There were two avenues growing up that set my heart of fire, they were:
Martial Arts and Fitness.
The martial arts was quite literally something that I was born into, watching my dad teach growing up, wether it was in a garage or a dojo setting. Was something that seemed to fit my personal desires.
Fitness followed, at an early age my dad placed a weight in my hand to teach me how to do a proper bicep curl. And taking a kids multi- vitamin to help me become strong. Martial arts and fitness were always on the forefront on my mind, even going through grade school, the thought of exiting the school doors to train filled my mind in such a captivating way.
It almost seemed as though, that these two avenues were my purpose and destiny in life. They weren’t vain pursuits for me. I didn’t merely want to make others look good on the outside, nor did I desire to teach others self defense for the sake of violence. Rather physically speaking the desire was to help others have a better relationship with their bodies, what they could do and who they could be.
With the martial arts, the ethos was similar, only that I desired to teach others how to have the security and confidence should they ever have to defend themselves, a loved one or a passer by from the hand of evil and danger. Fitness and martial arts are honestly the own two things that I’ve been good at and made me feel as though I was doing what God created me to do.
Though, if I’m exceedingly honest, it would seem that I’ve acquired more failures at both than there have been successes. Upon finally making the choice to become a certified personal trainer, perhaps my disposition was an over zealous one in that I believed that people with adaptive needs would flock to me, to become the best version of themselves.
Certainly, there is no denying that I’ve helped a fair amount of people with both my knowledge and passion. From a worldly perspective, it became exceedingly difficult to find paying clients. Often, being one that understands what living on a very fixed income is all about, there were many times I’d coach clients for free. The war in my mind was the equation of: do I want to make money or help others? What was more important to me?
Obviously helping others was the driving force, but money never hurt either, often out of the charity of my heart I only wanted to help others. Perhaps in hindsight, I shouldn’t have compromised on money as much if at all. The same can be said of the martial arts as well, teaching is something that has a profound love for. My of my greatest desires is to one day have a school of my own.
Yet, the reality of making money and retaining students has always been my dark shadow that has haunted me. So, what business do I have to even dream of a reality such as this? If you ask me, I don’t anymore. Or so it seems to be. These dreams have always been the spark that starts the engine of my soul, lately, however it would seem that its time to lock them up and toss the key away.
My personal bent has always been optimism, but maybe it’s time to see the reality for what it is, that being that I’m not very good as a trainer and martial artist. Perhaps it’s time for me to acknowledge them for what they are wishful thinking that will I will never succeed at. Perhaps this is only an ache in my soul, and will go away in time. At this point in time however, I feel as though there is nothing to show for in life. I feel as though I’ve failed too many times to ever have a straight path again.
Death is one reality that all humans share with each other, it comes for us all regardless of what factors make us up as a human being. Humans, especially in current times may not agree on much, and a lot more divides us than unites us.
The topic of death is one that I’ve written on before, yet in weighed on my heart as my eyes awakened to another day that God has set before me. A scary reality that few like to give credence to, is the lack of control that we posses as humans. Many times we can’t control the many factors that take place and shape our lives, and the chaos that shapes us, the parents that raised us and so on.
As it were, the one thing we can control is how we choose to respond to things that have happened to us, especially to what we see as bad. Through out my life, being born with CP, my childhood for the vast part was riddled with hardship due to the reality of dealing with various surgeries on my body and the long recover from each.
What my body and spirit endured through each surgery, shaped my young mind into a world view that was close to nihilism. All the pain that came upon me eventually made my mind and heart bitter, and over time they made comfortable homes inside me. My thinking was that of, this is how my life is going to be and this is my personal bent on life and existence.
While there was an early understanding that life was (and could be) a very cold, painful and bitter one. No one ever informed me that, if I faced everything that was inside me, that my life could change and I could be an entirely different person.
Of course, facing the realities and events that have shaped us into who we are today takes an exceeding amount of courage. It takes a certain amount of vulnerability, especially if we are going to find the courage and inner gull to look at ourselves for who we truly are.
There came a point in my life, where something inside me said that it was time for a change of course. I didn’t want to be an angry and bitter person anymore, one who faked the smile on his face. Certainly, I did not want the remainder of my life or even my last breath to be marked by pain and jadedness.
It was when I started reading more about stoic thought, that my thinking started to become more focused on death. Of course, as a Christian we too are told to be very mindful of the time that is given to us as it reality of eternity.
As a Christian, the reality of Heaven and Hell are two roads that can embark on, and for some the reality of hell is a laughable after thought. And yet, the more that I’ve personally thought about my life as it relates to death the more sober it has made me. There are people in this world, that claim that they will never forgive an offense that was done to them.
