When You Want Everything to Just STOP

“I just want everything to stop. I just want to be done.”

Those sentences are pretty much what’s been running through my mind for the past couple months. You know when everything just gets so overwhelming. It feels like everyone wants a piece of you and everyone wants you to completely devote yourself to them. It doesn’t help that I’m a perfectionist, and I probably expect ten times more out of myself than what anyone else does.

I love stories. In all the craziness of my life, I can always find a story that totally mirrors what I’m going through. I believe that stories have the power to change people’s lives. Stories can resonate in you like nothing else. Recently, my friend and I watched Barbie in The Princess and the Pauper. That movie first came out when I was seven, and I absolutely loved it.  So, when my friend and I watched it again, all those happy feelings came back. I hadn’t seen this movie in years, but all those powerful emotions from the story were still there.(Just a little side note, Princess and the Pauper is an awesome story. Way better romance than Twilight!) I promise there was a reason for me going off on a tangent (I never understood that phrase…) about stories. You’ll probably hear me talk a lot about stories. I am a writer after all. But I believe that stories have really shaped who we are as a society. People love stories. There’s a reason why Hollywood makes so much money. We love stories because they’re a reflection of things we go through or feelings that we can never find a good way to express.

Your life is a powerful story. You might think it’s a boring story. Or a hopeless one. Or a pointless story. I guarantee you’re wrong. In every story, there is the hopeless moment. Usually, there’s more than one hopeless moment. But the main character hangs on, because they see something worth it. If you’re reading this, then that means that you’re alive. If you put your hand over your heart, you would feel it beating. That beating is called purpose. Guess what, you have a 100% success rate of getting through bad days. There’s a reason you've hung on. There’s a reason you've kept going.

When you want to stop, when you want to quit, when you want to just give up and let go, remember the reason why you've kept at it for so long. Is it because you have a friend who’s looking up to you? Maybe you have a sibling who needs you. Maybe you just need to prove to yourself that you can keep going. In the darkness, it’s so easy to lose sight of the thing that kept you going. It’s in the darkness that you need to cling most to what you knew in the light.

The Princess and the Pauper isn't my favorite story. My favorite story is actually about a man who saw you and me in our hopelessness and decided that we were worth dying for. He put hope in the end of our story. I don’t know how much you know about Jesus. Maybe you don’t really believe in God. If you don’t, I’m not here to cram religion down your throat. I just want to let you know my reason for keeping on. This is the reason I keep going when I've just spent half the night crying myself to sleep— the reason I choose not to let the darkness envelop me. My Jesus saw me and decided that I was worth it. He decided that He would be broken. He would die a heinous death for me.

He believed that I was worth it. He believed that I had a purpose that could far exceed my brokenness. That is my reason for continuing.

Honestly, the last few months have been crazy. There have been really good things, like making a lot of awesome new friends and making some other friendships stronger. Then there have been some really not good things. Like having my mouth wired shut—and puking through that. Yeah, if you stick with me for the next couple weeks, you’ll probably get to hear about that (or I just lost half of you guys who would rather not hear about that…). A lot of the things that have happened have made me want to just stop, but life keeps going. I have to choose to keep going along with it.

When you want everything to just stop, what's your reason to keep going? 

Moving On

My last post was a kinda depressing, wasn’t it? Yeah, I was feeling a little bit down. I’m still on the recovering end. But things are getting better. Sometimes ya just gotta shove your face in some cake and trust things will get better. While you’re shoving your face in cake, you thank God for a best friend who’s willing do it with you—and pray for you.

Thankfully my story is not done being written (as shown by the little glitch in my emotional system last week). If any of you are struggling right now, and totally identify with what I wrote last week, please find someone you can talk to. That’s what I did. A best friend or a parent or someone. And maybe shove your face in some cake. 

Anyway, moving on from all that, here’s a little bit more of my story.

After I had finished up school, the craziness of moving really began. We were packing, sorting, cleaning, and repeating. I also started online school. I was a little bit stressed, but I was still hopeful because we were going to be moving soon. Every time I felt angry, I told myself that it would all get better once we moved. I believed that all the gloominess I was feeling would go away once I was finally out.

But the stress was building—fast! Instead of having to deal with girl drama, I now had to deal with the hassles of moving, working in really hard schoolwork, and sorting through family conflicts that were arising out of the tension. It was a pretty crazy time for everyone. I can’t really remember everything that happened during those 2 months that we were preparing to move. It was mostly a blur.

