I, Being of Sound Mind and Body...

I took some time last week to just be in my skin and live my life. I focused on getting out and getting some sun and exercise, and on cooking good food in my kitchen. These are the ways that I best care for myself and my family. And it definitely helped drive back the clouds of ppd.

As is thankfully often these days, people with good and healthy messages were put in my path, for which I give great thanks. I also experienced some healthy humility in the form of hearing from and extending care to some that are in far worse circumstances than I. The wisdom of not letting oneself withdraw when those clouds roll in, even if painful and leaving one vulnerable, has been especially important to me this last week. You have to emerge from the darkness of the cave to see the truth in the light.

Particularly helpful to me last week was the speaker at my weekly bible study, Danna Demetre. Speaking about the beauty battle for women, she made several key points that are applicable to any internal battle a woman is waging.

Drawing from Psalm 139, she spoke about accepting yourself as specifically designed to be just who you are. "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb." (Psalm 139:13) I find this tremendously comforting on the one hand, but also pretty frustrating as well in those moments when I wonder why I have to go through this stuff. And, I'd imagine that those who also struggle with far more serious burdens and sorrows also feel similarly. What is the purpose of struggling so mightily?

I can really only speak for myself, and I know that only when I have been to the lowest point, and become very vulnerable am I able to really see, or at least follow the path that will eventually lead me out of it. But until that point, I'll wander stubbornly in the dark, not asking, or not listening more the case, to direction.

She also drew from Romans 12:2:

"Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will."

As she told us, "in the human brain, the most dominant thought wins," and "before you can begin, you must identify the lies you believe and replace them with the truth." She concluded with :

"Watch your thoughts; they become your words.
Watch your words; they become your actions.
Watch your actions; they become your habits.
Watch your habits; they become your character.
Watch your character; it becomes your destiny."

My verse of prayer and meditation this week is 2 Timothy 1:7 (NKJV):

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

I'm counting on that sound mind.