But what if ones own inability to forgive and let go, becomes hell (as it were) for you? what if you die with all that pain and agony inside you, with no way of escape? Even if there was no God that created everything and gave life, that’s still not a death to be desired.
It’s said and believed that hell is a party with friends, and yet if hell is true is a true existence when we did, it has to be far more painful and unending than anything else we could ever face in this world.
So once again, do you really want to leave this world without ever do the hard, scary work of not confronting your own darkness and pain? It is my belief and understand, that each of us are given ample opportunity of facing those realities about ourselves everyday.
The sad part of is though, is that some of us have become so comfortable in who we are and how we see the world that there isn’t a plausible alternative. That saddens my soul in such great and unexplainable ways.
If you have battled addiction for a long part of life, guess what? There’s still time to reverse the course of your life.
If you’ve made a habit of being deceitful and manipulating others, there’s still time to start living in and telling the truth. No matter how uncomfortable it may be. In doing so, you will experience a peace and weight lifted off you that you never thought possible.
You can let go of the pain and agony that life has brought you, wether you asked for it or not.
The process of trying to change ones life, is a long and sometimes an exhausting one. Sometimes it seems as though it us completely impossible to be different from who you once were. The fact of the matter is, however is that is possible to change. And while it may take a longer process that we would like, if you believe in God or not, you can take aim at dying without the heaviness of the world ruining you.
In this blog I’d like to share some very candid thoughts, on the reality of the Transabled movement. The reason that I’ve chosen to use the wording of movement, is simply because this isn’t a new issue so to speak. Yet in has been gaining much more traction in recent years. I’m also profoundly aware, that my thoughts might very well offend some, however in as much as my aim is to live at peace with others (both online and in real life) sometimes truth, for the simple nature of what it is, offends and cuts beyond the human flesh and understanding.
The reality of being transabled falls under what is called Body integrity identity disorder (BIID). This disorder is when a person has the desire to have their body medically changed into a physical impairment of some kind, whether that be visually impaired, amputee and even paraplegic.
In college this was a topic that I spend numerous hours, writing a term paper on. Somethings that caught my attention in a shocking manner, were people wanting to become blind and to accomplish such a task. It involved having acid poured into their eyes. I’ve known visually impaired people through out my life, and sometimes their desire to want be able to see is great.
In a sense they would do anything to see, even if it were a mere moment, they would never think of having acid poured into their eyes, my girlfriend has CRPS, due to a horse stepping on her foot and breaking all the bones in her foot, as a result she had to get her right foot removed. Her condition is not visible to the human, but what most people don’t know the amount of pain that she is in every day. Again, most everyday she wishes that she could get some sort of relief if for a moment. She wouldn’t wish what she must go through on anyone. I myself have lived with cerebral palsy for thirty-eight years, have had a handful of major operations on my back and lower body. The thoughts that flow through my mind the most, are wishing that my right-hand full use, and that my legs were able to do things that most of us take for granted every single day.
While the reality of mental health issues is very real, this in my opinion is much deeper than the mind. It is a profoundly spiritual one as well. This is a battle between good and evil, these people that want to have their bodies willfully changed to live as someone with a disability, are still people made in the holy and beautiful image of God. On the other hand, because we live in a fallen and broken world, the mirror that we as humans have, reflecting the image of God is broken. As such, the enemy, Satan attacks people in the best place that he can overtake them, that being the mind. As a Christian, is it is of great importance to pray for these people and pray for them.
It is of equal importance then, to confront the lies of the enemy with truth and love. And the truth is that, as a society we are being deceived and lied to. The Bible tells us that we are not our own (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Our bodies are gifts of God and as such we should honor our bodies by taking care of them and not destroying them. I can assure you that it is not in the heart of Father God to have people doing these things to themselves, yet because many of choose not to listen or adhere to Gods voice and word sin and brokenness play out. What causes my heart even more grief, not to mention how much it grieves and angers the heart of God as well, is the mere fact that medical professionals (doctors) are allowing such atrocity to take place in their own practices.
It’s as though the reality of doing no harm, means nothing to them anymore to them anymore. Unless it puts a percentage of money in their pockets, which they should be filled with shame for. Licensed mental health professionals, should be doing whatever they can to steer their patients away from the idea of radically changing their bodies in such a great way. One that will change their lives forever, without being able to truly weigh and not the consequences that can follow such a decision. This may seem strong, but medical and mental health professionals who give a green light for people, to go through with such a desire should not be allowed to practice any longer.
Once again, it may seem harsh that my conviction is to strip medical professionals of their ability to practice, who do great harm to others in this way, by virtue of pandering to one’s desires. The questions that we must ask ourselves as a society, is how far we are willing to let this slippery slope go? How much more will we allow people to willfully destroy their bodies before we wake up from our sleep and say enough is enough? I can’t speak for anyone else, but I’m tired of seeing society progress more and more into emptiness.
