I am not alone

The devil.

He is relentless.

But so is God.

The devil?

He whispers lies in my head all day long.

Especially on those days I am extra weary.

But God?

He speaks truth to me...all day long.

And if I listen carefully, I hear him.

In another person.

In a song.

In the way the cold hits my face and refreshes me.

On Tuesday I heard a song while doing dishes, and barely stopped to dry my hands before I found myself writing the name of the song and the artist on my blackboard.

And then I left it there.

And went about my day.

On Wednesday I spent my morning at Walking With Purpose, a women's Catholic Bible Study, right here in Newtown. I spent my Wednesday afternoon at the Yale Children's Trauma Clinic, in New Haven. Dinner is in a crock pot on Wednesday. Because Wednesday? Wednesday is a lot.

And the thing is, while one room is full of women and pink ,hot coffee and bagels, scripture and quiche, and the other is full of children and foster parents and used toys and books, at the core of it all, they are exactly the same.

In both of these spaces, where the broken gather and share, where picture perfect images are left at the door, and the reality of this life is hard is brought into the light; where we bring it all, and dump it out, and say Here I am, this is me, and pray to God that we will hear something back, learn something, that will make it all better, that will give us the tools, that will reassure us there is hope...there is one truth that never fails to smack me in my face:

I am not alone.

I think that the worst part of holding onto your pain, is that you end up believing you are the only person in the world who carries such a burden.

And when we hide our sufferings, they often cause us shame...they grow into something so much heavier than they actually are.

What a blessing...what a gift it is...these Wednesday's.

That I have a place to counsel and to be counseled...a place to lift up and be lifted...a weekly reminder that no matter what the devil tries to tell me, I am not alone.

This morning I finally looked up that song I had heard while doing the dishes.

The song that allowed me to pause...to feel Gods tug...and to write it down.

And I have been singing it ever since.