I’ve been gifted with such amazing friendships through life. With a batch full of breakups and a divorce under my belt, romantic relationships might not be my strongest suit, but when it comes to female friendship, I feel like I’ve won the lotto. Add the support two amazing sisters in the mix, and essentially I’ve been uplifted and carried through every hard season of life …until recently when enduring rough patch of life.
I remember one morning during this season of woe, quite literally rubbing my eyes and re-starting my phone because I couldn’t believe not a single friend had text to check in. Was the WiFi down? Was there a national emergency that has distracted all ten of my besties away from their concern over poor me? A viral Botox sale, perhaps?!
For months I lived bewildered, fighting a mix of hurt and anger, if I’m honest, wondering why on Earth more ride or dies weren’t calling/texting more, or offering to go out or being the loyal, on-call therapists they’d always been during hard times. Then it hit me. God was teaching me to strengthen my own soul.
It doesn’t sound remotely magical, or fun, because it isn’t. But it worked.
Unbeknownst to me before experiencing this horrible comfort drought, I’ve learned God will sometimes blind the eyes and deafen the ears of our closest friends when we’re in pain, so we learn the art of ministering to ourselves. This isn’t to build an independence. It’s to build a greater dependence on Him, and really to bolster our spirit in ways the comfort of others never can.
So, through this time of involuntary “personal growth,” I’ve learned to dig deep and draw out of my own well so to speak, which after LOTS of tearful trips and empty buckets, feels like a gift. In a practical sense, this is what strengthening your own soul looks like:
- Getting Into the Word
Sounds obvious, but think for a moment about the last hard thing you’ve gone through. Did the amount of time spent gleaning God’s comfort and direction from the Bible in any way coincide with the amount of pain you were in? Until this past season of my life transpired, my answer woulda been a solid no. But when the pages of the Bible appear to be the only open arms in the room, you really do learn the healing, strengthening power of Scripture.
My best advice to anyone needing some serious doses of strength and comfort when life falls apart would be to plunk yourself in right in the Psalms, and stay there until you can breathe again. My list of favorites is below. Much of the Psalms were written when the ever-emotive King David after being deserted by his own soldiers and forced into solitude hiding in caves, wondering if he would live or die.
So essentially, the most uplifting, encouraging book of the Bible was written by a man learning to strengthen his own soul. When David eventually reclaimed his reign, he was able to lead his people and live the extent of his life from a place of absolute assurance in God, needing exactly zero from anyone else but the Lord.
- Meditating On God’s Goodness, Apart From You
God is always merciful, kind, faithful, and good. He’s all of those things, 100 percent of the time, even when we’ve been hurt by others, when we choose to hurt others, when we fail, make mistakes, backslide, sin, and/or light our life like a dumpster fire.
So, whether your hard season was self-imposed, or circumstantial, it really doesn’t matter. God is good, and therefore, you will be okay. Your rescue plan is happening, even though you can’t see or feel it. In the same way we believe Earth is spinning, even though we can’t feel a thing, we can know God’s moving right now on our behalf, fully aware of every one of your emotional, physical and spiritual needs.
Aside from mediating on the character of God, it always helps to recount all the ways God’s come through when finding myself in need. I recommend keeping a list somewhere to revert to, when feeling hopeless. Doesn’t matter if it’s financial, relational, emotional…He just simply always comes through, in His time. Speak that truth over your current troubles, reassuring your soul that this too, will be a marker of God’s faithfulness in your life.
- Remember that Your Emotions Are Not Irrelevant. But They’re Always Fleeting
We spend so much time trying to avoid pain and escape from negative emotions. Before essentially becoming a prescriptive to life in recent years, therapy was pretty taboo in certain circles. Growing up, Gen X was told emotions were meant to be controlled, not dealt with. Anger was sinful. Sadness should be quickly irayed away. But part of strengthening our own souls involves being able to acknowledge our negative thoughts and emotions, process where they’re coming from, and then bring them captive to Christ.
Jesus felt sadness, anger, loneliness, fear, rejection, anxiety and anger, and all the others. He had to strengthen his own soul too, by exerting power over the enemy’s lies through knowledge of the Word, constantly praying and always worshipping. Which leads to my final and favorite point…
- Worship
I’m a worship junkie so this comes easy to me, but honestly, how does anyone really struggling EVER feel better without the regular practice of worship? And the use if Zoloft doesn’t count, haha. There’s a very specific comfort, and freedom from Earthly stresses when we really close our eyes to a worship song and escape away into the presence of God. That’s why David worshipped in the middle of his absolute catastrophe of his life. It’s the very meaning of the Nehemiah 8:10 verse, “The Joy of the Lord is our strength.” If this is foreign to you, and feels a little weird, do it anyway. Because fear, anxiety, sadness, etc. at the VERY least lessons, if not disappears completely, when you’re connected to Him.
If you’ve been finding yourself left a little more alone than normal, feeling a general disappointment at your current lack of friend support, consider this your David moment. Took a while for me to get there, but there’s for sure a sweet, deeper level of wholeness to be found when going to Him alone for your source of strength. It’s truly irreplaceable.
Here’s that list of my all-time best Psalms when it comes to gaining strength. xo
For more on this topic, check out my post, “When Battling Anxiety, Remember This One Thing.”
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