It’s time that we as people, start pushing back against these norms, rather than allowing people to go down such routes. They must know that there made in the image of God, they must know that there is purpose in the bodies that God has originally blessed them with. They must know that there is a spiritual war that is taken place for the mind and soul, they must know that nothing else can satisfy them, the way the presence of God can.
“It is not death that a man should fear, but rather he should fear never beginning to live.” -Marcus Aurelius This quote from Marcus Aurelius is thought provoking and frankly quite scary, why? Because his words cut deep in the human framework. Lately, sleep has been a fight for me, there have been a lot of dreams that take place in the spiritual realm. For those that don’t know much about me, I consider myself to be a religious person, despite my imperfections and the many-a-time that I’ve wandered from the path. As a religious person, the reality of death frightens me at times, even though I believe that I am eternally secure in Gods grace. The stoics spoke of death more than most because many of us run from the fear of death itself. We try and remove the fear of death from our minds by filling our minds with more busy times. And yet, time is passing, and we are growing older with time. Have you begun to live? How do we begin to define living? Personally, in my heart of hearts I’ve felt like I haven’t begun to live. Not even come close what I want to accomplish in life. The People that I want to try and help, the legacy that my heart desires to live. We put some much time into earthly things, thinking that they will bring lasting hope and significant, but they won’t nor will they ever. There was a movie producer once, that became so addicted and driven by money, that he kept saying to himself “one more million and I’ll be happy.” Was he? No, in fact even sadder his fat was a cold and dark one. I fear the worst of what God would say to me, upon seeing him in eternity… Him asking me: “Brandon, what did you do with the time I gave you?” And my fearful response would be, “Not much my king.” “For I didn’t make the most of the time and chances given to me.”
The serenity prayer is one of my favorite prayers to recite,
God grant me the serenity to accept the things that I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can; And the wisdom to know the difference.
The prayer is simple, but one that is always there in time of need. It also can be one that serves and comforts you. The first step is the acknowledgement of God, and our need for his mercy and help. One might stumble over the reality of a higher power existing, regardless of how one believes or feels.
There will be times in life (for all of us) when we feel powerless over our circumstances, and we will most certainly seek help outside of ourselves. Even if it is from another person or group of people. In these times, we seek out hope, wisdom, truth and even serenity. It points further to the reality that as humans, we were never meant to walk alone. Hold onto this given inclination, it might point you to the greatest truth ever discovered or even your destiny might be revealed.
Things we cannot change
All of us in life are surrounded by things we cannot change, for example, one could wake up in a perfectly good mood and ready to take on the day. Despite that, however, there might be the furthest from how you woke up. In fact, if you or I are not in control of faculties, we can find ourselves absorbing their very own mood. This is written from both experience and repeated failure. There are times in life where it is easier to deal with the world around me, and others where nothing but chaos surrounds. Anxiety pounces, and depression finds a way to mix itself in.
A few things that have aided me in this, beyond saying this prayer, is slow breathing through the nose and out the mouth: Breathing in 5 seconds slow and exhaling 5 seconds slowly. Repeat this for 2-5 minutes daily. The second practice is knowing that you cannot control how people act or what they decide to do. If on the other hand, were the cause of another’s problems, then take ownership of it as much as you can. Make the amends that are needing, with the understanding that is up to them how they respond. Thirdly, pray, even if you have never prayed before. There have been times, when alone that my prayers have been screams and laments. Though, I am not proud of the fact, none the less God’s spirit has always comforted me.
The Things We Can Change
Most often the things we can change, are the same things we refuse to do. Our hearts have a God ordained way of letting us know what’s wrong and what requires fixing. Yet, we knowingly suppress the truth of what we should do. For instance, we might believe that it is time to embark on the path of our own destiny. And yet, we don’t because we’re afraid of the judgement or attitudes of others. What we are meant to do, will continually rise to the surface until we do what must be done. We might not be able to control what happens around us and to us, but we can change how we respond to them. It takes a lot of time, and grace but it is a skill set that can be improved upon.
Its also something that you will fail at, a lot, rather learn to get back up quickly and stay on course. We can change quite a lot about ourselves, we only must be able to put in the work daily. We can learn self-control, to eat better, we can shed weight or body fat, we can improve the relationship around us, we can make the environments around us look and feel better. There is so much more that can added to the list, if only we let the discover the dreams and visions that God has placed inside of us, then we will find a mode of being and a true reason to live.
