Tag: mental health

Silencing the Voices

July 11th, 2025

Sometimes the loudest voices we need to quiet are the ones inside our own heads—the critics, the doubts, the constant noise that drowns out creativity and courage.

I’m an overthinker, unfortunately a worrier, and deeply empathetic. My brain goes 24/7 and even wakes me up in the night sometimes. I’ve written about writing blogs as a way of journaling and connecting myself to the truth of God’s Word as an anchor. In the last year I accidentally discovered an activity that forces me to completely devote my whole brain to its execution, effectively silencing all of the voices. I’m not a painter, or I never have been anyway. My mother minored in art in college and taught it in public school until the funding was cut. She’s phenomenal at painting, drawing, decorating, regardless of the medium, she can create. The things she can bring to life with a simple pencil are astounding. I feel like I’ve always been a disappointment to her since I could barely draw a stick figure.

On a whim and in search of something refreshingly different, I found myself at an art studio in the Hampton-Newport News, Virginia area called Painting with a Twist. The studio offers walk-in projects—just choose a painting, pay for your canvas, and they set up your space as you follow step-by-step directions. What I didn’t expect was how much this experience would demand of me: I had to focus intently on the instructions, the color mixing, and the brushwork. It felt like my brain was running at 100%—the way your computer’s CPU spikes when it’s running a heavy program, yet somehow everything keeps working smoothly instead of crashing!

I’ll be honest: I’m not a big risk-taker. In dominoes, I only bid if I’m sure I can win. I rarely leap unless there’s a backup for my backup plan. Trying to become more flexible in this area, I realized painting was a safe, controlled way to take risks. I was honestly terrified to touch that blank canvas with my brush, not knowing if I could follow the directions. The result? My very first painting—proof that sometimes courage is as simple as making the first brushstroke.

Another reason I’d never painted before—aside from doubting my talent—was that it always seemed like such a feminine activity. While yes, I’m a woman, mom, and wife, I’m also a tomboy at heart. I love the outdoors, anything tough and dirty, and I feel awkward in dresses or shopping at boutiques. I often feel out of place at “girly” women’s events, surrounded by talented women who always look magazine-ready and have homes impeccably decorated for every season. I know this is my own hang-up—a small mindset that’s begun to shift in a big way.

With everything happening in our country right now—especially the heartbreak of the horrific loss of life in Texas—I’ve found myself doom-scrolling social media, overwhelmed by negativity. I’ve wept, prayed about, and executed ways to help every day since learning of the tragedy in the Hill Country. It’s been painful to watch compassion get lost in politicized commentary. Yesterday, I decided to try painting —to give 100% of my mind to something else for a bit, to create a moment of quiet and focus in one of my new favorite places.

There are other activities that require my full attention—hiking, for example. Shaun and I recently trekked down the Grand Canyon, and standing in awe of that landscape inspired my latest painting. That’s part of why we love hiking and backpacking: it forces us to be fully present. Sometimes you have to silence the voices, leave work at work and social media in the ether, and do something so challenging it demands all of you, right there in the moment. I never expected to find such a tool at my own dining room table, but I’m grateful to have stumbled onto it. Below is the result of yesterday’s effort to silence the noise and just be present.
Best Moments-Gratitude & Reprogramming Fighting Depression

January 23rd, 2024

I’m tagging along on a business trip with my hubs because he’s going to be relatively close to a good friend I haven’t seen in ages! As we do when he and I are on roadtrips, we picked a book to listen to. I had downloaded Jon Acuff’s “All You Need Is A Goal,” since it had been referred to me by my bestie.

https://amzn.to/3Ob8PWL

There’s the link in case you’d like to get your own copy, I do earn commissions from Amazon from my referral links.

Anyhow, the first exercise he instructs readers to do is create a best moments list. He goes on to list some of his own best moments as well as others so there are ample examples of what those could look like. He even talks about the difficulty in focusing on yourself enough to call attention to some of your accomplishments as you recognize them as best moments. Not all best moments are accomplishments. Later you’ll categorize these moments into 4 different categories: experience, accomplishments, relationship, & objects.

