“When I was in the midst of my suffering, I thought only of you.”
Ugh. Truth bomb deployed, but in all honesty, I had asked for it. I’d asked the Lord to speak some truth to me. Whenever my mind was spinning I knew enough to know that’s what I needed. Honest, from God, words to keep me grounded. Otherwise, my mind could get the best of me. My emotions tended to be like a loosely secured tarp out in the elements. When the rain came it would collect in a big old heap, but before you knew it the water would start collapsing over the sides. It had nowhere else to go. My thoughts were like that.
It usually happened when I was stressed out and had a lot on my mind. Or if there was something I really needed to work out, then it was guaranteed to happen. Yep, I’d be chugging along just fine, superwoman style, when all of the sudden some tiny thing would set me off. I’d be dealing with uncertainty like a champ, a brave face forward, but then something as minuscule as a slow internet connection would make me cuss like my former sailor self.
In these times of stress, where I felt overburdened by responsibility or the task before me, I would suddenly become keenly aware of my efforts in comparison to everyone else. I noticed my contributions in life the most. I needed to be let out in traffic first. I was in a hurry. I needed my recruiter to call me back now. Surely I was his only client. I needed my coworkers to do more, and I needed to leave work on time. I became acutely aware of everyone’s spending habits but my own when balancing the checkbook. I also magnified everyone else’s messes without seeing my own laziness. I needed computer problems fixed pronto, service people to answer the phone immediately, and the dadgum weather to cooperate with my off days! In my self-absorbed angst I was the inconvenienced, overlooked, and taken advantage of one. Even if I was contributing in a mighty way, that was all I saw. I was basically blind to the contributions of others. I couldn’t see the service in what I was doing, or even the love that caused me to serve. I’m not saying I didn’t deserve some accolades for it, but sometimes I let my stress turn me into a woman who only wanted applause. Or worse, who couldn’t see that she got a standing ovation on the regular.