Do You Feel Empty Inside?

Tears sit perched behind my stinging eyes and I could feel myself falling into a hole that has found a home in my aching chest.

If I shut my eyes I could see a little girl peering out from a closet seeing if it’s safe to sneak out. Longing to be loved, taken care of. She felt tainted, different, and unworthy.

This was how I felt, and what I saw as an adult needing to be loved and taken care of. Thinking I was unworthy to be loved, and wondering why I was even born.

There was a hole left inside of me. I realized I was the only one who could fill it.

I chose some ways to try a fill it that weren’t right but knowing the hole was there. I started to drink a lot of alcohol. Tequila, Jack Daniels, and thing I could get my hands on.

But when I woke up from passing out, the hole was still there. So I added sex and a lot of it, it made the hole go away for a little while I made me felt loved and accepted. But then after I felt used. So I started doing drugs, cocaine was my drug of choice it made me feel thumb, I it made me numb all over I couldn’t feel anything, but unfortunately I kept drinking and having sex.

Then I met one night, a guy that wanted me to just go partying with him. Well I felt like he could be the one. I had sex with him that night I had sex with him. Surprisingly he want to see me after that, one night we were partying and a drug dealer was there. I of course over did it. To the point I could not move. I was paralyze. This guy picked me up and took me to his house and let me sober up. It was this night I stoped doing cocaine. That experiment scared me to death. I only drank after that but not to the point I would pass out.

All of this trying to fill the hole inside of me.

I ended up marrying the guy, and we’ve been together 30 years.

Most of my life I’ve been trying to fill that hole, but when I realized I was only putting a patch on it. Nothing or nobody could ever fill it for more then a little while. Yes I glowed during the temporary high of what I was doing. Soon enough I was left feeling empty and alone.

You can try to fill that hole with sex, alcohol, drugs, or food with your attempts at perfection in many areas of your life. But it will never work.

So I was married at first it was the perfect marriage every thing I was looking for. But I was struggling to me the perfect wife. Cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, plus workin a full-time job.

But I realized that I would never experience peace by just doing my best. All the doing I was doing in the world would be futile. So I tried to feel the feelings inside of me. All the trauma came rushing out. And I was taken back to the vision of the little girl that felt unworthy.

It’s really quite amazing an example of how we live our lives as if we’re in prison, yet we posses the keys to get out. So often we long for others to love, treasure and appreciate us. But we need to do that for ourselves.

After a year of marriage I became pregnant. We were not ready to bring a child into our lives. We wanted to have time to work on our careers first. But it didn’t work out that way. Here came a baby girl into our life. Here I couldn’t take care of myself and I was expected to take care of a child.

I didn’t even think about having an abortion. This was God’s creation and He brought her to us for a reason sometimes we don’t understand the things that happen to us, but God knows the future even if we don’t have a clue.

I tried a exercise that I heard someone telling their doctor told her to try. Sometimes just listening to strangers without speaking. If very helpful.

This exercise was writing out all the things I wanted in my life. Example: I want George to think of me and do for me. “I want George to love me.” “I want George to see the best in me.” “ I want George to truly be my fan.” I want George to make me feel safe.” I put a different name in there you, can put any name in there you need to.

And then take the exercise a step further. Turn those names to put in there as yourself. “I want me to love me, complete the exercise with yourself in ther.

We need to love ourselves before you can love anyone else, especially a baby.

The Bible commands us to love your neighbor as yourself. How can you love your neighbors if you don’t love yourself?

We all have some sort of holes in us. I learned the hard way physical ways no matter what will never fill that hole. I has to be spiritual. Once I began to have a relationship with Father God, that hole has been filled. I repented for trying to fill the hole inside on me with sinful thinks. Was forgiven and moved forward with my life.

There’s a song that’s called Amazing Grace. “You saved a Wretch like me.” And that’s exactly what I was, and he saved me, from all of that sin and forgave me, so I could start anew.

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How To Live A Life Of Peace In A Chaotic World

There’s no doubt that the world is in complete chaos.

When I look at the world around me chaos is what I see. I see a government divided that cannot get along with itself. I see people who are hurting. I see disease and sickness. I see sins like selfishness, pride, anger, and anxiety. I see major failure among people to agree to disagree. I see hatred and addictions. I see people who are searching for something but they cannot seem to find what they want. I see a fast-paced world that is racing past us. I see people with schedules that are packed full, but they feel like they are living lives that are meaningless. It is so easy to be swallowed up by the chaotic world in which we live,

If I am honest about my own life, I must admit that things seem pretty chaotic at times. I have two volunteer jobs, I also take care of some senior citizens, I go shopping for them, keep them uplifted when they are down. I’ve taken them to Doctor appointments. I also have two prayer meetings a week, and I volunteer at my church. All of these things can run into together at times.