This will not be a book review, it’s the doing of this exercise that captured my attention from a mental health standpoint.

As Shaun and I began to form our lists audibly calling out loud our best moments and reminiscing there were tears, smiles, laughter and joy. Jon said the 40’s hit a little different and are characterized by self reflection which I find to be true.

Today has been a gray day and it sputtered rain off and on all day. This is the typical kind of day that usually gets me down and blue, but this exercise made me really focus on so many of the good and wonderful moments I’ve had in my life. It’s very difficult to be gloomy when you’re focusing on those moments and literally writing them down on a piece of paper that you can stare at. It’s very difficult to ignore the truth you’re very plainly listing out and continue in false and dark thoughts attempting to consume your mind.

I listed things like

-meeting my husband,

-getting to be pregnant 3 times

-having 3 beautiful babies!

-The sound of our children’s laughter even as adults especially when we’re all together.

-Our first trip to CO and every trip since that allowed us to meet some of the most incredible people who have become family and not just friends.

-Specific hunts

-our Little Buddy

-Frankie the Tortoise

-church camp 2018

-publishing my first book!

-and so on!

My list is soooooo long and it’s hard for me to continue to be blue with all of these clearly wonderful moments staring at my face! This will be an exercise I employ when I feel myself being blue, and it’s one you can use too.

As a believer, I have long known the expression “count your blessings” which makes me think of the song and then the following lyric “name the one by one.” This isn’t a new tactic, clearly it’s been in use awhile!

Further, I’ve long learned to employ the verse about taking my thoughts captive in 2Corinthians 10:5 and forcing them to be obedient to the will of a Christ. To turn them from gloom and despair to what Paul suggested us to focus on in his letter to the Philippians,

Philippians 4:8 (NASB95): Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.

Sometimes hearing that and doing it are two separate battles and trying to use it to reprogram your thought processes can be just as tough. This exercise however, is a simple one that set me on the right path today. I know that all good things come from my Father above, so if I’m listing out blessings, that’s focusing on lovely things that are worthy of praising our Father about.

If you’re struggling with depression, what could it hurt to grab a pen and paper and start listing some of your best moments, any favorite memory. You’ll see that the truth, and what you’re feeling, aren’t in alignment right now and you need to continue to focus on these “bests” to have them help you reprogram your “stinkin thinkin.” This worked for my stinkin thinkin today!!

The next book I listen to will be “Don’t Believe Everything You Think” by Joseph Nguyen https://amzn.to/3OeRJHE and I’ll see if there’s anything practical and helpful I can use and share with others in there!
Nothing Really Prepares You

December 29th, 2023

When I’m in my feels I write, it gives me something productive to do instead of just cry.

Over the last 2 years we’ve done a lot of waving and hugging bye and it still hasn’t gotten any easier, and nothing prepares you.

Nothing really prepares you for the vacancy at home,
For waking up to an empty house and being all alone.

The missing sound of tiny feet and all the chatter being gone.
Driving away after holidays with empty seats just feels wrong.

Nothing prepares you for leaving them behind, or watching them drive out the driveway to go back to their home,
or the feeling that poisons that last day together knowing tomorrow you’ll wake up empty and alone.

Nothing prepares you for the tightness in your chest and the invisible hand around your neck.
Just when you think you’ve got the battle won and you can make it, the memories flood back!

The tears cloud your vision at random times in the day, and the pain that comes with missing them dulls but never goes away. It’s not as though they’re completely gone, you’ll see them again, you’ll arrange vacations and visits and burn up the FaceTime calls until you’re back together with them.

The time is never long enough, you hate for them to leave. No one really prepares you for your bigs to grow up or the way it makes you grieve.
When the first ones out you begin to grieve the others if they’re close, even though they’re still at home you know all of them leaving will hurt the most.
You learn to treasure the moments and the time that you have left, you hold them a little tighter and hug a little longer and don’t explain your eyes when they randomly become wet.
Nothing can prepare you for the way letting them grow up feels, even though you know it’s the right way you, just long for those big sit down family meals.

