All My Troubles Seemed So Far Away....

Mara almost got me yesterday. I must admit I spent at least two hours of my day pretty much destroyed.

Today is a new day, and everything will be fine. unfortunately there is no turning back to the day before yesterday. But yesterday taught me a lesson.

Sometimes it is when you are comfortable and happy that your personal Mara gets stronger. It finds the weakness, the loophole ... simply because you have let your guard down.

One thing I had to remind myself is that there is no ignoring or forgetting about what happened in my life almost a year ago. I can and have moved on, but it will still touch me in some way, shape, or form, for probably the rest of my life.

Yesterday it touched me in a way I didn't see coming, and that shook me pretty hard. But I have to keep reminding myself that I have moved forward, beyond the evil that was an everyday part of my life. There is no longer a hand around my ankle while I'm swimming up for air. Although I let that hand drown me for far too long, I've wrestled free. It's gone - for good. And I thank God every day for giving me the strength to get out.

Yes, I will feel the ghost hand's presence in the water. I may be affected financially, physically, emotionally, for longer than I anticipated. But all I can do is keep moving forward, keep making good choices about who I let into my life, and keep my head above water. Keep growing, and learning from my mistakes, and being the loving person that I am. I can only move upward from here.

I also did a couple of strategic things that helped me when Mara was present yesterday. I prayed for what I have, rather than what I had lost. It was really hard, because I was feeling horrible. But I sat down and looked around me, thanking God for things like a roof, a cat, food, water, my faith, the unyielding love of those around me. I forced myself to focus on a small ray of light above me while sitting in what felt like a rock-bottom hole. And it helped.

With everything else I've been through and the fact that I'm still here, I knew that I would be okay.

I found the below quote at Ron Hutchcraft Ministries, a bible website I stumbled upon. It's within a passage about God never giving you more than you can handle.

"Your Father loves you. Your Father knows what you can handle. He knows what He can trust you with. There's something much bigger, something much more eternal going on here than you can possibly imagine, maybe even a contest over you between the devil and God Himself. Carry your burden faithfully, with undiminished allegiance to your Lord and daily downloading of the mighty grace of God."

A contest over you between the devil and God himself!

Wow.

I've heard the idea of God not giving you more than you can handle, but never thought of the grand plan in that way. Sometimes life really feels like just that - like you're caught in the middle of the war between God and the devil.

These periods of love and pain interspersed. Like a cyclical tug and a pull of beauty and pain going back and forth with the times. Such is life.

I know one thing - If there is anything at all I can do, I will not let God lose this battle. And I still consider myself very incredibly lucky, for the angels he's sent to fight by my side.