Before a few days ago, I’d never seen a field that stretched as far as the horizon or drove hundreds of miles to see mountain range upon mountain range. I’d seen Lake Michigan and the ocean kiss the horizon in displays of vast beauty, but driving out west was entirely different. My husband and I drove Route 66 to California to start a new season in our lives. We took a detour on our way to San Jose through the Sequoia National Forest. The largeness of everything I saw was staggering.
There have been things in my life that felt like mountains, and–in retrospect–were personal mountains. Things like anorexia, fear & anxiety, and depression that’s immobilized me. These things tore at me. Sometimes they still do. But driving out west taught me something about my personal mountains; the far-reaching struggles that sometimes feel like they are too big to conquer.
My mountain is small in comparison to the universe of life around me.
Before we drove west, I knew there were mountains, plains, and deserts out there, but I didn’t realize how big they were. Driving through them made me feel small, an ink dot on a page filled with beautiful calligraphy. I am such a small part of an uncontainable creation. I imagine a camera starting at my face then retracting until the United States, then the earth, and then the galaxy is in view. I’m tiny!
This made me think about the things you and I struggle with; our personal mountains. We all have them. Each of us fights a different battle. They are each unique, and we are all fighters. But what I realized is that while my personal mountains may seem Everest tall, I am only seeing them from my small and narrow perspective. Just like I could know there were mountains whos size I couldn’t imagine out west, I can’t know what others are struggling with around me or how long my struggle will last. I don’t say this to make your or my struggles seem less important, but to shine a light on them in light of life and eternity.
Anorexia was a season, my fear and anxiety was a season, my depression comes in seasons. In the moment they feel like they will last forever, but that’s not true. Yes, they are big, yes they are scary and real things that are going on in my life, but I’m not seeing the wholeness of my life when I singlemindedly focus only on the mountain I know. When I do that, I forget that there is so much out there I have never seen. I am a believer in eternity and to think of my mountain within the context of forever makes it even smaller.
Girl, if you think your mountain is too big, try to think bigger than the mountain.
I know this is hard. When I struggle with depression it feels like a weight on my body. I don’t want to think about the future or eternity. I just want to sleep it off. And that is fine as long as I don’t use sleep to escape my life. It’s okay to struggle as long as you don’t let it consume your life. You have to fight it.
So, girl, your mountain is big, but your mind and the way you look at the mountain are bigger. You are stronger than a narrow view of life. You don’t know what’s out there.