Tag: Recovery

Put Your House In Order. While You Still Can.

I was reading my Bible this morning, and this particular phrase in 2 kings 20:1

“This is what the Lord says: Put your house in order, because you are going to die; you will not recover.”

I do not intend to dig a lot in the context of this passage, but rather center the focus of this around what verse one means for us today. My room has a lot of clutter in it, I know where everything is at, but it has a lot of clutter.

Now, on one hand there is a method to how my room is, its easier for me to reach certain things and doesn’t require me to stand and reach for high objects. I know this annoys my family, but for me it works. It’s not because I intend to live like a slob. My clothes are not neatly folded because folding can be tough for me.

My parents come sometimes and fold things as they see it should be, it stays neat for awhile but then as time goes by, things return to the way they were before. People within the design word, claim that your outside world reflects your inside world.

So, if I have a lot of clutter in my room, I probably have a lot of clutter on the inside too. It makes sense and I would agree that it is true. I do have a lot of clutter on my inside life. I’ve been trying to get it in order for a long time now, I’m not where I want to be but I am damn sure much better than what I was.

Getting your room in order is not only physical, but it is mentally, emotionally and spiritually too. I would submit that the latter three are of greater significants. All of us are headed to our graves, and to a degree we can choose how we get there.

Maybe for someone its getting your mental health in order, so that the heaviness of depression and anxiety don’t completely drain you of all joy and appreciation of life. Perhaps its getting your money in order, where you actually plan for a future and not burn your money on meaningless pleasure. Maybe it’s making peace with your past and people that you have wronged or wronged you.

If you and I don’t do this, what is the consequence? We die in the state we have chosen to live in and we will not recover. We will die holding onto that shame, regret, bitterness and anger. We will die, never know what we could have been.

I think hell is a real reality, not some metaphorical reality. And I believe that God reaches out to us every day, telling us that he is the way out from the suffering in our lives. That’s why he sent his son Jesus on a rescue mission, for us. He can make us new, fill us with peace and joy and give us a completely new road map to destiny.

The sad part is, some choose to stay in the pain and suffering because that’s all they know. It’s become their norm of comfort. Shedding the old skin and experience new life can be painful too. In one of the Narnia movies, a young boy turned into a dragon, who was then a mean and grumpy soul.

In order for the boy to be transformed from being a dragon, Aslan had to remove the dragon flesh from his body. Which was extremely painful. Which is true for us as well, it hurts an extreme amount. But when our own dragon skin is removed, it is as though we are all new people.

I’m still working on getting myself in order, you can too. We can still recover while there’s still time.

Why I love CBD: A Few Reasons

I have wanted to write this entry for quite some time now,  my reason for not doing so stemmed from the fact that I am a Christian. My faith is utterly important to me and comes before everything else in my life. That being said, I feared the backlash that a post like this might cause, but I’ve come to a point where I don’t care if fellow believers roll their eyes at me or question the validity of my faith.

I also want to clearly state, that this is not a scientific exploration of what CBD is, there is much more notable places to look than something like this. This will much rather be a few reasons as to why I use it, and why I believe others should use it too!

Reason one: As someone with cerebral palsy, I have tried nearly every muscle relaxer under the sun. In the name of coping with the pain that follows spasticity. Muscle relaxers often make me feel tired and zombie like for a few days at least. With CBD, my muscles are able to relax more naturally and doesn’t leave me feeling like an unproductive zombie.

Reason two: Much less joint pain and inflammation. Once again, as someone with CP, I am more often than not, in a fair amount of pain and stiffness. So much so that it becomes very difficult to walk with my crutches. Having used CBD for over a year now, I have noticed that the inflammation has gone down dramatically. And it’s much easier to move. Are there days where pain is still present? Yes, but it is much much less and bearable, without having to put so many pills in my mouth, that how much more side-effects.

