I’ll just admit this: I struggled with depression even as a Christian and I was ashamed to admit it.
It all stemmed from a constant feeling of not being good enough.
I feel like the desire to be the popular kid doesn’t end when you graduate high school. Rather, you enter society at the bottom of the totem pole (unless you’re a 1 in a million exception childhood star), still trying to be Homecoming Queen in a class of 7.8 billion. You watch as people fight to “make it” in various areas—some in medicine, some in business, some competing to make pies and bedazzle houseguests better than Martha Stewart. In any arena, there’s a competition, some race to get to the top. Which outlet you choose? That’s on you. I feel like no one ever tells you that you’re going to struggle with an innate sense of loneliness that the world tells you “success” will resolve. So, you kill yourself to obtain accolades, material wealth, and Instagram followers only to find yourself empty as you meet each new rung of the ladder. You’re exhausted yet still striving for the next achievement, the next partner, the next car, the next whatever . . . to make you happy. That’s what the Samaritan woman at the well did. She had several husbands and was not satisfied. Jesus spoke in parables, comparing her unfulfillment in life with an inability to quench her thirst with water from the well.
Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” (New International Version, John 4:13).
I can relate to the Samaritan woman. If it wasn’t people I sought, it was the next success, all the while comparing myself to everyone around me and feeling “not enough.” The pressure to prove myself to 7.8 billion combined with insecurity and doubt woke me up each morning like a bag of bricks being thrown at my head. Skull-crushing anxiety and horrible, horrible thoughts of worthlessness. When I couldn’t master these thoughts, I tried hiding from them. I subtly started to sleep my life away. But, every time I’d open my eyes, the thoughts were there, this time louder, accompanied by their evil stepsisters—shame and condemnation. Moreover, friends and family begin to worry about me, but often it was too hard to see me in this state so they slowly trickled out of my life. Isolation became the breeding ground for more insidious thoughts.
And I just laid down and took it.
Despite all this, I white-knuckled it to pass my classes in college and law school, even gaining honorable achievements along the way.
I hid the pain well.
But no achievement in the world could silence the inner critic. They were all merely distractions. I could never really appreciate each milestone since my eyes were always set on the next, and the next, and the next. Law school kind of programs you to think like this anyway. You have to get in, then pass your classes, then get the internships, then join the competition teams, then graduate, then pass the bar, then find a job. Constant performing, constant measuring your value amongst a group of type-A individuals.
Its exhausting.
Yet, for some reason I put myself in that environment because I wanted to change the world with a law degree.
The aforementioned mental battle took place before I found Jesus, but even after giving my life to Him, these feelings tried to wrestle their way back into heart and steal the joy God freely gave me.
I learned no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t hide from my feelings. Hiding was MY way of dealing with life, but that wasn’t God’s way. When I did things MY way, my anxiety grew exponentially until I cried out to God in utter surrender. And some days I didn’t feel His presence but I had to trust He was there. Deuteronomy 8:2-3 says:
And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
I had to feel the pain of my own hunger to understand my necessity for God. That required humbling, the leveling of my pride. Pride says, “I don’t need anyone; I can do life alone.” Humility reminds us that without God, we can’t do anything.
So, I humbly asked God to remove the anxious thoughts I faced daily. When He wouldn’t remove them, I asked WHY. I had to do my part, He said. Faith without works is dead. I had to get up in the morning and spend time with Him. I had to open up my bible and seek wisdom and truth.
And I didn’t do these things until I was sick and tired of being sick and tired.
Once I spent time renewing my mind with the Word of God, I learned to distinguish His voice from the ramblings and lies. And when I did, I discovered some beautiful truths.
That I was fearfully and wonderfully made. (New King James Version, Psalm 139:14)
That I was blessed and highly favored. (Luke 1:28)
That I didn’t have to compete with anyone. (2 Corinthians 10:12)
That He KNEW me before He formed me in my mother’s womb. (Jeremiah 1:5)
That God had a plan for me, not to harm me, plans to give me hope and a future. (Jeremiah 29:11)
I began to study these truths, speak these truths, and plant them into my heart. So, when the devil whispered those thoughts of worthlessness at me, I was armed and ready to fire back. And let me tell you, some days, I am weary and I don’t want to fight. But what other option do I have?
I want to encourage you to not give up. It may take time to master your thoughts. It may take a ton of spiritual vigor to fight a very real spiritual war. But what’s impossible for man, is possible for God. And He is there freely giving us strength we need to fight, if only we are open to receive it.
