Dear Anxiety, who invited you? I was living just fine without you. You barged in one day and took over. I felt scared, I lost all control, you abruptly pushed me into a corner. Can I be honest? I hate you! I hate how you make me feel. You make me feel crazy, alone, out of touch, paralyzed with fear, you make me tremble and for some reason you make me only imagine and even believe the worst about everything. You are obviously not from God! You are from the devil himself. The emotions and feelings God gave us to help us navigate through life, you somehow found a way to steal too and use it to haunt us. How dare you! Anxiety, it keeps you awake at night, your heart is racing pounding through your chest, it makes you oh so tired from the mental fight, it causes your mind to be crowded and just so loud from the train of fearful thoughts, it makes you feel like you’re drowning, longing for just a breath of hope. It tells you just how unworthy, unfit and unstable you are when really those are just twisted lies. Anxiety causes you to go on an endless rat race trying to find its origin but never figuring it out. Where did it come from, was it my childhood, the trauma, the abandonment, this or that, who knows? But how do I get rid of it? Anxiety makes you feel like a frantic person longing for an answer, a solution! Anxiety is dark, it’s heavy, it’s tangible, it’s a lie, it’s scary! But then I realized one day it’s not as scary as it tries to portray itself. I started to look up from despair and look at anxiety straight in the face. I started to see it’s true colors. I started to realize that I didn’t have to be a victim of it’s abuse and control. I didn’t have to believe all the lies it was feeding me. I began to fight back! I began to see this huge black cloud as a swift fog that is quickly disappearing. I began to look back and see that God was there even when I felt utterly alone in the room with anxiety. I wasn’t alone. He was there. Sitting in the dark with me, holding my hand, just sitting. I realized he sits with me in the dark places and he never abandons me even to the most anxious moments of my life. But he begins to whisper words of hope, his truth, his love, his vision for the future and he begins to show me a picture I’ve never seen before. A picture of me, stronger, better, more resilient, wiser, calmer, more peaceful and brave than ever before. He shows me where I am going. He tells me that I won’t stay in this valley of despair forever, unlike the voices of anxiety almost convinced me of. He tells me to stand up, take one step at a time as he leads and shows me that we can walk freely right out of the grasp of anxiety. The chains of anxiety I thought I was wearing, fell off at the name of Jesus. They crashed to the floor and lost all it’s power. It has no hold on me anymore. The devil loses yet again! No one or nothing can stand in the presence of God, no lie, no fear, no anxiety, no demon, no weight. Jesus truly is my Savior, my Lord, my helper, my redeemer, my freedom, my hope and literally the only one who can save me from myself and the trials and pains of this life, and He is that for you too!

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