Early this morning I was reading my Bible the words- Rejoice in the Lord always; again, I say rejoice. A call not to be anxious, and pray to God in everything and include Thanksgiving in our prayers. And then It talks about the peace of God with surpasses all understanding, will guard our hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. This is a very encouraging promise. The starting point for claiming this promise is knowing Jesus as our savior. Isaiah 26:3 says, You keel him in perfect peace who’s mind stays on you, because he trusts in you.

The Apostle Paul was writing to a church of believers in the book of Philippines who had trusted in Jesus, His death on the cross for the sins of the world, and His resurrection from the dead. Believing in Jesus is the starting point of peace.

Rejoice. These world has many cares and concerns, but there are always reasons to rejoice in what God had done and is doing.

Be reasonable. If we are reasonable then we will avoid being bothered by useless arguments, and will be able to get along well with others. This eliminates a lot of chaos.

Mathew 10;13 reads If the household is worthy, let your peace come to it, but if it isn’t worthy, let your peace return to you.

So, it’s saying if you’re in a situation and you come to it in peace, then if you do not have peace in the situation, take your peace and leave.

Piece I leave with you; My peace I give you not as the world gives. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful.

John 14:27

Anxiety and peace cannot exist together. Replace worry with prayer. When we take our concerns to God it helps us let go of them and not dwell on them. When our hearts are thankful, it keeps things in a proper perspective.

I want to share something with you. I was meditating on the word of God in Isaiah early Sunday morning. And I heard these words. Without fainting – The Outer Court is where we walk, the Holy Place is where we run, and we sour like Eagles into the Heavenly Realm.

The Outer Court is where we walk but if we run to the Holy Place which is God’s Word, and pray and worship him when we are in Chaos then we will have the peace like an Eagle.

If we are thankful and faithful when we prayer, studying God’s word. Then their will be peace in our hearts.

Do You Trust Yourself?

Distrusting ourselves can show up in many ways, from ignoring our intuition to imposter syndrome, from not believing our own lived experiences and memories to ignoring our triggers, from not having a clear sense of our own boundaries to being disconnected from our bodies and not trusting what they are telling us.

So, whatever each of us enters into the work of processing our trauma or healing, with whatever sense we use or whoever we look to for support, I believe learning to trust ourselves should be a fundamental aspect of the process.

We hear about “doing the work” a lot these days, and “doing the work, of trauma processing, of coming back into our bodies, of anti-oppression needs to include learning and relearning self-trust at its core. If has to if we are going to break the patterns and systems of trauma and oppression.

I know the return to self- trust can be a complex experience.

Many narratives in wellness tell us we can unlearn or process deep conditioning once and we will be healed. When in the reality of living with trauma, of having lived through decades of abuse of living in a oppressive culture living in a body that needs the support of systems that teach us to not trust ourselves is often that we must learn and relearn to trust ourselves over and over.

Their are so many still living with trauma and oppression, so the process of returning to self-trust is going to be complex.

It is one always going against the grain of our already learned conditioning and living cultures and systems that are not designed to support us in this process of trusting ourselves and this often doing things the complete opposite.

I know this is true because I have to live this way I chose because I don’t ever want to be who I was before.

I believe learning to trust ourselves is a practice we can return to again and again. Each time, hopefully with a deeper level of trusting in our knowing what worth, in our bodies, in our full selves.

I know while I do have many moments of defaulting back to my lifetime of conditioning and of allowing the voices of the culture that’s around me continually still live in to take hold, I do now, at my core believe I can trust myself.

Reaching this place of trusting myself of returning here, has not something I have done alone. Just like I did not learn to distrust and disbelieve myself alone. I did not return to trusting and believing in myself alone either.

Sometimes we need another trusted person or a group to mirror back to us the belief we want to find in ourselves. Sometimes we need others to remind us that they trust us that they trust us, and our capacity to trust ourselves before we can fully land in the space of trusting ourselves.

My moment was when I chose to go to church, I have to admit I made this choice to do this to get away from my husband for a few hours a week. Our married life was in such despair. I had to do something to try and get some alone time.

At church I made a few friends and one in particular that helped me know I was valuable and loved. And how to love myself hence I began the journey to trust myself again, but it took a long time coming.

I had to trust myself enough to realize I needed more help than I was getting. I changed doctors out of the town I was living. I needed trauma healing. While it took many years and some health issues along the way. I made it by telling the doctors everything I had bottled up inside me for so many years, all the pain, broken hearted ness, and my deepest thoughts I wasn’t ever going to tell anyone, I let it all out.

Once I chose to not want to live the way I was living. And letting everything out. And starting to pray and talking to Father God. Asking for forgiveness for everything. My life started to change for the better.