A man is called to adventure when the time comes to leave the home of his mother and father, it’s echo’s the words of Genesis 2:24: This is why a man leaves his father and mother and bonds with his wife, and they become one flesh. This is the reality for most abled bodied men, parents know that the day will eventually arrive, and the father usual takes it better than the mother. The mother typically wrestles more when their son or daughter leaves home and embarks on the journey and adventure of them, because there is a fear that overcomes them, usually about the safety and well-being being of their child. Any parent that had any amount of sense to them would feel this way, even that of a rugged and strong father. Imagine if your son or daughter was born with a disability, the fear that would fill a parent then. That sense of freedom and adventure still fills them as well.
My mother and I have butted head quite a few times, one of which times was when the desire for me to attend college, away from home. She didn’t like the idea at all, in fact she shot it down and told me that the only way that attending college would be a reality, was if it was online. Her reasoning was that it would be much safer for me, and she could help should something happen to me. And as much as she shot down my desire to attend college outside of the home, the more the desire for me to fight for what I wanted came out. We had a few several heated arguments, at this time the ability to be able to control my emotions was rather difficult and thinking before the words came out of my mouth didn’t exist as a practice. My mother is a very stubborn woman in nature, and she doesn’t back down until she gets what she desires, so you can naturally see where my same attitude comes from.
My father graciously took me to tour a few college campuses in town, truthfully, which could have been any local college, but it was the size of a few colleges freaked me out and ultimately it seemed right to me to choose a very small faith-based college. After getting accepted to the college of my choosing, which was a very simple and straight forward process, came the time to pack up my things in move into my dorm. If my memory serves me correct, my mom stayed home and my dad and sister helped me move into my dorm, my mom had tears in her eyes as we were leaving. Which in a way made me feel bad, but this was something that God has called me to do, and when he commands, you execute the mission at hand. There was even uneasiness in my own heart because of the realm of “no man’s” land that awaited me. After several hours and trips back and forth from my dorm room, it was time for my family to leave. My dad tried to play it tough, but deep down, he was terrified as well.
It wasn’t as though, there were hundreds of miles from home either, literally the span of time was twenty minutes. The four and a half years that was my college experience was some of the best years of my life, but my God did learning come through hardship and even pain. One day in the cafeteria while trying to transport a cup a coffee to the table while driving my scooter, sometimes my brain didn’t connect the dots, between turning the speed down on my scooter and the hot cup of coffee held between my legs. The coffee spilled all over my lap, which was a very painful and frankly embarrassing experience. Or in a similar experience, but only dropping an entire plate of food on the ground. There isn’t another time in my life, where the struggle was so real, apart from recovering from a severe operation, but you know what? It was deeply-deeply satisfying to my soul.
This has been one of the most profound regrets of my life, was that there wasn’t room for much struggle and toil in my life. Well, why would you want struggle and toil in your life? You might ask, because you find out what you can do as a man, and when you overcome a challenge in life, you feel as though you were Samson, who killed a lion with his bare hands. Sometimes parents of children who have disabilities ask me for advice on how to raise their children, there’s no real words of inspiration, but in a frank and compassionate way, I tell them that eventually you must let your children struggle and fight. Love them yes, care for them yes, but sometimes love is letting a person experience things for themselves. This isn’t to say, that you should be careless with your child and let them do horrible dangerous actions because they’ll learn. The point is that when it comes to mastering their lives, they must know how to succeed and thrive in hard times.
Whether that’s learning how to cook, tie shoes, button up a shirt and so on. It may be difficult for a parent to stand back to hear your child to become frustrated and even cry. But when they overcome the challenge in front of them, they will gain a confidence in themselves and be ready to take on the next. There is always the reality of adaption, meaning that if something is physically out of the realm of possibility for them, because of lack of dexterity in the hands find a device that can that reality more doable. Example being, tying my own shoes was nothing something that was very doable because of the lack of dexterity in my right hand, so my sister went to a shoe store and got me some shoelaces, that you didn’t need to tie, but pull for you shoe to become tighter on my feet. In terms of buttoning my ow shirt, some buttons are far easier than others, or I’ve learned that if buying a shirt that’s dressier I’ll simply put the shirt over my head without unbuttoning the shirt all together.
There’s almost always a way to adapt to a situation in life, we only must be willing to find that solution. The plea that is in my heart for parents who have disabled children is beyond what words can possibly express. There’re are profound consequences if you do not allow your children to grow, not only will their growth be stunted in every sense of the word, but they may never get to fully embrace the dreams that God has breathed into their hearts. Worse yet, if you do not allow them to grow and move into the world in as much as they can, the chances of the developing a great amount of shame within themselves is very high. Speaking from experience, the intense shame that I’ve battled for thirty-seven years of my life has been much. Sometimes the shame was so intensifying that the longing for sleep was my only way to obtain peace. Trying to mount any sort of fight against it proved to be futile. The shame that made its home inside me, seemed like a resident that would never leave, and one that was better off accepted as reality.
