The fade

 Proverbs 4:23 (HCSB)
Guard your heart above all else,
for it is the source of life.


I don't believe most things happen in an instant.  In the case of the changes from positive to negative, I would have to say the song "Slow Fade"  comes to mind.

I used to be a very positive person who somehow was able to still dwell on the negative.  It was like, " Well xyz happened but I am still kickin.  Nothing good seems to happen I hope for the best but I am prepared for the worst...and I usually get the worst."  After hearing others say I was a negative person I evaluated my life and began to make some changes that in time lead to me giving my life to Christ, at which point the positive changes continued.  

Somewhere along the road though, I was emotionally injured and the old self I had died to, was slowly coming back from the dead and knocking on the door to my thoughts.  Living in a damaged state for so long, it was hard to overcome what had just happened and then more happened...and more and more and so on.  Before I knew it I had opened the door to let dead me back in and my thought life became very ugly.  I fought the thoughts daily but it was hard to win.  It got to the point where I had to have others tell me to pray because I had forgotten that was what I used to do several times a day and never had these issues then.  Feeling like a simpleton, I began to pray but it wasn't long before old me was reminding me of all the hurt I had been through and what I was still going through and again fight as I may, I still lost out to old me.  Again a friend would say, something about being in His Word and praying and I was again like "duhhh" why am I not remembering this...it is soooo easy to do and I would once again dig in.

By this time the enemy knew so well how to pull me out of my study time and prayer time it was almost impossible to stay focused.  After so much pain and loss I realized three years had passed and I was so far gone.  The woman I became when I gave my life to Christ was nowhere to be found.  I had grown in many ways but my attitude was horrible.  The things I let come out of my mouth were like daggers to my heart...I was not that person.  Those were not words that belonged to THIS heart!!!  

Sadly those words DID in fact belong to this heart, they just did not belong where I was applying them.  I had walled myself in from all the hurtful things that happened and kept happening and the emotions from those things were trying to escape any way they could.  I felt out of control and it seemed as if everyone else was so in control of their lives and they all could see my mess and were judging me.  That thought process brought out a lot more issues to over come. 

I sat wondering where the old me went and how did this all happen.  Then I heard someone mention something that happened three years ago and it was like a movie montage rushed through my mind in reverse and took me right to the moment I gave up and let the enemy take up a nice beachfront condo in my mind.  At the front of every thought was something negative.  "You could be doing ____ right now but, _____ happened." and many more thoughts like this, always about how I had been cheated out of something good.  Bitterness grew and pain burned deeply.  I felt alone.  I tried many times to reapply myself back to the life I had lived when things were going well...to no avail.  I was defeated and I did not know how to overcome anymore.  Trying to read the Bible ended in interruption, time and time again.  Trying to start a Bible study fell flat on it's face.

I had to begin with what little I could get done.  If is was just to pray the basic Lord's prayer than that is what I did.  If the thoughts came back about all I had lost, I would stop what I was doing and do something different and turn on praise music and say to myself something opposite of the negative that was rushing in.  Little by little I started to gain back some good ground.  I know that what I have been through and what I am going through is not in vain.  I know there is great growth coming from this learning experience I allowed by letting the hurt control me.  God takes my mistakes and patiently guides me through them and then uses what I have been through to help others, and to remind me when needed just where I have been and how I got out.

I am not completely out of the wilderness, but I am heading in the right direction and God is my guide.  I continue to shut out the negative and pour on and in the good.  I will always remember that the enemy usually doesn't win in an instant, it is a slow timely process as to deceive so we are unaware it is even happening till one day we are in a dark place and don't know how we got there.  I never lost who my Savior is, but I had forgotten what all He saves us from and all of His benefits.  "I'm trading my sorrow, I'm trading my shame.  I'm laying them down for the joy of the Lord..."