Yes, I had a lot of apologies to do to the people in my life and the other’s I had hurt badly who refused to speak to me. While most forgave me, their we a few who chose not to, but my conscience was finally clear and I had to work hard to regain some trust from people. But it was so worth it, I have become a new creation. As long as I follow my own path and not try to walk anyone else’s.

The first thing to have to do before you can change anything in your life is you want to have to change. Without that you will succeed in anything.

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Thankful Project

November 14th- I am thankful my migraine only lasted 2 days.

November 15th – I am thankful for my church, someone knocked on my door and gave me some food today.

Thankful Project

November 14th- I am thankful for loving people in my life and the guidance I have received.

Why People Put Other’s Down

Some people have to dig at others every time they can.

They belittle others, make fun of them, and put them down.

If you are on the receiving end of this behavior. It can hurt.

So why do they do it? What makes people put others down?

When this happens, what is the best way to respond to it?

There are reasons people put other’s down.

It makes them feel better. As backwards as this may sound. It makes people feel better by putting people down. It’s adult bullying.

They will typically have low-esteem, and their misguided way of boosting it is to take aim at other person.

They are insecure and a common technique they use is to put others down to make you feel lower than them.

Their ego gets a temporary lift from its own pain by inflicting hurt on someone else.

Of course their relief doesn’t last long and so they are always looking for ways to put people down.

They are jealous.

Giver their low self-esteem, they will be resentful to see someone else doing well in any sense.

Their jealousy causes them the lash out. Their aim is to bring the other person down to their level by belittling their success or happiness. It is spiteful but they think “If I can feel good about myself then neither can you.”

To make them feel important

Nobody likes to feel small or insignificant. But some people use put downs to give themselves importance.

This is often as part of a group where they believe that attacking someone else gives their own a standing boost.

But these people don’t realize is that while this approach might work to a small extent in some cut-throat areas. It actually has the opposite effect in general life.

To make other people like them

Making others the butt of a considered joke among the group of friends can make everyone laugh.

However, some people take this approach in other situations, thinking that it will help others feel more positively towards them, It won’t.

These kind of people really care what others think about them. But when they put themselves in awkward moments they can look like a fool.

For some people they don’t care if it’s negative attention or positive attention as long as it’s attention toward them. Any attention makes them feel noticed.

To feel in control

Putting someone else down provided a level of control over their lives, which is often due to childhood difficulties or trauma.

These bullies, have for example have been bullied themselves so it’s a sense to gain back control back.

When I was bullied in school I had some pretty rotten things, like fat, ugly, stupid. The issue was that’s what I was told at home. So it was just normal to me. I just ignored them and went on with my day. One day long ago, I was looking for pictures and came across a photo for my graduation, I weighed about 80-pounds I not bad looking either. I got to thinking why to bullies bully you with lies. The answer is written above.

Later in life talking to people who were bullies in school, had tough a childhood also. Some kind of trauma, and had to deal with someone form of death, or divorce of their parents.

Some have asked me why did you not bully anyone. I told them I knew how that made me feel, and I didn’t want anyone else to feel the same way. Plus I feared my mother would beat me with in a inch of my life.

So, when you are being bullied or you are the bully, think about what kind of life they

If you can turn this situation on them, so say things bad, but good. Make them feel better. Or if you feel you cannot do that smile and walk away. Give their words no power. We need to learn how to react, not let our emotions control us.

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Thankful Project

November 13th

I am Thankful today for being able to stop and relax for a time.

The Winter Blues

We have officially entered what for some are the hard months for some “The Dark Ages” the time of year when the sun disappears and the pale complexion of your friends reminds you that you better take your probiotics and your vitamins or you’ll end up with a cold to go with that pasty look.

I dread winter each winter because I have Seasonal Affective Disorder, it’s a type of depression that’s related to changes in seasons and begins and end at about the same time every year. Most people with SAD, starts in the fall and continue into the winter months, sapping your energy and making you feel moody.

In most cases SAD starts during the last part of fall, and goes until spring, it becomes very difficult for me. I try to stock up on food, and finish my holiday shopping in September, because I don’t even want to leave my house.

Here are some symptoms of SAD

Oversleeping

Appetite changes, especially cravings for foods high in carbohydrates

Weight gain

Tiredness or low energy

It’s normal to have some days when you feel down. But if you feel down for days at a time and you can not get motivated to be activities you normally enjoy you probably need to see a Doctor.

Some causes of SAD

The specific cause of seasonal affective disorder remains unknown. Some factors that make come in play include:

Your biological clock (circadian rhythm). The reduced level on sunlight in fall and winter may cause winter-onset SAD. This decrease in sunlight may disrupt your body’s internal clock and leads to feelings of depression.

