It’s Ok Not To Be Ok
Yes. It is. It is OK.
In 2008 –––– my wife and I moved to Eugene, OR to start a church. I had a passion to reach college students and hoped to impact a city. The church began with a handful of people and quickly became a rapidly growing community of college students. As the church was growing, I began experiencing chronic stress and severe anxiety. I was young and full of drive, but had yet to learn how to create healthy rhythms, and manage stress and anxiety. Five years into our church plant, the church had grown to a few thousand people on multiple campuses. Most entrepreneurs would consider this to be a dream scenario. I was unable to experience that feeling of joy.
I was trying to survive –––– the overwhelming and debilitating reality of my chronic stress and anxiety. Adding more pain and challenge to that experience, the same month we celebrated our five-year anniversary as a church, my wife was in car accident. This led to a six-year journey of surgeries and my wife eventually being diagnosed with a serious neurological condition.
I did not feel okay –––– I felt overwhelmed, exhausted, discouraged and devastated. Yet I felt like everyone expected me to be okay. Everyone expected me to have it all together, or at least that was my internal dialogue.
Maybe you are living through a similar experience. You may feel like you are suppose to be okay, but below the surface you are feeling everything opposite of okay.
Pain.
Heartbreak.
Exhaustion.
Chronic stress.
Anxious.
Depressed.
Overwhelmed.
Do any of those resonate with you?
I want to tell you today –––– it is okay to feel these emotions.
The perceived false expectations of others often paralyze us from taking steps toward healing.
We have to honestly acknowledge our pain and suffering in order to move forward.
It is okay not to be okay. And it is okay to say –––– I don’t want to stay in this place permanently.
There is life to live, hope to be anchored in and healing to experience.
This journey often starts with the simple acknowledgement that it is okay to not always be okay.
I am believing there are Better Days Ahead for you.
Much love,
Wesley, Founder + Speaker