But one memory is still vivid.

I was actually out in the new city helping some of our relatives move. I was feeling really down and stressed, mostly because I had some really hard math that I was working on and had to get done because I was behind (side note—don’t ever try to take on math in the middle of a big move. Just don’t.) I had just finished reading Anything but Normal by Melody Carlson. I put the book down and I started bawling. The book was about a Christian teenager who finds herself pregnant. She had to learn to let God forgive her, and she had to forgive herself and others. Now, I wasn’t pregnant, but the message of forgiveness hit me so hard. I was so angry at myself for the mess I had become. I was mad at myself for not being a good friend, for liking pain, for being mean to my family, and for not knowing what to do as I watched my grandpa die. I laid there on my bed in the dark, listening to God tell me to let it all go. That He still loved me. That He had forgiven be because I had asked (over and over!)

I shook my head that night. I told God that I wasn’t good enough. That I would mess it up again. Finally, I cried myself to sleep.

The next morning and for the next few weeks, I tried to talk to God and tried to make up for the things I had done, but I kept messing up.

The emptiness was growing. As the weeks continued, food became disgusting to me. I didn’t want to eat, and when I did, I felt sick. I just didn’t want to be full of anything.

I felt helpless, and I kept counting down the days until we moved.

I would really like to go on, but then this post could become a novel, so I’ll stop there. As I think about how I couldn’t forgive myself, I can see how badly it hurt me. Please don’t make that same mistake. You are not such a horrible person that you can’t be forgiven.  Even by yourself.  You are not a failure. You don’t deserve the pain and emptiness. No matter what anyone has told you. No matter what you’ve told yourself.

God does forgive. I don’t know what your opinions are on God. Maybe you see him as harsh, judging, and just downright mean. Maybe you don’t really care about God. But I know, in my heart, that God forgives. He’s not harsh and judging. We’re the ones that are harsh and judging. God is there to forgive and help us start over. No matter how many times we have to do that.

We just have to accept that forgiveness.

“Love is when a man wipes away your tears…even after your sins left Him hanging on a cross.”

Love,

Jyllenna

 

A Post from the Pit

Today's post is a little bit different than my other posts. If it seems weird, just stick with it. I promise it has a happy ending.

Have you ever felt like you hit a wall at 100 miles an hour? Honestly, that's how I fell right now. Over the last month, I had a lot of awesome experiences. I was really happy, and everything was going great.

Then, BAM!

There's the wall. And I'm still seeing stars. The last 2 weeks have been rough for me. It's familar ground, and it scares me. I've had a tough time getting out of bed. I've cried myself to sleep. I've lacked the motivation to do anything. Scary things.

But right now, as I write this, I know things are gonna change. I chose to believe what I know to be true. I know that there is always a Light brighter than the darkness. I know that I am an overcomer.

Stress is a scary thing, and I feel  a lot of it right now. Exams are coming. Schoolwork is challenging. I feel inadequate. Insecure.

Inesecurity is also a scary thing. Lately, insecurity has been raring its big ugly head. I just don't want to be rejected. Again.

Guys, down here in the pit, those are the kinds of thoughts that fill your mind. Every problem you face is magnified. You cry. You ache. You get angry. Maybe you physically hurt yourself. Maybe you hurt others. No one understands.

So we think.

But I choose to believe that Someone is there, aching with me. Crying with me. Waiting for me to call for help. I choose to believe this because I know it's true.

I know that not everyone reading this believes the same as I do. Sometimes it's hard for me to believe it.

But while you're crying, wondering if life will ever get better, try calling for Someone bigger than you. I had to do that. And guess what. Rainbows didn't appear. I didn't jump up and dance for joy. Things didn't just magically get better. But I got though the night. I know that I was heard.

So, if you're down in the pits, choose to believe what you know is true--not what you feel. Man, I know it's hard. Writing this post has been hard. Right now, every minute is a fight for me. You can cry too. In fact, cry a lot. I've done that several times in the last few day. And call for the One who is crying with you. Join me. Let's watch things change. Sure, our circumstances might not change, but we'll change. For the better.

And finally, eat chocolate. Seriously, God made it for a reason.

Love
Jyllenna

"In my distress, when seemingly closed in, I called upon the Lord and cried to my God; He heard my voice...my cry came before Him, into His very ears." Psalm 18:6