Reason three: Anxiety and Depression, yes CBD has helped me in these areas as well, I don’t have many panic attacks anymore, and the depressive episodes are not as present. Yes, they still happen, but using CBD I find helps relieve the symptoms that are associated with anxiety and depression.

Much more, using CBD is wonderful after my workouts, and it leaves me much less sore and allows to recover faster. I’ll end with this though, I don’t think that CBD is cure all, in terms of our over all health, its also a good thing to learn coping skills, listening to our bodies, getting more sleep etc.

Yet there are more, even greater benefits to using  CBD than the ones I’ve listed above.

Here is what I use: https://johnnyapple.com/cartridges/

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Removing The Mask on The Christian Life.

For the last few years of my life, I have found myself increasingly frustrated with both myself and Christians in general. I’ve attempted to sit down and write out my thoughts in the form of a new manuscript, but nothing seems to be coming to completion. At best I am a complete paradox, to say the least. I’m packed with joy and various sorrows, I’m happy and angry at the same time, I want to laugh and scream all in the same breath.

I have never been that steady Christian that always seems to be happy and with no real pressing issues or things that bother them. If such a Christian even exists. I’m frustrated with myself that I have such a hard time forgiving others. Rather, I keep a record of wrongs and hold onto grudges. I’ve never been that Christian or person who can only forgive and forget. Though, other believers would suggest that I need to move on as though nothing happened.

I long to follow Christ with all that I am, yet I still become increasingly entangled in my sin. The everyday Protestant Christian would say “well you’re are not fighting back against your sin hard enough.” And there right, but my sin still feels good.  Atheists can call me a hypocrite all they want, but they have struggles and flaws too, I’m just not afraid to admit my own. Nor are they under as big of a microscope as Christians are.

Go ahead and call me a freak for believing in God, go ahead and make fun of me for believing in something that I have yet to see with my own eyes. In the end, I’d rather be wrong about the existence of God then only living for myself and my own passions.

But I regress… The fact is, I know that myself and the body of Christ as a whole are hypocrites. I believe that should be all the more the reason to place our faith in the Lord Jesus. For he came to call upon people who were sick and knew it deep down inside their souls. Not for those who believed that they were without flaw or blemish.

The church, though it is full of broken, sick and twisted people. Is capable of bringing about the most change in this world. Not only are we be able to bring a healthy balance of

social justice in the world, but also we would be doing so with the love, truth and mercy of God. Which is what this world so desperately needs. While this all sounds well a good, this generation of believers must come outside the four walls of our church buildings and engage the society around us.

We must put down our cell phones and notice the lonely and hurting people around us. Furthermore, we must develop a good sense of people skills.   At least in the Christian community that I am currently, people skills seem to be few, far and between. Everyone appears to be so caught up in their worlds. Myself included.

In my estimation, this should not be the reality of the church. At the heart of the matter, the church can and should be a reflection of Christ. But again, in my estimation we are not, in fact, we are far from it. Or maybe it’s only me that is far from the mark. Regardless, I long for revival to happen among Christians and even our country.  The fact of the matter is that there is no secret formulate to obtain such results is to (as Christians) is to seek God actively in faith and repentance.

Then, we must actively seek one another in a community and learn the art of vulnerability. Far too often it appears as though we Christians smile and act as though everything seemingly perfect and in it’s right place. But I think that for many of us (Christian and not) that life is extremely messy, even if someone of us are not good or willing to admit it.

When it comes to great examples of what vulnerability in the church should look like, the example that I go to is recovery movements. A place of utter honesty and transparency, a place where people let down their facades and find community and the possibility of healing. I’m in no way saying that recovery movements are perfect, for nothing in this world is.  But they are a starting block that Christians and all people can glean from.

Vulnerability is something that I strongly feel (is still) lacking from the Christian life. I know that people don’t enjoy being open with others, but it is how we experience both growth and healing. With God and others. The truth is, (I believe) is that we are scared, to be honest about our pain and what plagues us. I am always going back to the story of Adam and Eve, the fact that when they sinned, instead of running to God and seeking forgiveness they covered up.

