The World Race isn’t an easy journey. There are so many challenges that I face, but a big one is change. I gave up a year of what is comfortable at home to live with new people, in new places, doing different ministries. Life is constantly changing and covid adds a spin to the year with restrictions, people getting sick, etc.
Throughout life I am one to internally process a lot of what happens in life and when this happens, I’m usually pretty quiet. I pray and talk with the Lord, and sometimes I verbally express my thoughts with friends and I’ll go on runs to help. As I process things, I would say I am one to have a lot of thoughts and questions that run through my brain. Looking back, I may have been the kid that always asks questions like why is the sky blue and how many insects are on this planet?
On the world race, there have been hard things to process through. For instance, seeking healing and forgiveness from things in my past, to saying goodbye to the friends that I’ve made in each country. Other hard things have been changing teams. Sometimes I feel as if I just start to really know my team and then we change teams. Also, losing squadmates is hard. There have been 8people that left the race for various reasons and most of them I didn’t get to say goodbye to. Being away from home since the beginning of January 2021 has been hard at times. Celebrating holidays and my birthday in different countries can be fun, but sometimes it makes me miss celebrating with my friends and family back in the states. Gosh, the couple of times I’ve been sick made me miss home. I had the stomach bug in Guatemala, a parasite in Honduras, food and water that didn’t agree with me in certain countries, and migraines every so often. During those times when I wasn’t feeling good, it was easy to want to be home in the states where I didn’t have to think about culture, language barrier, where I could have my own bed, own bathroom, where I could get away from bugs and could get away from sweating 24/7 like in some countries. Putting my wants aside, seeing poverty or certain laws in different countries is heartbreaking and makes me feel like I can’t help them get out of their situations. Just in general, events happening in the world like Afghans being scared, fleeing their country, and people dying have left me speechless and feeling hopeless. All these things make me want to cry, but I rarely do.
I know crying is good if that is what is needed, but most of the time, I process things without letting myself cry. I think through why and I realized how much I don’t want people to see me cry. Showing that side of vulnerability is not what I’m comfortable doing. So when I get teary-eyed around people, I do what I can to hold back the tears. When I am finally alone, (which is usually hard to find alone time) I tell myself that I can only cry for a moment, because I get headaches easily, and getting myself all worked up to cry isn’t worth possibly getting a headache. So I shed a few tears and tell myself to move on and that is how I get through hard things.
I have realized that I don’t let myself sit in the hurt, the pain, the grieving, the why did this happen, etc. I’m not saying I should get to a mental state of depression by letting myself sit in the pain; I think there is a healthy and unhealthy way to process. When I don’t let myself sit in the hard things, I can easily skip over what God is trying to teach me or what He is trying to heal in my life. Whether I pay attention or not, God is always working, but why would I want to miss what God is trying to reveal to me. I want to be teachable, and I want to be challenged. To change how I process hard things, I want to cry without holding back my tears if that’s what I need to process at that moment. I want to talk about things if that’s what I need, and I want to go to our Father and ask Him for what I need. Whether that’s peace or comfort, strength when I’m weak and to ask God to reveal what He is trying to teach or heal in me. I want to depend on God rather than my flesh. It’s easier said than done, but I’m now aware of what I’m missing when I don’t sit in the pain and when I’m not paying attention to what God is teaching me.
Update: I’m going to Africa! October 8th I will be going to Lesotho for a few weeks and then I will be going to Jeffrey’s Bay, South Africa for a few weeks. After that, I will have final debrief in Cape Town, South Africa, and then the race will be over. Crazy to think the race is coming to an end. I’m excited for these last couple months and what God is going to teach me!
Hey you are such a sweet friend and such a blessing, I am always here with an open ear and to cry with you, I pray God meets you in new ways with more of His fullness and love and that He pours so many new things into you, you are in my thoughts and prayers and we need to hangout again