Panic is not sustainable.
I read that line in a blog about food allergies and it has been running through my mind all week. Often lately, I wake up in a panic for no reason. Do you know what it reminds me of? The alien thing in the movie Alien.
As my eyes open, I feel it in my chest, wrapping around my throat and preventing me from breathing on my own. The panic seems desperate to grasp onto anything and thrive in my open mind. That anything could be a lot of things…a thought, a problem, a bill that needs paid, a doctor’s appointment coming up, a physical problem that I’ve turned into cancer, offense, anything. Panic is running around blind until it finds something to attach onto; like a parasite, panic feeds off of a fear I have. Then guess what happens? It gives that fear power that it didn't have before; it builds it up. Panic is so desperately running around because if it doesn't attach to something, it dies. That's why it's not sustainable. It needs a host.
yep, I feel like this guy
As my eyes open, I feel it in my chest, wrapping around my throat and preventing me from breathing on my own. The panic seems desperate to grasp onto anything and thrive in my open mind. That anything could be a lot of things…a thought, a problem, a bill that needs paid, a doctor’s appointment coming up, a physical problem that I’ve turned into cancer, offense, anything. Panic is running around blind until it finds something to attach onto; like a parasite, panic feeds off of a fear I have. Then guess what happens? It gives that fear power that it didn't have before; it builds it up. Panic is so desperately running around because if it doesn't attach to something, it dies. That's why it's not sustainable. It needs a host.
When panic finds a worry to attach onto, then I worry and obsess and feel anxious and sick.Which probably tricks me at first into thinking I'm doing something, but that's not true.
Panic is not sustainable and worry is not productive.
The problem is, there aren't always fixes. Sometimes I have to wait situations out and anxiety doesn't give two flips about that. In fact, waiting is anxiety's playground. Example: On Monday, I may start to worry about how we will pay a bill but that bill can’t even be paid until Friday when Isaac gets paid. My mind won’t let it go. Friday is coming, but it’s a long way away and what if the paycheck doesn’t cover it and and and and…I have to just wait for Friday. Friday becomes my savior. Everything rests on Friday. Life will be fine, if Friday comes and goes and the bill gets paid. Then I can breathe.It gives me a little thrill of fleeting peace, but I want more than that. I want steadfast peace and security no matter if there is a solution in sight or not.
I fight all week to trust and be thankful and just…wait. Sometimes panic loses quickly and sometimes it wins, but it never wins for good, that’s what I’ve learned. That’s what I remind myself of over and over. Kicking panic to the curb while IN the unknown, while nothing is resolved is the ultimate win. It happens...not as often as I'd like, but it happens.
So if panic is like a parasite that feeds off of my fear, then I have to starve it. And that becomes the battle of the day. Some days I go to sleep exhausted, having fought it all day and some days I kill it early and move on with my life. Some days it’s back and forth. My weapons: prayer, scripture, being thankful on purpose, serving others, talking with my husband, asking my friends to take the worry from me and pray for the situation, to lift up my battle worn arms, to act as Aaron and Hur to my Moses.
I go through seasons like this, usually with many months in between, sometimes it lasts many months. But man, I have learned to fight and each of those battles have taught me things which means that my panic and anxiety serve a purpose. It means more weapons for next time. Do I want to go through it? NO. But if I’m going to anyway, how amazing is it that the lessons I learn from past attacks make me stronger for the coming ones?
Romans 5:3-5 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
Our sufferings (panic) produce endurance and character and hope. And I swear to you, I can FEEL that happening. I can look back and see where I was, and then look ahead and see how much stronger I'll be next time. That is huge. In fact, that is something I will never ever access outside of trials, so I may as well USE it, right? In fact that scripture up there tells me to rejoice, to celebrate in my sufferings. I'm working on rejoicing IN them (and I am getting there, even if I just speak it and don't feel it) but for now, I rejoice outside of them. I even thank God for them,which sounds crazy I KNOW.
James 1:2-4 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
Steadfast: unwavering; firmly established.
THAT IS WHAT I'VE ALWAYS WANTED, and if these trials get me there then (while I'm outside of them) I can say BRING EM ON!
I keep the following in my phone and read it when I need it. I wrote it a few years ago when I didn’t know how I would be sustained within the panic.
**
I may experience panic. It doesn't mean God is not good or not for me. While I acknowledge that God can heal me of this, I declare one thing:
Every second I have in life NOT filled with panic, I'll spend glorifying Him, being joyful even when I don't feel it and being His hands and feet. There are very short amounts of time when I feel panic compared to how big life is and I won't let them and thinking about them affect the crazy amount of time I have outside of them.
While IN panic, I'll continually say that if God is in me, panic cannot be; it's a lie.
It won't always be like this. Eventually I'll have no panic at all.
It won't always be like this. Eventually I'll have no panic at all.
If God is for me, panic CANNOT be against me.
**
Romans 8:18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.
I hope you see that there is victory in this. I feel it and I feel like a victorious warrior, even when I'm in the midst of battle. Especially when I'm in the midst of battle. A warrior isn't always someone who looks like she's winning the war. It's someone who gets up and keeps going when she's scared out of her mind. It's someone who cries out, "I NEED HELP!" It's someone who takes a deep breath of fear in and releases a big sigh of surrender out.
Sometimes I feel like a failure and that's when I can let scriptures remind me that I'm not. That life is hard and the battles are big and they're even to be expected. They certainly keep me running back to my Creator.