The funny thing is we do the same, rather then being open and honest with one another. We hide. And for different reasons, one reason might be that we feel we have to have it all together and can’t show who we really are and where we are at in life. Another reason might be that we are afraid that if people see who we really are they might run away. Let me submit to you that, if people ran away after seeing who you really are then they never really loved you in the first place.

Regardless of what our reason is, we must learn to rake the mask of that we some comfortable wear and stand bare before others.

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Letting Go of The Heavy Load.

Do you ever feel like you have to have it all together?

Do you ever feel like if you don’t have your act together 24/7, then you’re not measuring up?

I relate to both those questions, both in a physical and spiritual sense and for me they both intertwine with one another. In a physical sense if I’m not winning then I do not amount to much.  It doesn’t matter if it’s in Brazilian Jiujitsu or Crossfit. If I’m not submitting people and bringing home the gold medals, then I further down the mountain while losing the respect of my team and sponsors.

If it’s Crossfit, and I’m not hitting the huge PR’s in the gym, if I’m not making the fastest time in competition and make it to the podium. Then others are beating me out and taking that spot that I desired in my heart.   As an athlete, I believe that wanting to win is a right and healthy mindset, but when we put too much unhealthy pressure on ourselves, I think that we willingly put ourselves into a mindset of slavery that we were never meant to be in any way.

You see, performance should never determine our worth. Sure, we should have dreams and be motivated to complete those goals. The bedrock of our lives should be centered around the understanding that we are loved. Loved by God, our family, and friends. When our lives are based on our performance and what we can produce with our lives, then it isn’t loving. It’s a tireless effort to meet a standard we could never meet on our own.

When the love of friends, family, and even coaches is based on the way we perform. Then one might strongly consider that the problem has little to do with you and more to do with them.  If it’s a coach treating you this way, I highly suggest not giving them anymore of your time.

Secondly, this can esaily translate over to the spiritual mind set, in that if we constanly feel that we have to earn Gods love, approval and favor then we have a foggy perspective of who God is. As sch our view of God most be quickly cleared up. So often we feel that if there is a God, then we first have to clean ourselves up in order to even approach him.

That couldn’t be more of a lie, the truth is that we can come to him despite how many flaws we have or how dirty we think we are. God longs for you to come to him, you don’t have to carry around the heavy load that is in your soul. Freedom and hope are possible.

There is a vast difference between God desiring for you to better off then you were, out of a new desire to be less of the person you were yesterday and wanting perfection. God wants you to be a brand new creation, but he understands that you will fall down time and time again. He won’t stop loving you just because you fall or have a bad day. He will love you to the sky and back. You just have to let him.

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Day 2: Fighting Back

Well, yesterday was a failure and victory all at the same time. While I fell again, I did not beat myself up in the process. Instead I repented and asked for forgiveness and fixed my eyes on the Lord. This was truly a victory for me, because I would wallow in my shame, regret and sorrow.

A friend of mine is going to be setting a password on my computer with a program called K-9. Which is anti porn software. I’ve tried XXX Church’s program, but I find it complicated and not worth the seven bucks a month. Anti-porn software is a start, but the real work lies in dealing with the triggers that make a person crave whatever they’re addicted to.

For example, if you fear the future or worry about not having enough money. It can then seem logical to run to what “soothes” us the the most. But it’s not really soothing when they bring us momentary fixes. Only the presence of God and his mercy can give us the freedom we desire.

Two ideas that come mind: When it comes to fighting addiction, we need to approach it with speed and violence of action. That doesn’t mean we harm ourselves, but that we do what it takes to bring our addiction and destructive habits into submission.

