Feeling the stress

Yes, I am. I'm recognizing a familiar pattern right now -right now being 2:53am. I went to bed and woke up a couple of hours later. Can't go back to sleep. I don't like this. It's one of the patterns of depression. I've had some crazy sleep patterns over the years. The wee hours of the morning just seem to be my processing time.

I am feeling some stress. First of all from work as the days of wondering what I will do with myself are well over - and thankfully so. Having lots of downtime at work is OK while the novelty part lasts but then it can get boring. I enjoy the work and there are some new responsibilities that I will be taking on to fill the gap between statement reconciliations. Good stuff. But right now I feel the learning curve as my mind is required to think in ways that it hasn't in such a long time and this month to deal with some temporary but really aggravating problems. I don't really mind it - I embrace all this - so I'm not complaining. I'm just saying that I'm feeling the stress of it right now.

Then there's the car issue. Still not completely resolved. It'll seem like it is then it isn't. It's kinda what I don't like about car buying. The negotiating part. The trying to get what you want for what you want to pay and maybe it's going to work out and maybe it's not. Thankfully I'm not emotionally tied up in the idea of a new car. If it doesn't work out I still have a good vehicle to drive. But it's not like walking in a store and picking out a pair of jeans. This is why I have always let Larry deal with the buying of the cars but now this is part of my journey and while I embrace it I also feel the stress of it.

So I'm stressed and the pattern is that when I get stressed about one thing I start thinking about everything else in my life that might not be just the way I want it and things get bigger and bigger in my mind. Scenarios start presenting themselves and inner conversations start happening and it all just wears me out. I even amaze myself at what I can find to obsess about if I let my mind loose at times like this. It's the pattern that would often precede a time of depression.

What to do.

Well. I'm not saying there won't be some battle here but my choice is to Choose to Trust Father. You know God doesn't ever take away all the stress factors of this life. Before about two years ago I could not deal with life stresses much at all. That's why I spent so much time in fear and anxiety and anger. I didn't trust Father. I really didn't. In fact I often saw him as my greatest betrayer. I don't believe that anymore and during the time that he was dealing with me and helping me to learn to trust him he put me through a sort of exercise. When something would touch this tender place inside of me and I would start to feel the pressure (fear would usually be my first response to many things) Father would speak to me and say "Ann, do you trust me?" and I would respond, honestly "Well, I CHOOSE to trust you." We would do this over and over. He never got impatient with me. As time went by I needed that less and less as I made it through incidents without going off the deep end or sometimes going off it a little bit but working my way through without totally losing it.

So that is the purpose of this blog this morning. To say out loud and declare that Yes, Father I choose to trust you. Again and again and again.