Dear God,
\nMan oh man is there is a lot of doom and gloom in Luke\u2019s Gospel reading for today (Luke 21:5-19). I thought I had my anxiety under control until I read the part where Jesus said, \u201cAll that you see here\u2014the days will come when there will not be left a stone upon another stone that will not be thrown down.\u201d
\nAfter that happy thought comes this one: \u201cNation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be powerful earthquakes, famines, and plagues from place to place.\u201d
\nBut before that party happens, we get \u201cseized\u201d and \u201cpersecuted\u201d and \u201chanded over to synagogues and prisons.\u201d
\nNow God, you know I have my own Armageddon going on inside this bipolar brain most of the time. Why all the fodder for anxiety? Is Pfizer giving you a percentage of its Xanax sales?
\nI did manage to find a consoling phrase following the part that says \u201cYou will even be handed over by parents, brothers, relatives, and friends, and they will put some of you to death.\u201d Here it is: \u201cBY YOUR PERSEVERANCE YOU WILL SECURE YOUR LIVES.\u201d
\nYah! That\u2019s good news on most days. (Bad news on the suicidal ones.)
\nIt always boils down to perseverance.
\nWith faith. With marriage. With parenting (if done without violence). With my profession, or ministry, as I like to call it. And most certainly with trying to live outside the Black Hole.
\nPerseverance, more than anything else, secures the life of a depressive.<\/p>\n
The heights of great men reached and kept I love that quote. And I say it so often when I\u2019m feeling defeated against this illness of mine. My literary agent, who has become a friend of mine because she\u2019s a wonderful person and also because I suck at boundaries, sent it to me on August 3, 2005, when I wanted to die in the worst possible way. Dear God, Man oh man is there is a lot of doom and gloom in Luke\u2019s Gospel reading for today (Luke 21:5-19). I thought I had my anxiety under control until I read the part where Jesus said, \u201cAll that you see here\u2014the days will come when there will not be left a stone upon…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-inspiration-and-prayer"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nBecause if we gave into our thoughts and our desperation, then the suicide rate in the United States would be more than 30,000 annual deaths, as it is now.
\nIf those of us suffering from mental illness didn\u2019t persevere every single minute of our lives, save those Foldger\u2019s coffee moments with Hershey\u2019s dark chocolate bars\u2014and especially in those hours when our Darkness says that the only repose lies in death\u2014then you can better believe that suicide would be the FIRST, not second-leading cause of death worldwide (as it is today) among women between the ages of 15 and 44, and fourth among men in that same age bracket, after road accidents, TB, and violence.
\nIf we with faulty circuitry in the hippocampus, the amygdala, and the prefrontal cortex regions of the brain didn\u2019t repeat to ourselves over and over and over again like Barney, the mentally handicapped purple dinosaur, that \u201cit will pass\u201d and \u201cignore that thought\u201d and \u201cit\u2019s your depression talking,\u201d then many, many more than 15 percent (today\u2019s statistic) of those treated for severe depression would kill themselves.
\nIf those of us with strained nerve circuits, the lucky folks experiencing a power outage the size of Manhattan in the part of the brain responsible for feeling peachy, if we didn\u2019t imagine ourselves like the goofy blue engine chugging up the hill \u2026 \u201cI think I can \u2026 I think I can \u2026 I think I can\u201d until it accidentally plows over Barney on the other side, then suicide would be the first- or second-leading cause of death among 15- to 24-year-olds, instead of the third-leading cause that it is today in that age group.
\n\u201cPerseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after another,\u201d wrote Walter Elliott<\/a>, the late Catholic priest and missionary.
\nWinston Churchill repeated to himself the same sentiment. He kept a note card with this quote on his desk to keep him going, to empower himself against the constant battle with his \u201cblack dog,\u201d a debilitating darkness that stalked him to his end:<\/p>\n
\nWere not attained by sudden flight,
\nBut they, while their companions slept,
\nWere toiling upwards in the night.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\nI couldn\u2019t even enjoy chocolate. Need I say more?
\nI\u2019m not sure what happened. All I know is that I don\u2019t want to die anymore. And I think it had something to do with finding an excellent doctor\u2014the shrink who doped me up on four kinds of antipsychotics and tranquilizers didn\u2019t help things, or the geriatric psychiatrist who diagnosed me with ADHD\u2014faith in you, hard work (diet, exercise, sleep, and the other boring things), and a TON of perseverance.
\nPerseverance and you, God, secured my life.
\nPerseverance means placing that leg, the one that hasn\u2019t been shaved for a month because you don\u2019t give a crap if someone mistakes you for your husband, on the floor when in it\u2019s time to get up in the morning, when you really don\u2019t see what the point of rising from your bed is if you fail at everything you do anyway.
\nPerseverance is trusting that the voice you hear most of the time–\u201cYou\u2019re ugly, fat, stupid, selfish, lazy, and every other antonym of every basic virtue\u201d\u2014belongs to a grumpy criminal that\u2019s bored in jail and wants free rent in your head.
\nPerseverance is ignoring that inaccurate opinion\u2014two index fingers in the ears \u2026 \u201cI can\u2019t hear you!!!\u201d\u2014until you are able to discern the faint murmurings of your real self again, the chick who admits to many weaknesses but believes there is hope at becoming virtuous, not its antonym.
\nPerseverance, on the most basic level, God, is not taking your own life, even though every organ, muscle, and blacked-out system of your body begs you to.
\nPerseverance means believing that you, God, are good, on the days it appears otherwise, no offense. It\u2019s waiting and waiting and waiting some more to feel better, until you do. And it\u2019s listing all of your blessings and gifts\u2014laying them on your table, God, and thanking you for them\u2014even though the gratitude isn\u2019t sincere.
\nPerseverance means arming your brain with the right weapons (medication, sleep, diet, exercise, light, friendship, service, faith) in its constant fight against darkness and despair, and not stopping until there is peace.
\nYes, by perseverance and your help, we, depressives, secure our lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"