closer. You know, sometimes the best things come from our dry seasons, although it certainly doesn’t feel like it in the middle of it. As I look back, not just on the past year but the past eight years, I view the topsy-turvy journey as a beautiful road. Good and bad times marked the journey, but that's life. We get a bit of both, but I think how we choose to look at our journey is the most predictive of our future outcome. Zig Ziglar once said, “If you are selective about the things you choose to read, look at or listen to, then you are taking effective action against negative thinking. It's just like with a computer; if you change the input, you will change the output.”

Or, if you’re not a spiritual person, take it from Willie Nelson who said, “Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you’ll start having positive results.” 

Now, I don’t have all the answers. I’m a work in progress, like the rest of you. But, I will say if I hadn’t been willing to lean in with God and dig deep, dwelling on the good things and learning from the not-so-good, I would have lost out on blessing after blessing. I learned so much–about God, about me, about the world–and I have so much left to learn. I look forward to the coming year with great excitement to see what comes next!

Here's to wishing you a spectacular 2025! I hope you experience wonderful moments that evolve into treasured memories. Go out there and experience that great, big world! There is so much out there for each of us. Keep your eyes open wide for the opportunities. Learn lots. Love big!