Unstuck - A Different New Year Resolution
As we enter this new year our news feeds are drowning in people ready with their huge goals and fancy vision boards ready to attack this year with great gusto. Everyone is leveling up, moving up, stepping up and you feel like you can’t even get up. You read these posts and your mind is overwhelmed. On one hand you want to be just like them, so for a moment you adopt their attitude of enthusiasm and feel ready to conquer the world. But quickly, you retreat and flee, because you feel so unequipped in this season to do much more than get unstuck.
Maybe you’re like me and instead of leaving a little sparkle wherever you go you leave a trail of dust bunnies and puff crumbs instead? This year your goals aren’t grandiose, they don’t glisten with greatness in fact those people you see jumping into the new year would grimace at your list. If your list is simply to get unstuck - you aren’t alone. You aren’t the only one wondering when is it going to be my turn to be like those people who exude joy. And you certainly aren’t alone in this fight, because yes, some days feel so impossibly long that fighting through it is the only thing you can manage. It feels like arrows fly at you in every direction as you sink deeper in the mud and darkness - a sick child, a payment past due, a neglected marriage in turmoil, a friend’s harsh words, the shame of inadequacy you whisper to yourself. Some of those arrows we can duck and dodge, but others pierce us to the soul. How can we armor ourselves from these arrows? How can we get unstuck from this place?
When I’m feeling overwhelmed I seek out the Psalms, because they are filled with healing for the hurting. David gives us a beautiful hope in the opening verses of Psalm 40.
“I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God.”
Many of the people we see shouting out their rally cries of a new year have walked the process of suffering first. Yes, of course the end goal is the new song, but the process starts with crying out to God. Next comes the hardest parts - the waiting and the getting unstuck. Don’t miss out on this part though, because without it our songs will never be the chart topping song God wants us to share with the world. You know the one that you can’t help but tap your toe to, sing along with, or get up dance around like crazy to (much like those inspiring new year posts you’ve been reading). That song is coming. Be expectant of that. Prepare your eyes to leave the shadows and adjust to the light, get out the towels ready to clean the mud off, reach out a hand as you get ready to learn to walk on a solid ground again, rest your voice as you wait to sing your song.
“Do not be afraid of the terrors of the night, nor the arrow that flies in the day...The Lord says, “I will rescue those who love me. I will protect those who trust in my name.” Psalm 91:5, 14