The laughter around the table now is a balm that heals your soul, and the pile of shoes and chaos that maybe used to bother you is let go!

Nothing really prepares you when all of you grow old, maybe something will come along and ease the ache someday like a grand baby to hold.
Thankful for the Rain

January 29th, 2023

There have been many times I’ve prayed for rain over hayfields and crops and one time when we had a drought in Texas and had over 100 days of over 100 degrees with no rain, I think people who had never prayed, began praying! It’s easy in those times to be thankful for the rain and to run out and dance in it as it soaks into the ground and cools your skin. You can almost hear the vegetation breathe a sigh of relief.

Photo by Sitthan Kutty on Pexels.com

Lately though, especially where we are now, it rains often, you don’t have to pray for it, you might be more tempted to pray for it to not happen! After the addition of some high-grade titanium to my body, I can usually predict the rain a day before it arrives, even my hip groans, and I’m more likely to be thankful for the massage chair in that moment. We have no lack of rain, and cloudy days, this doesn’t always bode well for my mental health or my attitude, sunshine makes me happy.

The other day as I sat praying on a day it rained from before I got up to long after I had gone to bed, I began really thinking about the difference between sunshine and rain and how without the rain I wouldn’t even know how much I love the sunshine. It took rainy, cold days to teach me gratitude for the warmth of the sunshine warming my skin and seeping into those achy joints.

I realized I was thankful for the rain. This got me to thinking about certain trials and tribulations I have been through and how if I had not experienced them, I wouldn’t be grateful for the deliverance from them or the growth they caused in me. This definitely sounds incredibly like that first chapter of James even though we often don’t always “consider it joy when we encounter trials of many kinds,” but we definitely want the endurance and growth they produce! We can’t have one without the other, but we can have a more grateful attitude when we grow through the trials.

As I sat in the sun that next day soaking it in like a lizard on a fence post, feeling the warmth spread through my body and my mind, I thanked God first for the cold rainy day before, because without it I wouldn’t have appreciated the golden rays painting the ground a soft yellow as they filtered through the leaves and splashed their golden glow all round nearly as much! I wonder how many other things we should stop and meditate on that were tough and uncomfortable, that truly taught us to be grateful for new seasons to come if we untether ourselves from the discomfort and tether ourselves to the growth it will eventually produce.

Photo by Min An on Pexels.com
Living Untethered from Regret

January 27th, 2023

I’ve never seen the movie, but I’ve seen clips from a movie with Jennifer Anniston where her daughter brings home a guy with a tattoo on his chest that says, “NO RAGRETS”, and the dad in the movie says something to the effect of, “you really have no regrets, not even one little letter?” For some reason I find that hysterical and while I’ve never actually watched the movie, we quote that scene playfully often!

The truth is we all have regrets, we all have things we wish we would have done or said differently. For some odd reason these memories pop up at the oddest times and when you reflect on them, sometimes from a much more mature season of life, you can see the trouble whatever action it was caused for you or your reputation and how it had long lasting effects. I was pondering on just that sort of memory this morning, (showers, walks in the sunshine and time in the saddle will make me do that) regretting my young self’s decision-making process.

Photo by Arvind shakya on Pexels.com

Today I can look back and understand the “why” behind some of my poor decisions, but it still doesn’t make me regret them any less. I have always had the desire to be included, liked, and accepted. A lot of people do, I’m not alone in that, my desire and the fact that I had moved around so much and always felt like an outsider drove me to make great effort to fit in. Sadly, it was often to the detriment of my character or reputation. For some reason this morning I remembered being around a group of kids in junior high or early high school and because, of the nature of the conversation that was going on and my desire to fit in and be one of them, telling some filthy jokes I had overheard from some adults and using incredibly course and foul language. Ordinarily, I would never speak like that but in that moment and others I did, and it began to shape my peers’ mental model of me and the type of person I was even though it was far from how I really was inside. Today, I’m utterly repulsed by the entire exchange and definitely disappointed in myself. There have been other poor decisions and many more regrets since then, but I started thinking this morning, what if, as a kid, I really took 1Corinthians 10:31 seriously and ran every thought or action through the filter of, “would this please the Lord and glorify Him?” If so, I could be living a life with no regrets.