The more that the attempt was made to simply shrug my shoulders, and the reality that was before me. The more unsettled my spirit became. My spirit became increasingly unsettled because on the inside of me, was the inclination that there was far more to my existence than even realized. Getting to a point where the culmination of my life’s purpose was before was a completely different story. The few things that have ever filled me with passion and fulfillment was writing, martial arts and fitness, and by the grace of God those avenues have been used to help others but not to the potential of what I believed to be right. The vision that unfolds in the sketch pad of my mind, was being a best-selling author, and helping others become healthier safer by the hundreds. It can be said that life doesn’t always work out the way we planned it. But we damn sure, should be able to take aim at the highest marker possible. It is better to aim and miss then to not have aimed at all.
Sadly, a good deal of the clients that I’ve worked with haven’t been able to take that aim either. As one that works as a fitness, nutrition, and health coach, most of my clients end up wanting to share their stories with me. The story is much of the same, they spend most of their time at home within different family dynamics. Many of them on some level of fixed income, some even have no means of transportation and or healthy amounts of in person social life. As a result, most of their mode of being is spent online via social media and other means of communication. These are in some ways, the forgotten people of society, both men and women. Meaning that they aren’t readily seen as the ones will conquer and make a difference in the world. They must fight harder to be recognized. Many of the clients that I’ve worked with over the past few years, have echoed the same feelings that their lives at times, are utterly meaningless and worthless. As though they will never get to embrace the adventure and longings that are indwelled within them. The simple way of saying it, is that they fear that they will never get the independence they long for.
The increasing difficult as a coach to inspire, share empathy and share wisdom, while fighting those realities myself is monumental. As a man, it is even more agonizing to the soul. Primally speaking the man is the one who is meant to go out and hunt. The word hunt, in this sense is used as the means to gather the things needed for survival, not only of the self but of the pack (the pack meaning family). Women largely do not select a man, who cannot go out into the wilderness of life and hunt for the betterment of the tribe. More in the nature of how they are wired, than mere coldness, though it can be portrayed that way. It can be a very difficult and taxing reality to swallow as a disabled man. It is a reality that we should come to terms with, not in a hopeless or blind acceptance, but one with increasing optimism.
The biblical figure of Abraham was 70 years old before God called him to pack up and leave all the comforts of home. He and his wife were also without children, the age of Abraham never truly stood out to me, until the moment the journey began through the bible again, my eyes saw the number of age his was and a sense of panic filled me. “what!? No God I can’t be like Abraham!” being 70 years old living with my family still, let alone with no children of my own. You see though, Abraham is the definition of the increasing optimism that was mentioned above. As Romans 4:17-19 informs us:
17 As it is written: “I have made you a father of many nations.”[a] He is our father in the sight of God, in whom he believed—the God who gives life to the dead and calls into being things that were not.
17 As it is written: I have made you the father of many nations[a]—in the presence of the God in whom he believed,the one who gives life to the dead and calls things into existence that do not exist. 18 He believed, hoping against hope, so that he became the father of many nations[b] according to what had been spoken: So will your descendants be.[c]19 He did not weaken in faith when he considered[d] his own body to be already dead (since he was about a hundred years old) and also the deadness of Sarah’s womb.
Others translation use the wording of “without weaking in his faith.” Or “against all hope. The fact is this, he never gave up even in the moments where he or his wife felt discouraged. Our own inner dispositions must be the same, so much that no matter how long it takes us to reach the destination that God has destined us for, by his grace we will get there. It bears repeating that the faith that Abraham possess, is not something that here kindled up within himself, but the faith that he has is God given. That same faith can lay dormant, I’m not attending to imply that all people have faith, but that in the grappling of our hearts can sometimes be the indication that there is something more going on. Such was the case in my own life, in the disparity and questions that weighed in me, was God himself waiting for his intended divine moment to reveal himself to me. Of all the times that was spent trying to suffocate the reality of God, it turned out to be my deepest need and longing. His love is the most sustaining reality of all life and existence. After my heart and mind were open to the revelation of Christ, there became an ever-increasing awareness of not only the gifting of how God wired me, but dreams as well. As a child the exposure to martial arts and writing came early, they were both gifts from God that needed cultivating and development over time. When academics were still very hit and miss for me, my mom gave me the ultimatum of sitting down to take a stab at writing a book or stick it out with college. Eventually, came the longing to find a wife, scripture even says that he who finds a wife finds a good thing. Yet my eyes always rolled when reading that verse after a series of failed relationships.
