It is 7 PM, Monday evening. I am home alone. The girls are with their mother tonight. After arriving home a half hour ago and preparing some rice for dinner I knelt beside my bed and prayed. I asked God if there was anything he would have me do right now. I do this frequently after returning home from work. I ask him all the time what He would have me do. I do this because I have very little self-confidence. I do this because if I didn't do it I would feel overwhelmed at all the things I need to do, not knowing where to begin. His response this evening was that I was to write about yesterday’s miracle. So here is yesterday’s miracle:
Yesterday was Sunday. As usual I had my girls and took them with me to church.
Because I have depression again, each morning when I wake the day ahead looks like a mountain, imposing and daunting. If I don’t bring my focus to the immediate task at hand I begin to struggle. Yesterday morning as I stole a glimpse of the day ahead I envisioned the anxiety attending church would likely cause me.
At some point in a morning prayer, a thought came into my mind. The thought was “stop thinking about yourself and focus on serving others.”
I took that thought to heart and willed myself to obey. The result taught me a great lesson—albeit the same lesson that I’ve been learning over and over during the past several months.
It is this:
Every prompting from the Holy Ghost obeyed results in blessings greater than the effort spent—oftentimes far greater.
What was the result of following the prompting? I was able to notice and address some needs of people I cared about. In responding to each need I was able to feel God’s love for each of them and in turn feel His love for me.
This is no small thing. Especially when compared to how the day would have likely gone had I disregarded the instruction.
Had I not followed the initial prompting (and each subsequent prompting) my experience would have been far different. Chances are it would have been like the countless other times I’ve gone to church and remained stuck on myself, feeling inferior, sucking the air out of every room I was in, faking a smile to every person I met, hoping my unhappy joyless self wasn’t too obvious, but thinking deep down that everyone knew I was a fraud. And this would be just the beginning of the string of negative thoughts that would take hold of my mind, leading me further into darkness, delusion, and confusion.
But not yesterday.
While leaving church yesterday it occurred to me that there was a good chance no one had known I was depressed. It was there for sure. It was there lurking just beneath the surface the whole time. It may have been watching me. But I was not watching it.