The second idea is, I’ve been listening to a song called “beautiful things” by Gungor, I must confess that it s still very hard to see myself as a beautiful thing, because I mess up so much. It’s hard to see myself as God see’s me. My prayer for this year, is that I (and others) would see and believe this beautiful reality.fighting_back

 

 

 

Day 1: Fighting Back

I have decided to start posting each day that my eyes and mind don’t consume porn. I’m doing this in spite of fear, ridicule and rejection. No matter how people view me or what they think. I’ve made it 90 days before and with God’s help I’ll do it again. That being said, here we go.

Day 1

I’m wrestling with the idea of this is an actual addiction, or simply a dirty habit. After all, it’s not really interfering with my life in massive ways. But man, does my mind and body crave it.The temptation comes between early mornings and when I know i’ll be alone for awhile.

The truth is, I know I’m far better than this. Better, meaning that I am not better than anyone else, but better in the sense that I am better than this addiction, vice, habit whatever we want to call this thing.  Regardless I don’t want this thing to interfere in my life down the road. I honestly believe that real freedom is possible.

Even though my insides scream other wise, I could sit here and feel sorry for myself, I could think of every justification. But that is rubbish, it’s all filth. It’s time to clinch these fists and fight.images

Fighting My Addiction Part 2

I believe that one of the hardest elements of fighting any addiction, be it porn, sex, food, drugs or what have you. Is actually believing that you can fight back against it. The truth is that when we have been bogged down by addictive patterns for so long it can be extremely difficult to believe that anything better can become of your life.

Being that I fight my own addiction daily (porn), there was a time when I deeply believed that I couldn’t break free from the grasp that addiction had on my life. So I basically surrendered myself to this addiction, believing that it was now my master. Eventually though, I became sick of looking at pornography and quickly realized that it was never really that satisfying as people made it sound.

And if we’re honest, we might very well say the same thing. We also have to remember that simply because people choose porn over a real person, yes very little to do with them actually  being “satisfied” and more to do with the wiring in their brains being so high jacked.

There are some therapists who claim that there are some people, whose brains will never be the same because of how much exposure they have had to pornography. While that might be true, it does not mean that things cannot get better. Far too many in medical/ helping professions have very little belief in faith and what inner strength and courage can actual do.

When I first started walking away my own addiction, it was the most difficult challenge I have ever had to face. Everyday that I fought the temptation grew stronger. There were many times when I had no choice but to get on my knees and cry out to God for help. There were many times when I would call a friend or spend lots of time in the gym. Anything to get myself through the tempting moments. Slowly but surely, days started to stack on top of one another.

By God’s grace, my desire to look at poronagraphy became less and less. And I began to desire a real relationship, with a real woman. Change is possible, healing is possible, hope is possible. You just have to be willing to commit to a daily fight. One that you will not win on your own.

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The Two Big C Words

For the past several months, there have been a host of horribly dreams that invade my sleep. Most recently, there has been a dream where I am diagnosed with cancer. I don’t know much about dream interpretation, but many claim that it is a manifestation of the sub conscious.

Be that as it may, the dreams (nightmares even) seem all the more real to me. When I first told this dream to a friend, they pointed out the fact that it might stem from the fact that I have a friend who has cerebral palsy and was recently diagnosed with cancer.

The thought never really crossed my mind, until they brought it to my attention. To be fair, anyone can be diagnosed with cancer on any given day. It doesn’t matter how well a person takes care of their bodies, sometimes things just happen.

My interpretation on the dream, perhaps, is that maybe I am the cancer. I mean this in the most non-dramatic way possible. In terms of a lot the relationships, there is the nagging sense that I’m always fucking things up some how. As such the logic that follows is that I am supposed to hide myself from society. Much like a diseased person would in the old testament.

Again, I am not aiming to be dramatic or cause others to feel sorry for me. The point is, is that this has been a great battle and difficulty for me. One that has been on and off again, for as long as I’ve lived.

