What happens when anger manifests into something else? When it takes over your life and you can't seem to move on? What do you do when you're too tired to carry the weight anymore?
“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God.” James 4:1-2
Let me tell you about who I was in my 20s. I’ll give you a guess, it is directly correlated to the verse above. When I say I was addicted to drama, I was ADDICTED. I almost got an adrenaline rush from it and looked for new ways to cause it or created scenarios in my head about what I would do in my next fight. It’s crazy to think that’s how I was when I’ve never been a fan of confrontation. It actually gives me a great deal of anxiety. However, it didn’t matter to me, because I was so consumed with what I wanted, what was going wrong in my life, and how absolutely angry I was, that I didn’t care.
People want to know, or are completely oblivious to, why it’s so dangerous to live for the world; it’s because it is so easy to become angry and bitter. It’s so easy to believe the lie that we have to hold on to it, for the sake of justice. That we have to hold on to it until we receive justice because until we do, the situation won’t be rectified, at least, it won’t be to our liking.
I mentioned in an earlier post that I was a teen mom at 18, then again at 21, by the same guy. If you haven’t figured it out, this guy was not who I had played him up to be in my mind. Let me be honest, I had watched so many romantic comedies that this guy was destined for failure from the get-go. He was no walk in the park, but I was not the victim that many people thought I was and that I allowed myself to be for too long. There was a lot of manipulation, gaslighting, toxicity, lies, and betrayal. Literally just stupid games being played by stupid kids.
Let me back up a little bit. My parents got divorced when I was really young, so I didn’t get to grow up like a lot of my friends did with both my parents in the household. In my formative teen years, I had made it up in my mind that my future kids would not grow up the way that I did; with stepparents. Which, now that I think about it, is absolutely ridiculous because I love my stepdad and so do my kids. In my mind, that was a broken home, and I didn’t want that for my kids, so I held on to something that God was begging me to let go of. He could see the hurt, the anger, the bitterness, and the misery that I was subjecting myself to and gave me every opportunity to let go and to get away, but I didn’t want to.
My parent counterpart, a PCP, if you will, was not ready to be a dad when we had our daughter. To be honest, I don’t think he wanted to be one, at least to our kids he didn’t. There’s so much history to unpack there that I could probably write three full volumes over the first half of my twenties, detailing everything that we put each other through. Like I said, I was no damsel in distress. If I’m being honest, I caused a lot of distress.
Let’s just get this out in the open: this man did not like me. Even in the slightest. I can laugh about it now because of how obvious it is but back then it hurt my ego to even think about. All I could do was question why I wasn’t good enough for him. I just wanted him to want me the way that I wanted him, or at least the played-up version in my mind. I would let him get away with treating me like absolute dirt, talking to me as if I was no better than the trash can at the curb, and I still let him have what he wanted. In my deluded mind, that was going to win him over some day. If I wasn’t too harsh, too naggy, too uptight, too prudish then maybe he would finally want to be with me and our daughter.
But when that didn’t happen and he would choose literally any other girl but me, my pride and ego took the biggest hit. In my mind, I was better than those girls because I had put up with him for so long and simply thought I deserved it. If you are one of those girls and happen to read this, from the bottom of my heart, I am so genuinely sorry. I’m sorry if I hurt you, if I said ugly things to you, if I made you feel any type of way. As bad as my mental health and headspace were, there was no reason to act as ugly as I did.
I had so much pent-up anger from what I was going through, comparing myself to the other girls, and trying to compete for a spot in recreation league when God was moving me to the Pros that I lashed out so much. There was a lot of complaining to God in those years. I cried a lot that my life didn’t turn out the way that I wanted, that I was having trouble completing my degree, that I couldn’t get a boyfriend, that I was constantly gaining weight, that I was under a mountain of debt, etc. If there was something that went wayward, I was probably complaining about it.