So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.
1Corinthians 10:31 NASB95

I’ve already mentioned my love for the internal consistency of the Bible, so you might expect that’s not the only verse that encourages Godly living, it’s just a short easy to remember one. In our house in Texas when the kids were all in elementary school, we used a “classroom” type setting and had a little classroom set up for school each day. I had Psalms 34:13 hung on the wall which read, “keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking lies.” I also had 1 Corinthians 10:5 about taking your thoughts captive and conforming them to the will of Christ, hanging on the wall as well as Philippians 4:8 about what to focus on instead, which I think also pairs really well with the following verse of Psalm 34 verse 14 which says, “turn from evil and do good, seek peace and pursue it.” This was in a great effort to hide God’s word in my kiddos’ hearts, and mine too, and encourage Godly living.

Here’s the kicker I thought about this morning. I have often been a fan of teaching my kids “the why”, sometimes I wish I had not, now and even as they began to get a little older, they always excepted “the why” behind whatever it was I told them to do. We had to work out that upon occasion I just needed them to obey quickly, and trust that I’d get to “the why” later. A lesson I wish I had learned when I was younger in regard to obeying God’s word in the now and letting Him bring understanding later. But here’s the deal, there are a lot of us that have lived through a few things, and we do understand “the why” about those things so why aren’t we spelling it out for the younger generation? Youth are willing to listen, all teenagers aren’t rebellious rabble rousers regardless of the impression they give, some of the deepest most insightful conversations I have had the pleasure of having, which better helped me understand the struggles youth face while navigating our ever-changing, tumultuous world have been from those very same “trouble making” youth!

I really think if someone had sat down with me and told me that the things I chose to say and not to say, and the activities I chose to participate in or not to participate in were going to build my reputation and other’s mental models of me, and that it could either help me or hurt me, I might have tried a little harder, especially if they had pointed me to God’s word and explained that it has less to do with your reputation and external validation from others and more to do with God’s reputation as you are a professing Christain, made in His image (Gen 1:26) and an ambassador for Christ (2Corinthians 5:20, Eph 6:20). Also let me add Malachi 2:7 which is referring to the lips of the priest and how he is a messenger of the Lord of hosts..ie ambassador.. (pre incarnate Christ..before Christ’s birth, death, burial, and resurrection), now (after Christ) we (all believers of every tribe and tongue) are a kingdom of priests (1Peter 2:9, Rev1:6) ambassadors for Christ, to share His message! Ya’ll this is good stuff!!!! What we do and say and choose not to do and say is important if we have truly surrendered to follow Christ as Lord of our lives. This doesn’t just apply on Sunday and Wednesday and church functions, this is anytime, anywhere, anyplace….. work, school, inside the closed doors of your home, your bedroom, your phone, etc. because Jesus is Lord at all of those times, and you should be making decisions in all of those places with that in mind. It’s about representing Christ rightly through our lives as ambassadors for Him so that others will be drawn to Him as a result, therefore, it’s about His reputation. More than one person has been turned away from “Christianity” because someone claiming to be Christian didn’t act Christ like. Represent well, it actually does matter.

If I had only grasped that younger, I could have lived a life untethered to regret. However, when we confess our sins to the Lord he is faithful to forgive us ( 1John 1:9) and separate them as far as the East is from the West(Psalm 103:12). So, while I do regret many of my actions, I sit here and type without condemnation of them because of Christ alone! (Rom 8:1) Sheesh, isn’t the Word of God literally ALL THA THINGS!!!!! Thank you Jesus!
Untethered-Loved

January 22nd, 2023

One of my favorite series of quotes and the intention behind it comes from the movie, “The Help”.

You is Kind

You is Smart

You is Important
“The Help”

That’s something I think everyone wants to feel, like they are seen by someone else and have value, those three statements were made from a place of deep love for the development of someone they cared so deeply about. Nothing had been done to earn that “special treatment”, it was freely given, often is the case between a parent and an infant. Often, or in my experience, as we get older, and society begins to warp our thinking and sometimes the way we love others we fall into the trap of performance-based love.