Serotonin levels. A drop in serotonin, a brain chemical (neurotransmitter) that affects mood, might play a role in SAD. Reduced sunlight can cause a drop in serotonin and trigger this depression.

Melatonin levels. The change in the season can disrupt the body’s levels of melatonin, which plays a role in-sleep patterns and mood.

Risk factors

Seasonal Affective Disorder is diagnosed more often in women that in men and occurs more in younger adults than older adults.

Factors that increase your risk of SAD include:

Family History. People with SAD. May be more likely to have blood relatives with SAD or another form of depression.

Having major depression or bipolar disorder. Symptoms of depression may worsen seasonally if you have neofascist these conditions.

Living far from the equator. SAD appears to be more common among people who live far north or south of the equator. This may be due to decreased sunlight during the winter and longer days during the summer months.

Complications

The signs and symptoms of SAD seriously. As with other types of depression, SAD can get worse and lead to problems if not treated. These include:

Social withdrawal

School or work problems

Substance abuse

Mental heath disorders such as anxiety or eating disorders

Suicidal thoughts or behavior.

Here are some tips to help with SAD:

Along with treatment of your doctor.

Watch the sugar

I think our body gets the cue just before Thanksgiving that it will be hibernating for a few months, so it needs to ingest everything edible in sight. I’m convinced that the snow somehow communicates to the human brain the need to consume every kind of chocolate available in the house.

Depressives and addicts need t be a especially careful with sweets because theaddiction to sugar and white flour products is very real, and physiological, affecting the same biochemical systems in your body as drugs like heroin. Your relationship to sweet things is operating on a cellular level. It is more powerful than you have realized. What you eat can a huge effect on how you feel.

Stock up on Omega-3’s

During at winter I make sure I take these because it is confirmed to have positive effects. It is a natural anti – inflammatory molecule on emotional heath. One 500mg soft-gel casual can elevate and stabilize mood.

Give back

It is said “The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service to others. The sense of purpose- committing oneself to a noble mission are acts the well-being on others are strong antidotes to depression.

Get some exercise

It’s difficult to go to the gym, because of the virus has closed down places of business. So instead go for a walk or run, exercise to a online exercise video. Getting your heart rate up. It is very good advice to spend 15 minutes or more outside everyday. You might as well spending that time exercising.

Use a light lamp

Bright-light therapy- involving sitting in front of a fluorescent light box that delivers an intensity of 1,000 iluminance can be as effective as an antidepressant medication for mild and moderate depression and can yield substantial relief for SAD.

Wear bright colors

Personally, I tend to wear black everyday in the winter. It’s supposed to make you look thinner. But the result is that I appear as if I’m going to a funeral every afternoon between the months of November to March. It isn’t good. Not for a person that’s hardwired to live in Stress and worry, the works very hard to stay happy and in control of my life. So I have to make a conscience effort to wear bright green, purple, blue, red and orange.

There is no research supporting this theory, but I am convicted there is a link between feeling optimistic and wearing bright colors. There’s a line with “faking it til you make it,” desperate attempts t trick your brain into thinking it’s sunny and beautiful outside-time to celebrate spring!- even though it’s a blizzard with sleet causing traffic jams,

Force yourself outside

I realize that the last thing you want to do is go outside when it’s 20 degrees outside and the roads are slushy is to head outside for a walk around the neighborhood. It’s much more fun to cuddle up with a book and chocolate chip cookies and enjoy being in your warm pajamas.

Hang out with friends

This seems like a obvious depression buster. Of course you get together when your mood starts to go south for the winter dreaming of when it’s going to be warm again. But that’s when we tend to hibernate for the winter. But, we need to be validated and encouraged and inspired by our friends. And with technology today, people don’t even have to put their slippers on to get support from anyone.

Head south

This solution isn’t free, I try to schedule my vacations during Christmas break or the last of January. It breaks up winter so I have something to look forward to in those depressing months.

Stay busy with a project like decluttering your house or going through clothes that no longer fit, find some place that takes clothing many people are looking for clothing during the winter. A friend of mine once painted every room in her house, during the winter months. I distracted her from her winter blue. Anything you can do during those dreary days to keep yourself busy, not thinking about your situation or moods.

Challenge yourself

I have found I can often be lifted up by choosing an activity that is formidable enough to keep my Attention, but easy enough to do when my brain is muddled. I’ve joined weight watchers once. You can also learn to scrapbook, or paint on canvas. Stretch yourself by doing small things that can keep yourself off the season.

Light a candle

Smelling the scents of a candle and watching the flickering flame some how just puts me at peace. During these months try to spoil yourself. Love yourself more. Enjoy spending your alone time on things only you enjoy.

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Thankful Project

November 12th- I am thankful that I am able to learn from my mistakes. Am able to have a chance to apologize and correct them.