I felt compelled today to share with you some of the current situations in my home.  As many of you know, my health is not in a good place.   Before too long, I will be sharing with you what the causes are for my bad health, but in the meantime I would like to encourage those of you that may be in a similar situation, there is hope.

There is hope for many things…  A better life, better health and always happiness.

Do you know we are responsible for our own happiness?  Yes, this is a truth!  We can not expect someone else to create our happiness.

In my humble opinion, I think a lot of our happiness and wholeness comes from the walk we have with Jesus!  The closer we walk with God the happier and more fulfilled we will be, no matter what our life circumstances.

Do you allow your unfortunate circumstances to define you and affect you?  This my friend's is a choice.

I have not felt well for well over 3 years now and as the years progressed so did the decline of my health.  Honestly, it was a very scary experience because no matter how hard I tried to find the answers, there were no answers in site.  There were so many things going wrong and going on at one time that it was hard to pin point my struggles, but by the grace of God and his amazing hand in my life,  we now know what things are responsible for my declining health.

Let me share this with you as well,  many of you know I am a VERY VERY VERY active person and a go getter!  I am no longer able to keep the pace or do the things I was always able to do.  Since October when my health rapidly declined I am couch bound and often so uncomfortable that standing, nor sitting, nor even laying down is comfortable which leaves me turning to God in prayer for his comfort, peace and removal of my pain.

Many of you suffer from debilitating and chronic illnesses.  My heart has always and will always go out to you because even before I was sick myself I knew how hard your day to days must be.  Such situations can chip away at our mental, physical and even emotional health, BUT there is hope and there are choices…

Perspective and our choices play a very BIG role in all of this.

When I get bummed out, have unfortunate circumstances or am not well – I battle more with myself than anything…  I do not allow my circumstances to rule and I battle with keeping a gloomy perspective on things because I know without question there is always someone in a worse situation than myself.    It is ok to be sick, to be bummed and we all have unfortunate circumstances and it is ok to feel the affects of those situations – it is not something we need to beat ourselves up for.  It is ok to experience those feelings, but it is important to move past those feelings too!  If we get stuck in a “woe is me” state of mind for too long we then become responsible for a very negative view of our situation and folks, negativity breeds negativity.  So when I experience such situations, I have learned to allow myself to experience those new feelings and then I start looking immediately for the shiny side of the penny in my situation.

No matter what the circumstance, I will always do this.  Why?  Because I truly feel that God uses all our circumstances for the good, IF WE ALLOW HIM TOO!!

The enemy looks for openings to slither in and work us over…  Negative things run through our heads such as, you will never be well, you are going to lose your home if you can't find work, your vehicle is not fixable, etc…  He is what creates that negative self talk we are ALL so good at!!  Yes – I too, even being as positive as I am, have to pay great attention to what is going on in my head…  I have learned that anything negative in my head is the enemy trying to win me over, trying to seep in and weaken me so that I will continue to listen to more of his negativity.  I was hearing him say that I was USELESS last week when I was couch bound and others were doing my chores.  I started to listen and was even reduced to tears in the changes in my life, but you know what?  He is WRONG!!  I was still working while on the couch and I am not USELESS – I am temporarily benched and needing to slow down, but at the same time I am BLESSED with the angels God has so conveniently provided just when I needed them most!

Seeing the good in our circumstances can be hard at times, but I know if you look hard enough you will find the blessings no matter how small.  You need to make a conscious effort to look for the blessings versus allowing your circumstances to consume you and define you.  When you put your focus on the blessings in even the worst situations you are reprogramming your brain to look for the positive instead of being stuck in the negative.  This is one of the best habits you could create in your life and I promise you the rewards are great!

Often times, our circumstances require us to be creative.  I LOVE being creative in my life.  I can thank my son for the creative spin I put on my life because it was what I needed to do to help him to conquer his autism.  I will give you an example of how I was creative.  I was very seriously feeling useless and it was because I was thrown into a new routine with a protocol I am doing for my health.  I am having to soak my feet and do some unique treatments which are taking at least an hour to an hour in the half in the morning.   My mornings are my power time of the day, I am a morning person and I do my best thinking and am the most productive in the wee hours of the morning when things are quiet.  I was giving up my most productive hours in my day to the new protocol when the new protocol did not need to be a morning thing – they just needed to get done.  I realized why I was so disheveled and changed my schedule in that I took back my power hours with God and my work and when my house comes alive and there is a lot of activity and things going on – I could soak my feet and do my treatments which has also enabled me to have some very personal time with my family so it actually has given me two wonderful things – the feeling of self and use and the personal time with my family that I hold near and dear.

As many of you will learn in taking my new course Getting Organized In A Crazy, Busy World in the new year, I am a very organized person and when we pay attention to our needs, our calendars and our goals and put God and our families first everything else just falls into place.

For those of you that are dealing with poor health, debilitating or chronic illnesses or unfortunate life circumstances, I encourage you to pause, pray and take a look in your life for the blessings.  Don't let your circumstances and the enemies negative talk define you.  With the help of God, be BIGGER than your life circumstances.  Choose to be a light to others and allow God to use you!

I feel so honored to be going through my current circumstances because I know God will be glorified and there is great purpose in all of this!

There are so many ways we can be a  light to others, but when others see us improvise, adapt and overcome or be content and happy even when life throws us a curve ball – it gives them hope and a new determination to experience their circumstances in different ways…

I do know how hard this can be and I also do not want to down play the emotional side of things.  Be sure to read my next post The Emotional Side of Sickness because there are ways you can help others around you to cope with sickness and their struggles.

If you or someone else is in need of prayers, by all means, feel free to email us at survive@trayerwilderness.com so we can add you to our daily prayers!

#TrayerWilderness  #PositivelyEncouraging

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