Just like the verse above, I wanted financial stability but what that looked like was God letting me win the lottery. I wanted a husband but that looked like God giving me a man to rub in my PCP’s face. I wanted to lose weight but that looked like God giving me the body of a model to make my PCP regret his decisions. If you aren’t sure how God works, I can tell you with 100% certainty that it isn’t like that. Sure I wanted those things but I never truly asked for them, I almost expected them because I believed in God.
When you have this mindset mixed with anger, you start to doubt God’s faithfulness because He isn’t giving you want YOU want. I am so glad that He didn’t give me what my flesh desired because I’m positive that I wouldn’t have what I have now, which is peace:
“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”
I had been saved when I was a little girl, baptized when I was 10, but I didn’t fully give my life to Christ until I was 28. Let me tell you, ya girl was tired, with a capital T. There was a point where I had finally let go of the dream that I had for us to be a family, but I just found something new to be angry at him for. Long story short, once my husband and I became serious, he took a bow and made his exit. I was mad for my daughter, for the hurt he put on her heart, for the insecurities she might have to deal with later on in life, and for not being the dad that he had promised he was going to be. Shame tried rearing it’s ugly head with me blaming myself for the choices that he made. Maybe if I had been less combative, less problematic, and more compliant that he would have been better.
I’ll never truly know that answer but what I do know is that when I started praying about it, I stopped obsessing over it. I don’t remember the exact day, but I do remember I was sitting at my house and felt urged and convicted to
pray. For him. Once I did, I felt lighter, like a significant weight had been lifted. I was tired of carrying it all. Can you imagine carrying the weight of all those negative emotions for the better part of a DECADE? Where did that anger get me? Nowhere other than wandering for the last ten years. I sit here saying that I couldn’t imagine being like the Israelites, wandering in the desert for 40 years, yet I was someone that did it. What it boiled down to was that my pride had hardened my heart to forgiveness. I wanted him to pay a debt that I gave him, but Jesus had already paid it. Jesus loves him, too. Jesus DIED for him, too.
If that didn’t humble me right up.
“Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you have a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord gave you.” Colossians 3:13
The scariest and hardest thing that I have ever done was give everything over to the Lord, including all of this anger and negativity. I finally asked for peace, and He gave it to me. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t all at once but little by little, I started noticing things that used to bother me did not influence me anymore. There are still days that I struggle with it, but it won’t always be this way. There will be a day when the enemy won’t be able to slither in the thoughts that used to keep me up at night, there will be a day when this foothold the enemy had on me will no longer exist.
But today? Today is a day that I can truthfully say that I forgive him, and he owes me no debt. The only person that I can thank for this is Jesus. Without Him, I would still be the same mess I was at 18. As much as I thought I would dread my 30s, I’m looking forward to it. I’ll be starting a new decade with the true Lord of my life, the one who helps me be stronger, wiser, kinder, calmer, and everything that I strive to be in Him.
I think that’s the most beautiful thing about giving your life over to Christ. I had messed up my life so many times, made decisions that harmed me and others, spoke harshly out of anger, used God as a way to hurt people, and He still gave me His grace and mercy that I didn’t deserve. He loves me so much that He cleaned up the mess that I had made and made me into a new creation. He can and will do that for you too.
If you’ve read this far, thank you! I truly appreciate it. If you are living in a similar way, know that you are not alone. God says, “Fear not for I am with you”, just like He was with me, He is with you too and He loves you.
“Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise His holy name. Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all His benefits- who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” Psalms 103: 1-5
“Dear Lord, I am so humbled and grateful for this opportunity to continue to share parts of my testimony. Because of the fires that You walked through with me, I get to glorify Your name through my testimony forever. Thank you for the chance to be vulnerable and hopefully share parts of my story that connect with others who may be struggling in the same way. I pray that you bless them and show them how to let go of the anger that they are feeling and the peace that forgiveness can bring. I thank You for walking with them through this difficult time just like You walked with me. Thank You for Your love, Your grace, Your Mercy, and Your forgiveness. In Your name, I pray. Amen.”
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