I Am Blessed

It has been a rough month... and it is only half over. I won't go into all the things that have hit me . It would take too long and range from the physical to the emotional to the spiritual and affected several relationships. You name it, I've dealt with it in the space of the last 6 weeks.

But there is a strange thing that has happened during all of it. The same words kept coming to my mind every time I was overwhelmed by stress, distress, anxiety, frustration, and annoyance.

I am blessed. I am highly favored. God has been so good and provided for me in every way possible.

 No, he didn't heal me of the horrible pain I've been dealing with or the emotional stresses that assailed me. Yet, the feeling of being so very blessed was there, in the middle of pain, in the middle of the stress.

I hate anxiety. I hate the shortness of breath, the tightness in my chest, the creeping fear that causes the hair on my arms to stand up. I hate the sensation that something is about to pounce, something dark and scary that I can't see. It is the most horrible feeling in the world. Fear that has no direction, no limit, and no discernable source. It is the "Something is coming" feeling of every horror movie you ever saw.

But I am so blessed. God, for some unimaginable reason, smiled on me at some point.

Oh, I wish I could tell you the stories that would shock you, the ones that would make you stare open mouthed at me. I don't dare. I try and forget those. But how could all that happen to someone and they still say they are blessed.

I don't know. I really don't. I ask myself how and it makes no sense. I just know that the reality hits me in the chest at the most horrible times in my life. When I'm out of control, when I'm prostrate from grief, pain, or fear, I know if I listen carefully, shut out the chaotic sounds of my life, I can hear the words.

I am so very blessed. God is still in control.