Climbing Out

“I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see what he has done and be amazed. They will put their trust in the Lord.” Psalm 40: 1-3

Sadness has a reputation, and it’s not a good one. It causes us to feel pain that isn’t easily consolable, and when faced with someone else’s Sadness we often don’t know how to console them. It causes us to act and react from a place of “weakness” and because seeing someone else sad has the power to make us sad ourselves, we run from any opportunity to be associated with that “bad” feeling. So we avoid, put together coping mechanisms, send our family and friends to therapy so they can work out their Sadness, and when it’s our turn… often we ended up avoiding completely, or falling into, the pit. What is the pit? The pit is the place we go to allow Sadness to have it’s moment. When we can’t avoid it any longer, we sit and sit, until we’ve had enough and then come jumping out.

When I am feeling at my lowest, I wallow. Wallow in self pity, wallow in darkness, wallow in unforgiveness (mostly of myself) and wallow in pain. The reality of that is that even though I often convince myself that my wallowing is the result of a multitude of emotions, it’s really just the aftermath of feeling one. Sadness. If I really sit and think about how all the other emotions manifest in me and how I respond to them, Sadness is the only one that causes me to retreat and push everyone and everything else away. Why is that? Why is it when we’re sad, we find ourselves in a pit of despair? Why do we bury ourselves so deep under all the other emotions and reject not only feeling, but dealing with, Sadness? There’s no perfect answer for that one. We’re all different, and process emotions in different ways. Even our emotions are different, never feeling the exact same way as the circumstances of each situation can contribute underlying factors to the circumstances. So, if how we feel is different, and what we feel constantly changing… why do we attack each situation the same way we did the last one?

Out of comfort. Sadness doesn’t feel good so to deal with it, we turn to what does. Comfortable shoes, clothes, food, and responses to what we don’t want to feel. But the problem with that is that each bout of Sadness is it’s own and doesn’t always call for the same method to deal with. Sometimes we need to celebrate the successors that accompanied it, sometimes we need to get Angry and become passionate about fighting it. Sometimes we just need to sit in it until we’ve accepted it and move on. But one thing is for certain; when dealing with Sadness, we need to respect it and figure out how to feed it so it can go away.

In Psalms, David writes “I waited patiently for the Lord to help me, and he turned to me and heard my cry. He lifted me out of the pit of despair, out of the mud and the mire. He set my feet on solid ground and steadied me as I walked along. He has given me a new song to sing, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see what he has done an dbe amazed. They will put their trust in the Lord.” (Psalm 40: 1-3) He says he waited patiently for God to take his Sadness and replace it with the right emotion for the next phase. That’s what we need to do. Respect Sadness and let God remove it. Have you ever tried to remove a tooth before it was ready? The process can mean tearing at your gums, damaging nerves, and having to have your hands in your mouth in a less than comfortable position. But if you let it make its way out naturally, the pain is much less and far less are difficult to handle. We need to treat Sadness the same way. Let it run it’s course. And when it’s time to naturally climb out of it, you can, and you will. And just like with a stubborn tooth that needs a dentist’s help, God is ready to help you climb out of that pit of pain.

So 3 things I want you to remember. Number 1, all Sadness isn’t the same. You have to recognize the root of the Sadness before you can default on how to deal with it. Number 2, turn to Comfort. Once you’ve determined what kind of Sadness you’re up against, turn to the method that will making dealing with the Sadness as easy as possible. Find the comfortable fix. And finally, let God pull you out don’t force yourself. Forcing yourself out of a Sad situation before you’re ready can be just as detrimental as sitting in it for too long. If you give it to God, he will provide you with the perfect anesthesia to deal with your pain. All in all, Sadness doesn’t have to be a permanent or detrimental experience. Respect the process, and Climb out the Pit.