This post is personal in nature, so if you do not like to read about struggles in a person’s life, then this post will not excite you. But for those of you that dare to venture into my mundane life…
The title of this post is the question I have heard the most since I had been unfairly let go from my job of over seven years two months ago. If you are interested in more of the background I have written about it in a previous post.
I don’t know what to say to people when this question is asked. How am I doing? Well a good Christian would say, “trusting the Lord”, “Resting in His Arms”,” when God closes a door, He opens a window”….statements like that are spiritual. Here is what I want to say…”Well pretty shitty.”
Shocking?
But it is real. When I lost my job I lost not just a paycheck every two weeks, I lost the outlet for my gifting, I lost daily interactions with co-workers whom I had come to love and who were helping me to become more of what I was created to be. I lost the challenges that keep my mind active, I lost interaction with people who were so different from me and because of that I was pushed to learn and grow intellectually and spiritually, I lost part of the purpose for my life.
So now I drift…floating in the banality that is the suburbs, insulated from the real world. I wake up in the morning, sometimes even forgetting what day it is. Motivation and drive are missing. I feel frustration and sadness and still sometimes anger at what had happened. Depression creeps into the corners of my mind, and I fight to keep it out. Some days I think that I will never find a job I love as much as the one I had. Some days I think that I will not find a job at all.
I am in limbo…sinking into the quicksand of apathy.
Sometimes I am afraid.
Sometimes I wonder if God is even there at all.
This is what I want to tell people.
Musings of a "not so good" Christian 
I hope you can find another place where you can use your gifts. Take care during this shitty time.
thank you.
I hope you give yourself the same grace and kindess you gave your clients too.
I like your honesty. I have met some people who can’t seem to say when they are struggling. Then we, as his fellow Christians, can’t encourage him or help him in any way. Thanks for your honesty. Looking for a new job is a very hard thing to do with the rejections, loss of identity, loss of contact with others etc.
May God walk with you as you continue to walk in the “valley of the shadow of” loss. May you have friends and/or family to walk by your side during this tough time. Amen.
Thank you so much. I appreciate your prayers and your words. A while ago I decided that being who I am and what struggles I have are not something that i should hide, but to be open about my life. Too many times we pretend and I do not think it help anyone. Peace to you.
One, I am in the same situation as you. That may not help all that much, but know that there are others on the same journey as you. And two, I’ve been reading your blog for about 6 months – don’t even remember how I found it – and your message is a voice of sanity in a mixed up world. So even though you are in a shitty time/place right now, you are growing some good growth out of the manure that surrounds you.
I am sorry to hear of your situation as well, so we share in the same struggle with work. And thank you so much for your encouragement about my writing. I am glad that it is helping some. It is what I hope that it does. I will pray for you as well. Peace to you.
I’m a Catholic girl, so forgive me if the saint thing causes you amy angst. Your struggles remind me thoigh of one of my favorite saints for inspiration: St. ]gnatius of Loyola. His entire world was turned upside-down when a cannon-ball left this soldier bedridden for months. It became a forced spiritual retreat, and from that he developed his Spiritual Exercises, which in their usual form involve a 30 day retreat with a spiritual director, leading to prayerful discernment. If you are near a Jesuit school or parish, they may offer adaptations of the retreat.
retreatretreaty. is somethimg you might at least find helpful to read a little more about. There is a prayer you can find online from the Spiritual Exerxises called The First Principle and Foundatiom of Ignatian Sporituality. I have it taped by my desk at work as insporation
Thank you very much.
I am not adverse to things Catholic (I was raised in that tradition). I may just look into the retreat idea.
Thanks for your kind words and peace to you.
Mark Lee
When my husband left me after 16 years of marriage, I felt the same way. Marriage had defined who I was and I was left hanging. But it was the best thing that happened to me. I was able to find the strength to see who I was, without outside influences telling me who I was. I will say, trust in God, no matter how crappy you feel. Look for the good and the beautiful in every day and thank God for it!
That being said, have you thought about volunteering? I’m sure there are several places that would welcome your talents, plus it look good on a resume.
Just some random thoughts. Peace.
Thank you for being honest and open yourself. It is what I hope for when I write, that we can be that way with one another. And I appreciate too you suggestions.
Thanks for reading and peace to you.
mark lee
Let me also encourage your writing. I regularly tweet it and post it on my Facebook page. The themes are important and so today.
I am assuming that I am consideraably older than you – but in my late 50’s a similar thing happened to me and it hurt like hell! The memories still are painful but have finally began to lose their power over me. Believe me, that has taken grace – pure grace. My whole former life actually ended as God has taken my ministry/work in a new long dreamed of direction.
My prayer is that you will find – as I did – that even when I wondered where God was, an under current of his approval of me as a person and of my work was always there. With the depression, grief, loss, lack of focus, yes, despair, it became the rock that sustained me and the foundation on which the next chapter in life began to be built.
Thank you so much for the encouragement. It is helpful for me to be reminded that God knows what he is doing, even when I don’t.
Thank you too for encouraging my writing too, It is something I truly enjoy and hope God is using it in the lives of others.
Peace to you.
Mark Lee
The deeper I seek Christ and to be like Christ, the more uncomfortable I find myself. I have had to crucify the god of my opinions, the god of my comfort, the control I have seemingly had……Christianity is much deeper and bigger than doctrines, comfort, and the shallow thing most of us have allowed it to be.
oh, and you are in my prayers…..I know God will use you—the question is always where and how……but I know God will use you and lead you where you need to go.
No, not shocking but honest – a quality which I sometimes – well quite often really – think that the church has mislaid along the way
Sadly, the many in the church are more interested in looking pious in front of others. Following the Gospel of grace invites us to be real, so that God gets the glory not us. I wish things were different in the church. So many people long for it.
Thanks for your comment and peace to you.
Mark Lee
I know the general replies of God closes one door to open another. But when you are in the desert and it is dry and you are hungry to go on with your mission for God you feel stuck and mired in deep mud. Well, brother I’ve been therre too. I have no wondeful advice other than to give God the glory that you got to touch so many wonderful lives and that He has something just around the corner for you. God may be resting you up for something big, or who knows maybe something small that will still take alot of energy. All I know is…Mark…God has not abandoned you to sit and mope and give up. Hope in the future, trust in the Lord and all trhings are possible to him that believes.
Thought I entered a reply but wasn;t signed in. It basically went like this: God does not abandon us in the wilderness. Think of the lives you touched. Think of the people who with a word of kindness and compassion in your heart you lifted up in prayer. God uses everything as a lesson, learn it and get off the path of going around the mounmtain so you are ready for what He has next for you. He could be giving you a period of resting up time to prepare you for the next plan, the next adventure with God. I am so excited everyday that I get to witness God’s plan in my life, I may not always understand it but eventually I see the bigger picture. Years of thinking I was supposed to be a substance abuse counselor only to find out I was being prepared to work with refugees!!! Talk about a turn around!!! I was flabbegasted, excited and now waiting patiently to start in May. Be excited for what God has for you around the corner, get spiritually fit and physically sound and be ready for the door of heaven is about to open up on you!!! and pour out a blesssing so rich that you won’t be able to contain it!!! I pray twenty-fold of what the locusts have eaten and that God opens your eyes to see the bigger picture!! Love yha brother!!!
twenty-fold return of what the locusts of eaten, sorry didn’t finish my thought
thank you Lynn for your encouragement and your open-ness and your prayers. I covet them. Thanks too for not allowing haters to try and influence you. They are not acting as Christ would, and I pray for them.
Peace to you,
Mark