It’s probably taken me more time than I’d like to mature in relationships, going from chaos to wanting to seek health in the bonding of two people. (I’ll unpack more of what that means later). With every failed relationship and every year that passes, is like an artist trying to sketch an image in their mind on piece of paper, only to rip it up and throw it away. Even though the moments of wanting to ditch this specific desire in me were quite intense, God has a way of bringing the desire to mind. Even though the desire is ever present and real, the question that soon follows is how? How is this going to work? That or follow up questions of “when Lord?” or “who would be strong enough to enter my context?” Answer to these questions have a way of befalling me, but the reality that settles me is trust. We must trust that even if God is the orchestrator of salvation, he will also do so with the rest of our life and mission. No matter how long it takes, as it did with Abraham.
My past has been haunting me the last few days, or rather I should say, resurfacing. My stomach has been is shambles. A fire burning up my insides if you will. I’ve done so many stupid things in the past, the natural response is to say that we’ve all done things we regret or are not proud of. Yet when my own past come to my mind again, it has a way of making me feel like the worst, disgusting sinner alive. Life could be going smoothly, and then out of the blue a memory comes popping up. Usually a condemning state follows:
“Hey, remember when you did this and this? Yeah, you’re a real piece of ####” Then those same condemning statements, have a way of sinking down into the depths of me. Regardless of how much I try and shield them from attacking me so vigorously. So how do we begin to deal with these seeming random thoughts that come are way?
Well for one: We can Acknowledge them
What I mean is this, while it may be uncomfortable to do so. Acknowledging the thoughts is actually very useful. You can simply say, “yes that happened, and I hate that it did.” Now, the trick to acknowledging it, is also making sure that you’re not let down a spiral of inner destruction where we spend hours beating ourselves up. This of course, comes from someone that also fails at that as well.
I only share that, so people can learn from that mistake as well. It can be very difficult to find the balance, in accepting and acknowledging our sins and not completely mentally flogging ourselves. But it is needed.
Seek Forgiveness
Again this is not an easy route and often it requires a huge chunk of humility and letting go of ego and pride. The reason I say this, is because of the people in the world, who’s disposition is “I’d never seek forgiveness of anyone.” Which leads to its own consequences. Forgiveness is actually a pivotal role in healing and arriving at a place of peace. Forgiveness, may require actually approach the person you hurt, and seek their forgiveness. Now then, whether they grant you forgiveness or not, is not for you to decide. Perhaps, they will forgive in time. The fact and reality remains that you did your part. Forgiveness is not only good on a human to human level, but it is also good on a spiritual level as well. Knowing that God can not only forgive you of your sins, but in a great exchange gives you his righteousness. Thus, when the father God looks us, he does not see us in our sin.
Know Who You Really Are
You may have noticed, that I put a bit more emphasis on the forgiveness of God, rather than human forgiveness. Reason being is because another human, might not grant you forgiveness when asked for it. However, if a person comes to God with a contrite heart, and whole heartedly asks God for forgiveness, the beauty of the gospel is that God is not one to say no. What kind of God would he be, if he said no?
When you are forgiven in Christ, there is no condemnation for those who in Christ Jesus, the old has gone and new has come. Yes, there might very well be consequences as a result of our actions. That’s merely apart of living in this world. It will in fact, take some courage to face the past and make amends if possible, the difference is, is that you will not be alone in doing so. The spirit of God will be with you at all times.
Get Your Act Together I’d like to end with this, the love and forgiveness of Christ, is not a free card to sin endlessly. No, it is a call to join the ongoing battle against the flesh and sin. It is a call to get your act together and be better than you once were. To submit the former self and way of living. It’s a chance to live for a higher calling and purpose. You don’t have to keep living as you once were, the shame of past regret does not have to define you. You can be a completely different person, with all new desires, hopes and dreams.
I’m going to try and express what living with depression feels like, and the battle that wages violently in my mind. I have long wanted to open my chest up and share the grappling match that takes place from within. My aim here is not sympathy, but rather to be candid not only for my own personal reasons but to help others as well. As that has always been my biggest goal in this life. Many times the depression that I experience inside, is like that of what person being attacked by a group of people. Completely outnumbered, and all I can do is cover up to guard myself even a little bit from the heavy blows. Often, there is a smile on my face, but that often is a mechanism to not show what’s truly going on. I’ve been smiling my whole life, so in some ways it’s my default. I’ve learned and sadly so, not to open up because then I won’t have to deal with the responses of others. People of faith have told me (over the years) that my faith is weak if I wrestle with depression, and if I go down the spiritual check list, everything should be just peachy. Little do they know how harmful statements like that are. Or “you have a good life, what could you possibly feel depressed about?”
