My son sat with his soon-to-be bride at their rehearsal dinner listening to stories of God’s goodness through the words of close friends and family. Stories made us laugh and cry as we appreciated the admirable qualities of the happy couple. I had the privilege of being the last person to speak. I read a final entry from a journal I had been keeping since the day my son was born. Sandwiched between my favorite stories from his childhood and my adoration of his beautiful bride, I included these words of advice…

She is often placed in a God-given role of unvoiced leadership and responsibility. She is often a single mom on Sunday, sometimes asked to fill roles unfitting with her giftedness. She absorbs her husband’s stress, and smiles at those who have been insensitive and occasionally sinful. Sometimes lonely in a sea of people who know a whole lot about her, she is noticed and observed in moments she longs simply to be known.

In our friendships, marriages, and family, we have moments of difficulty. We miscommunicate or we hear words and assume the worst. We often feel angry towards someone or hurt by them and can’t really name why. These internal disruptions are not enjoyable, but that does not mean they are bad. Emotional discomfort is a gift from the Lord. It tells us there is something happening, and He is at work to help us understand.

I sat in a nondescript conference room looking at eight individuals I had not previously met. I was simultaneously filled with anticipation and regret, excited over what will come and fear of what it may feel like. This moment of conflicted emotion was the beginning of a two-day intensive led by qualified therapists. We put our temporary fate in their capable hands. These fearless facilitators led us in a process of digging out parts of ourselves we had either covered up or disregarded.

God’s sanctifying work often happens through suffering and does not always feel loving. As mentioned in the previous posts about the heart and the brain, seeking a true reality of self is instrumental in our ability to adjust our perspective. This adjustment allows for literal healing of the neurons in our brains. Neurological healing provides the sufferer a more accurate idea of who God is and how deeply his love reaches.

In Anatomy of the Soul, Dr. Thompson says, “our experiences are inextricably woven together with our neural firing patterns, and therefore, we cannot separate the two” (pg. 31). Pain from our past and anxieties about our future are constantly weaving this tapestry of our present. The first post of this three part series addressed our hearts. The hope of living out of our hearts hinges on the various threads comprising our thought patterns.

Physical pain is isolated and can typically be resolved with medical treatment. Emotional and mental anguish can be much more difficult to pinpoint. However, it is not something we can simply ignore and move past. In his book, The Body Keeps the Score, Bessel van der Kolk describes how detrimental it is to hold onto internal suffering without processing our emotions. If we hold our pain, stuff our emotions, try to forget destructive events, our physical bodies will remember.