Pause

If you know me, you know my heart shows straight through my eyes. I was built to be transparent. It’s how I make sense of layered trails that follow many of us from childhood…ones that can cage us or set us free.

I’ve been in a funk. The past couple months felt like a fog rolled in, blurring everything. I was on a path with a destination—publish my book—and then a landslide crashed in front of me. I cry easily, but lately, oof….

I didn’t understand why until I looked back at what had actually gone on.

The list was weighty: multiple dental bone spurs (OUCH!), mini family crises, another fall (protect the ribs!), our dog went blind, three huge trips and two small (luggage gets heavy y’all), then more family/personal “stuff” …all within four months.

No wonder the ground buckled.Everyone has their own rapid-fire list that knocks them off course. The starts and stops can be baffling. They freeze my spirit and steal a little of my faith without my knowing.

So my momentum sprinted off. I slipped into emotional mute mode—functioning in public, but inside stuck in the in between…not myself, not someone else, just adrift — grabbing anything that promised relief.

Then I started researching. (I’m a research geek). What I found is helping me slowly rise out of “whatever that was.”

One thing I learned is environments and people around us act like mirrors. Inactive surroundings dull our momentum; motivated ones spark it — and it all intensifies under stress.

Stress automatically wakes up our oldest survival pathways. Whatever we learned as kids we default to when our nervous systems overload.

I experienced this my first night at the cape house—my insides buzzed and hummed intensely while I sat “relaxing” on the couch. The energy I used to get through the day was still being processed long after the moment had passed.

Bizarre.

I had to lie down until it subsided.

The running and upheavals are behind me. I’m not full steam, but I’m no longer adrift. New knowledge gave me tools, and I’m doing the work. Takes effort, but it’s worth it.

This upcoming birthday threatens to weigh on my forward movement like an annoying kid, but I know how to whack it away. Cue the metaphorical hammer!

The shift is partially effort, partially timing. And turning back to the faith that has held me through everything.

Hanging with new friends has been especially sweet. Phone chats with those far away illuminate the path — gifts I didn’t expect but needed.

My faith has been uncovered from the rubble of chaos. It took some serious digging. I forgot I could tell God everything, and that no matter what, He is good and has my back.

I know better now what steadies me, what softens me, what inspires me. I know which voices spark something, which moments lift. Beams of light are returning after a long stretch of shadows.

Integrating faith into the churn of the real world when it gets choppy takes real work. This is how we get out of the bramble, back onto solid ground.

I’m moving again. Slow. Intentionally. Forward.

And for now, that’s enough.

If you find yourself in a similar season, give yourself a break.

Take inventory.

Take time.

Take the pressure off.

There is power to be found in the pause.