I remember as a girl feeling like my parents loved me more if I made straight A’s or sat 1st chair in whichever band I was in. I’m sure that wasn’t really true as I have 3 kids of my own and love them whether they do amazing things or perfectly regular things or even bad things. I don’t love the bad things but I do love them. no matter what. I repeat the phrase, “there’s nothing you could ever do or say to make me not love you,” regularly.

We don’t always feel that way though, especially since the inventions of social media. We are in a terrible habit of feeling worthy and lovable when other people tell us we are through our likes and engagements on social platforms and external validation is what begins to shape what we believe about ourselves. This unfortunately effects our ability to receive feedback that could help us grow because rather than responding to it with an eagerness to learn and grow we perceive it as rejection and an attack that makes us feel unaccepted and unloved. I have definitely been guilty of this, and still am from time to time. Unfortunately, I have allowed myself to be affected so much by this external validation, and performance-based love that I have often had thoughts about why anyone would or does love me.

Recently, I was invited to join a virtual Bible study by a friend. First, just the act of being invited is such a loving, thoughtful thing, so thanks for that, friend, I will be sure to do the same for others! We are studying a Nancy Guthrie book called, “Blessed” over the book of Revelation in the Bible. As I worked diligently through the 1st set of lesson questions I was loving the style and structure which caused us to focus on the one giant metanarrative of the entire Bible which is God’s great love for us culminating in the gospel message of Jesus’ birth, death, burial, and resurrection. It all points to Jesus.

We were looking specifically at Revelation 1 verses 5-7 and discussing what it reveals to us about Jesus, about who he is, what he has done, and what he’s going to do.

“and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To Him who loves us and released us from our sis by His blood.”
Revelation 1:5 NASB95

The very next question instructed us to dwell upon one or two aspects of the previous question that were particularly meaningful to us. In full transparency and vulnerability, I wrote, “loved-because often enough I don’t “feel” like I’m worth loving or understand why anyone would love me.” Second, I wrote, ” released- words cannot describe how it feels to have Jesus take all your ugly/evil and pay the ultimate price of death for it without you doing a thing to earn it or deserve it and then still be able, but more than that willing and wanting, to look you in the eye knowing everything about you and still love you and want a relationship with you.” I couldn’t even type that without tearing up all over again. Jesus, my Savior and King of Kings, loves me that much and knows everything about me. This is true for you too.

Truthfully, I’m not sure my life would be at all the same or even be still happening if it wasn’t for someone being willing to share about Jesus and His great love for me and then a lot of someones discipling me so that I truly know that the ultimate authority on all things is God and the Word of God. What His word says is true regardless of what is going on in the world, and regardless of how I “feel”. When I read what His word says about me, since I am in Christ, because I value it as the ultimate authority, regardless of how I feel, I find I can face tomorrow. (If you know me personally you know that just made me think of a song!) In Christ all that ugly/evil that I know about myself is no longer condemning because His word tells me that’s true,

Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.
Romans 8:1 NASB95

Don’t forget to go back and read what the “therefore” is there for, the previous chapter talks about believers being united to Christ and then proceeds into the result being deliverance from bondage to sin. Isn’t that so comforting? Comfort is the opposite of what I feel when I listen to the lies of the devil who seeks to kill, steal, and destroy (John 10:10). Unfortunately, he’s able to steal my joy and comfort with thoughts from inside my own head sometimes. It’s why Paul warned us to take every thought captive and conform it to the will of Christ in 2Corinthians 10:5 and told us to focus on whatever is true, pure, lovely, and holy in Philippians 4:8. I have to untether myself from the thoughts and opinions of others, and sometimes from my own thoughts and opinions of myself, and tether myself to what God’s word says about me in Christ. This may be true for you too. Even when I don’t “feel” it, “I will praise Him because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” Psalm 139:14. I hope this draws you to God and His word and gives you the courage to live a life untethered to the lies of the world, the flesh, and the devil, and tethered to Jesus. Definitely reach out if you have questions!

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