This has been on my heart for a while now and I can definitely say that God taught me a lot throughout this stressful season. And it feels a little better now that I have learned these three important things.
God uses us in times of fast-paced storms and long, dry seasons, but he is trying to teach us in the ways that we least expect it. We are all at a age that we just want to constantly go, go, go, and never take time to actually stop and take in the moment.
- You are doing better than you think you are. The stress of life can really get to us and bog us down. Because of this stress, we miss the joy of some things. I think that we get so involved and so busy that we let the easiest thing get us down and frustrated. But a sweet reminder that we all need to tell ourselves is that we are doing better than we think we are. We might miss every deadline in the book or have to stay up all hours of the night getting things done. We might have a million things to get done but never have enough time to get it done in the day. It's okay. The next day will come.
- If you let anxiety take over, it will control your life. As a young adult, I have realized that anxiety can be extremely real and take over your life. For the longest time, I let anxiety take over my life and control me, but I have made the decision to say no and not get myself so worked up that it puts me into that panic state. Anxiety will always be a struggle for me, but I will never again let it take over my life. For those of you that struggle with anxiety, you are bigger than whatever it is that triggers for you. Let the best version of you shine through.
- It's okay to say no. Recently being so overwhelmed with traveling, classes, work, and trying to jam pack everything into my schedule, I end up feeling so overwhelmed and exhausted. I realized that it's okay to say no to going out or doing something with friends and yes to just staying in and getting things done or reorganizing life. Its okay to say no to some things and its okay to not say yes to everything. I know that can be very confusing, but it's been a struggle for me to constantly say yes to everything, but the calm prepares us for the storm.
Friends, my encouragement for you today is to just enjoy life and not let the stress overwhelm and bog you down. It is definitely not worth it. Life has just begun for us and I can't wait to see where God takes us to. There is nothing too big for us to handle and there always is silver lining to every day. My challenge for y'all is to live out every silver lining.
