Life is HARD. I’m constantly reminded that there is no free pass in life for bypassing struggle and pain. However, I am also learning truth about the significance of the struggle.   All of the quick one liners we hear when we are in pain that are hurtful and not very helpful run through my mind. We all know them. 

“God won’t allow things to happen that you can’t handle.”

“God must think you are strong to give you this battle.”

“All things happen for a reason.”

There are many more. There are whole books written on what not to say, but there are very few written on what to say. 

The problem is the RIGHT thing to say doesn’t exist without a true deep concern and willingness to sit in the struggle too.  It’s not what you say that helps, but your level of comfort sitting in the pain with someone. A person in pain can feel your discomfort, your fear, your uneasiness, and avoidance. That is truly where the frustration with the one line scripted responses comes from. There is truth in SOME of those one liners, but the attitude and willingness to face the struggle head on with you is what is truly missing. 

If you truly want to help someone who is in the valley and struggling. Ask to go to lunch, bring them a gift and stay, open up about how much you hate this for them. Be available, help with the little things that may be overwhelming for them, do them without making them figure out the logistics. Sometimes, if it’s all you can manage, a simple, “I hate this is happening” is the best response. Be willing to tear up and show them that you truly do hate it. 

Also, be available to say the hard things they may need to hear. Pray to be a vessel the Lord will use in their lives and don’t shy away from pointing out God’s promises or challenging their faulty thinking when God exposes it to you. We are to serve and love one another but that doesn’t always look like hearts and flowers. 

Let’s learn to sit in the mess with each other, to cry with each other, to engage when it’s uncomfortable, to serve one another without reservation or avoidance.  This is so important for loving one another well and for truly growing to be more like Christ ourselves. 

The new norm is to shy away from pain. Hide from it like that will make it go away. Facing hard things is a lost art. But the spiritual, relational, and emotional growth that comes from facing hard things together is SO VERY worth it. 

This is also getting lost in parenting. The new norm is to manipulate, fix, and allow our children to avoid pain, hard work, and struggle. This is creating an even more disconnected world because our children reach adulthood having struggled very little, and not being able to relate to others in the struggle. It lands our kids with very superficial relationships and very immature spiritual and emotional lives. They also cannot relate to those children who live without a referee or goalie and have major struggles. They could be such a blessing to those kids if we gave them the tools, but instead we leave those kids with more people who avoid their pain and cause them to feel alone in the struggle. 

Trauma is a huge hot topic today because of the new trends in this country and the fact that,”hurt people, hurt people.”  If we don’t stop the cycle of avoidance and superficial approaches to those deep in hurt, no matter what push we have nationally, the trend towards a population lost in the deep valley of PTSD and drugs will continue. Don’t forget that it is also true that “healed people, heal people.” Don’t avoid facing your pain, face it, grow, heal, and go serve and love others bringing them to a place of healing. Let your children be a part of that. This is where the answer to the Trauma and Opiate crisis lies. 

God in his wisdom knew that a perfect life without free will would make depth and true relationships impossible. A carved out perfect existence would make it impossible to have growth because we would be perfect, all the same with no experiences to teach us the power of love and joy. There has to be something to compare love and joy to in order for them to really exist. Unfortunately, freewill lends to corruption of love and joy.

I think the new parenting trend has parents trying to give kids the perfect life that we wish existed, but that can’t with the gift of freewill. No matter how hard we try we can’t give them a struggle free or perfect life. The crazy thing is the more we help them avoid struggle the more superficial their understanding of love and joy gets and the more selfish and self serving they become. 

As parents we need to sit in the struggle with our kids, show them our struggle. Let them experience watching you navigate the hard things in life with prayer, grace, and mercy, not with avoidance, alcohol, or aggression. Don’t let them leave the nest without experiencing what it means to struggle well. If you do, they will look to earthly ways of avoiding struggle and there are so many destructive ones that exist. 

Watching my children experience this thing called life, completely unscripted, with us has been unbelievable. My kids already at 12 and 7 know my story, the stories of those close to us, and those stories are shared daily. They understand that this life is hard and that struggle comes to all of us. We are teaching them how to be honest with themselves and us about their experience with struggle and challenging them to struggle well. I tell them all the time that I can’t wait to see what God will do with them because they are learning what I am at 39 when they are 12 and 7.  Imagine the growth that they can experience in their lifetime learning such valuable and life changing skills this young. Don’t underestimate what your children are capable of understanding, don’t hide your struggle, grow with your children through it. Through this kind of living God can move mountains in our lives and use us to help Him move mountains for others. 

For so long my joy was held off until….(this happens). The struggle came when I realized that even when that thing or event happened, there would be a new thought about a new thing/event that needed to happen before joy was possible. Chasing joy, banking on it coming through earthly happenings is futile.

Now I realize that joy comes in embracing Christ at all costs, in all moments, in all messes. His embrace brings joy. Only his embrace. A calm peaceful, joyful spirit is not achieved through earthly effort, happenings, or achievement, it only comes from a wholehearted closeness with God. One that comes with surrendering all that you are to Him every minute, one minute at a time.

I am continually amazed by our humanness collectively and the desire to avoid exposing anything negative about ourselves, including fear, insecurity, errors in judgement, weakness, lack of knowledge, or just that we are uncomfortable. The length that we will go to to avoid feeling vulnerable is crazy. In taking a hard look at who I am and why (mostly because of trauma) proving myself has been such a focus for me at any cost, from a mental and physical health and relationship perspective. I find that the need is an innate desire to prove that “I’ve got this!”

The truth is none of us can say “I’ve got this.” Giving in and truly being vulnerable requires opening our eyes to the fact that any perceived control we think we have is false and a ploy of the devil used to distance us from the freedom that is available in Christ. Freedom comes in admitting the truth, admitting our vulnerability and embracing it while trusting in God, understanding that our perspective is limited by our humanness. Letting go of pride and the desire to lean on our own understanding.

Peace comes in accepting that we are not in control and truly letting go and leaning on God. Trusting that he will use the hills, cliffs, and valleys in our lives for His glory to reach others with His love. Trusting that one day the growth and closeness that we have gained through struggle will shape us into the truest version of ourselves, much like as a mom watching the struggles in your child’s life teach them and help them grow into better stronger versions of themselves, God is watching us hoping that we choose to learn and grow and draw closer to Him through our struggles.

The catch (for me and those close to me) is that from the outside your behaviors might not look that different. We should all give and serve, putting ourselves out there in whatever way we can using our gifts for His glory. The change is internal. I learned with the busyness of the last month or so that I am working just as hard but the change is in the level of exhaustion and type of tired that I feel. When I was “hustling for worthiness” (Brene Brown) the internal dialogue was alway negative, “you messed up here, you should have…., you didn’t finish this..”. at the end of the day I was exhausted and then added to that exhaustion by beating myself up. Picking myself up out of bed to do it all again knowing it would never be enough. Today I am tired, but the internal dialogue is “God, thank you for using me and allowing me to rest in you.” There is joy, not from everything going perfectly or anywhere close to mistake free, but instead from knowing that I made myself available and vulnerable and God was able to shine because I wasn’t so worried about shining myself. No more hustling for worthiness, thank you Jesus!