With that line of thinking, its okay for everyone else to have bouts with depression and despair-just not me? It only makes me want to close myself off all the more. It’s painfully lonely when you feel so stuck in life, you keep spinning your wheels and feel as though you aren’t going anywhere . Similar to being stuck at the back of the line always. Often, it feels like I’m paralyzed on the inside and can’t move. And yet, each and every day, I get out of my bed and do what I’m supposed to. The dark enemy in my mind says “you better get comfy, because this is all your life will ever be, because you’ve blown it too much to get better.” And as many times as I have attempted to drive out the dark enemy, all I want to do is curl up under and blanket and not move.
A few days ago I was listening to a man, who deeply depressed, and so to attempt to get the pain to stop. He jumped off a bridge in San Francisco, by the grace of God he survived, but what he said struck me. He said that as he was falling off the bride, he instantly regretted the choice he made. He said that many people don’t want to die, they only want the pain to stop. And you know what? He’s exactly right, I have had many dark nights of the soul, I have even spent days in a hospital, and I can attribute myself resolve to stay in the fight, to God gracing me with a stubborn hope. Anne Lamott says
““Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.”
Going back to the analogy of being beat up by a group of people, after the beating, I lay there for a while. But eventually I find the strength to get back up. It reminds me when Neo fights the agent in one of the final scene, Neo is getting his ass handed to him, the agent thinks that he has completed his task at finally shutting neo down. And yet Neo gets back up again, the agent in a state of disbelief wonders what’s in Neo that helps him get back up. Why!? Why do you persist!?
I persist because in the depths of who I am, I know that there is something else on the darkness. In spite of such paralyzing heaviness. Christ has given me himself and he alone is my anchor in life. And even he got back up after the worst suffering imaginable. The other night, a friend reminded me that depression is not my true identity. That being a beloved child of God is, that is my truest self. As we walk, crawl and drag ourselves through the heaviness , know that you were never meant to carry your pain alone. You can cast all your pain upon Christ because he cares for you. I’m reminded of the line, in the foot poem “when you see only one pair of foot prints, it was then that he carried you.”
I don’t know when the pain will end- or that it will even stop. But I can tell you, that it is worth it, getting up each time you feel destroyed by life’s current. You never know what life could turn out to be.
Throughout history, many people, poets, pastors, theologians and even philosophers have tried to do the best that they can to make sense of suffering within the human experience. After all suffering has been with us since the beginning of time and human existence. Even though, I myself have much first hand experience with suffering, there is something inside me that hesitates. Probably because so many other thoughts of wisdom and hope have already been uttered.
Yet, I believe that holy spirit is softly whispering from within, saying “share what I have placed inside you.” So when the holy spirit commands, the obedient son or daughter must follow. One of the most frequent objections to the existence of God or any other divine figure has been the reality of suffering. Cancer, AIDS, rape, murder and suffering in all other forms all stop us in our tracks.
Why would any sort of higher power even allow suffering? That’s a very good question that we all have asked regardless of creed or background. Cerebral Palsy, was the cross I was given when I was born. If you want a full breakdown of my story, you can check out my first book The Emotional Struggle on Amazon.
With having cerebral palsy, my life has been tested with not just physical pain from surgeries and therapy. But emotional and mental pain as well. I’ve had the entire lower half of my body operated on, each other operation taking a year or more to recover from. Doctors and professionals with the realm of education, telling me that I wouldn’t amount to much because I wasn’t smart enough.
To add more to the equation, throughout my 36 of life, there have been battles against depression, anxiety and there was once an attempted suicide. Why? Because I felt so trapped in my own life circumstances, as though nothing could or would ever change. Others in the world have faced suffering far greater than even my own.
Nowhere in my life was I ever starved to death, or tortured by evil and wicked people. Which is another reason why there was a hesitation inside me to share in the first place. And yet the starkest of realities is that some of us never make it out of suffering. Not so much in the reality of suicide, but that some of us never find a way to prevail in spite of it. Some make the choice to let the weight of suffering swallow them up like a tidal wave. As mentioned above, many of us ask of the why of suffering.
The why is important, but dare I suggest that the why is not as important as the how. How are we not going to let suffering swallow us up? How are we going to come out the suffering more brighter and courageous? I will caution you (the reader) in that, if you decide to ask the how. You must also decide to follow through with whatever the how asks of you.
For example, if you discover that your how, is being able to look at years of trauma or destructive habits. Are you willing to face it all? Are you willing to endure the process of what it takes to heal and start new chapters of your life? The consequence of not doing so, means that everything in your life stays the same.
And in choosing to stay in that reality, also then means that you’re fundamentally making a choice to cling to that suffering. Reasons for that might very well be, that it’s all you know. On the other hand, some of us are far too stubborn (such as myself) and know what we should do and end up not do it. Regardless, we both are making a choice.
