Read This When You Feel Alone

At your absolute lowest and most vulnerable, there’s a reservoir strength you aren’t acquainted with, because it’s only to be used when needed. That strength is the anchor that stops you from floating away into a sea of uncertainty about yourself and your life. That strength is the soil on which you plant the seeds of the rest of your life – and from those seeds, hope and faith are born.

But this is easier said than done. I don’t have all of the answers for the specific hells we walk through. I just know how it hurts when I walk through my own.

I need you to know that you are not alone, even when your voice echoes off of the walls of your heart. I am with you in the moments that you feel the quiet despair of failure or when it gets so loud in your mind you can’t make out the words. There are sometimes no names to call the demons that haunt us, just the pain that they leave behind. When you’re under attack, know that you are not in this fight by yourself. We can’t go to war with an army of one.

I can’t promise you won’t be knocked down or that you won’t get hurt. I can’t tell you for certain when the blows will come or where they will strike. I can just tell you what I know and what I’ve felt.

I can make you out in the darkness – a silhouette of light, a shot of hope in the darkness this life can cover us with. I can sense your will to fight and I implore you to do so. I’ll be there with you every step of the way, pushing you when you pause, pulling you when you fall back. I will wrap you in grace and mercy until you see what I see – what we all see in and about you. You matter. You are loved. You are worthy.

I won’t tell you joy will come in the morning because sometimes it doesn’t. I can tell you that it will come, and to be ready to open the door to let it in.