The Second C: Control

With so many areas of life changing, or seeming to be that way. I have learned to not hold on so tight. Because people are not ultimately ours. Though I will add, that in regards to my personal convictions regarding the life and way of Christ. I do believe that we belong to each other and that we are created to share in life and give our lives to others.

But at the same time, we as humans have the choice to come and go as we please. Other times other elements to life take the front seat. But what happens when you feel like your on the outside looking in? Even with our own personal tasks, be it school, job, family etc. Relationships that we perceived to e long lasting and strong seem to be slipping away.

Wether that is true or not, remains to be discovered. What I am speaking of though, is the mere feeling or belief that people are slipping away. Perhaps if your like me, a sense of great panic sets in. And much like when a parent has to be separated from a child they do everything in their power to hold onto the grasp.

I’m the learning the painfully obvious truth, that friendships change. And sometimes you have to let people go, not because you want them to, but because it is their choice. That does mean that we don’t long for close, intimate relationships. This is why my faith and spirituality is so very important to me. Because I am told that there is a friend that sticks closer then a brother (Proverbs 18:24).

If you struggle with anxiety and panic, I want you to know that its not the end of your life. Your panic and fear do not define you or the sum total of your life. It’s okay to ask for help. It’s okay to let people in. Never give up in the darkness.

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Dealing With Cerebral Palsy and Suicial Thoughts

Going off my last blog, which discussed the idea of living with cerebral palsy and feeling like a burden. One comment in particular really stood out to me, one gentlemen wrote about how feeling like a burden can often lead toward suicidal thoughts and various other elements like extended bouts of depression.

Suicide first and foremost does not care about the color of ones skin, whether one is skinny or fat or whether on is living with something like cerebral palsy or is paralyzed. It spares no one and never well. So as humans, it’s almost as though we have something that can cause us to relate or open up to one another (if we were so willing). In a sense, it can be easier to say the powerful words of “me too”.

As a person living with cerebral palsy, I have battled depression for over the past ten or more years of my life. And yes, suicidal thoughts have been a part of that. I have even spent days in a hospital, in an attempt to try and balance out the disconnection of my thoughts and brain chemistry. I’m not ashamed or afraid to admit these things, and I certainly do not care if that causes people to think that I’m crazy or weird.

We are all broken people, the simple fact is that we have a choice to confess it, seek help and live in community and transparency. Dealing with both cerebral palsy and suicidal thoughts, can be different in the sense that if you don’t have methods to simply escape for awhile or friends that can care and help. It can be all the more taxing. For people to simply state that depression and suicidal thoughts are selfish, is simply them missing the fuller picture.

People simply aren’t physical beings, or emotional beings and even chemicals. We are all of them at the same time, and we must learn that if one suffers, the rest suffer as well. Having cerebral palsy and not having healthy social structure, can lead to intense loneliness and even despair. Having no one around you that tries to understand can make it all the more taxing.

A pastor once told me that, despite how you feel, you have to step out first and ask for help and community. While that can be extremely difficult, I do believe that he was right. That does not mean then, that a friend, loved one or doctor cannot step into your darkness first. It simply means that most times, it require us to rely not on our own strength, wisdom and courage. But that of the divine, the creator of the universe, for guidance and healing.

In fact, in terms of recovery the very first step is to admit you in yourself are powerless.This is not a popular perspective, but I truly believe that this is where healing and recovery truly begins. Suicidal thoughts do not have to have victory over your life, you are not your cerebral palsy, you are not your thoughts. You are a person with a immense value and purpose.

So I implore you today, whether you have cerebral palsy, or some other condition and have been quiet about the thoughts that fill your mind, please talk to someone, call someone, even a crisis hotline if you have to. Corner someone until they actually listen to you. But do not give your thoughts another ounce of power, for you are far more valuable then all the gold in the world. Then to be constantly haunted by this ugly demon.

Please call this number if you need help: http://www.treatmentadvocacycenter.org/index.php?option=com_content&id=619

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