In processing and embarking on our how, we first need a new perspective on suffering. That may raise some eyebrows, but it’s the only option we have. We can agree that suffering sucks, it hurts and can beat the will out of us. But if we slowly started looking at the suffering in our lives differently, we might very well find that there is more to live for.
The author of the book of James in the Bible, he says to “count it all joy” when trials come our way. As humans, we scoff and even are appalled by such statements. Because there is nothing joyful about suffering on the surface. But as the author continues by saying
“for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” James says, in other words that suffering we endure, produces something in that. That something is steadfastness. Meaning that we are anchored in something greater than ourselves. We admit that suffering is awful but we are not destroyed by it. When the grace of God allows to become more steadfast with time, we can find that a sense of calmness fills us up. Where we don’t always have to fly off the handle because life is not going how we want it.
This true peace and steadfastness is in divine, because one could not find it anywhere else. As much as I love stoic philosophy and philosophy in general. It does not lead to true peace. In my own life, I have surveyed every world religion and even tried meditation and even believed that I would come back in my next life as some other person. The biggest problem with that rests in the reality that, you can never know if you have done enough good to outweigh the bad.
Biblical writes like James and Paul, their how is Christ himself. Christ for them, is the how to transcending the suffering and not simply running from it. But rather they can stare that suffering in the eye knowing it won’t win in the end. For James and Paul, they know that something far sweeter is at the end of suffering.
So that patiently and even joyfully endure, while living out the mission that God has set before them. Let us not forget Christ himself, Christ was sent by God the father in human likeness. In the Philippians 2:7, it says that Christ “emptied himself” interesting, what on earth might that mean? To empty comes from the Greek word Kenosis, Tony Evans has a very clear and beautiful way of explaining this, when he writes:
What does the self-emptying of Christ mean? The theological doctrine is called the kenosis, from the Greek verb meaning “to empty.” Did He empty Himself of His deity and become merely a man? No, the focus of His self-emptying is not heaven, but earth; that is, what Christ emptied Himself into. He didn’t empty out God and pour in man. Rather, He emptied all of God into man. In other words, He didn’t stop being God. He didn’t say, “Deity, I’m going to leave You in heaven and go down to become humanity.” Furthermore he writes: What Jesus did was take all of His deity and pour it into humanity so that He became much more than mere man. He became the God-man-God poured into man. Let me tell you something impor¬tant. When Jesus Christ did something about your sin and mine, He didn’t give us the leftovers. He poured all that made Him God into man so that man would have all of God. There is nothing that belonged to God that man didn’t have when Jesus emptied Himself into man.
One of the reasons that Christ came to live among us, I believe, was to show us humans that he is the answer to the human condition and suffering. Even when on the cross, Christ took all our suffering on himself. Moreover, the cross shows that even in spite of suffering still present. The cross still shows that Christ is present with us. I don’t believe I’ll ever understand why God chooses to heal some but not others, but I do believe that he has given me the greatest gift ever, himself, his love, his presence and grace. What is more amazing, is that eternity with Christ, means no more suffering and complete joy.
Until then, Christ is my how in my own journey. He is why I can give all my fear and anxiety, and instead breath in his peace. He is why I can have joy and smile in the midst of life not being as desired.
In college an area of psychology that truly intrigued me was the area of addiction, mainly how addiction rewires the human brain and changes the way human behave. I’m pretty sure what stopped me from fully pursuing the route was the amount of schooling and debt that I’d rack up at the end of all. Still, however, the area still fascinates to this day. And something that came to my attention recently was the idea “hijacker”.
That is, in simple terms it’s very much like a voice in the human brain that tells us it’s okay to go back to the things that give us comfort. It doesn’t have to be things as extreme as drugs or pornography. But it can be things as simple as food, spending money on things you don’t need, binge watching a show and so on.
The “hijacker” is the voice that says “it’s okay, go back to whatever substance it is, you’ll feel better after.” And that’s the lie, you might feel better after. But your still stuck in the same old destructive cycle. Still filled with shame, regret and feeling hopeless…
And yet we are not hopeless. Recently I heard a therapist say that the hijacker isn’t you talking. The Hijacker is the one you can feel starting to raise its voice in the certain contexts that make us want to run back to fake comfort. The apostle Paul had an extremely similar thought process in Romans 7:14-15 when he said:
14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.”
Paul understood that this wasn’t necessarily him, but something else trying to take over. And that’s the key to winning the battle. We have to start to be on watch, so when it does lurk its head up. We can notice it and quickly shut it down.
You can heal. You can overcome. But it won’t be own your own or on your own strength.
brandonleeryan 