I’ve been bumping into stuff all day. It’s a natural consequence of 1) being blind, 2) wearing contact lenses for your entire adult life to compensate, and 3) every once in a great while, switching to glasses for a day. With my contacts in, my peripheral vision is intact; while wearing my glasses I can see in front of me just dandy, but everything around the edges is merely colorful static. So if I forget what is right under my nose, just over my head, or immediately to either side, and if I then move suddenly, there’s a good chance I’m going to trip over something or run into someone.

There is an upside to having everything around you sort of disappear, of course: It kind of forces you to notice what is clear and bright and pretty much right in front of your nose. (Today that has mostly been a computer screen.) Life is full of clutter and distractions, and I am highly distractable. As much as I prefer to be aware of my surroundings, sometimes it is a blessing to take my head off of a swivel and just focus on one thing that really matters.

A Year In Hell

2007 was a year loaded with distractions. And by distractions I mean “things that sucked.” In January a friend in ministry, after some shocking secrets became public, took his own life. In December my boss got a letter loaded with subtle insults and unsubtle slanders about me, sent by a concerned fellow who was pretty sure he knew more than he actually did (despite never making any sort of Matthew 18 effort with me). In between those two attractive bookends was a ten-month forced march of misery, mistakes, tragedy, and pain I am eager to never repeat. That was a year when my unwelcome companion in life, Depression, got new batteries for her megaphone and amused herself with near-daily karaoke sessions.

I got into a dark, dark place that year that I did not want to be in, and every time I thought I was climbing out of the hole the cussing ladder broke under my feet. All I could think about was how messed up everything was, and hopelessness would wash over me like a black wave. I went through days on end where I was disengaged from everyone and everything around me. After watching me stare at a wall night after night for a week, Stacie told me I needed to either snap out of it or get help. That made me realize just how deep of a hole I was in, and it  pushed me to find a way to crawl out of it (which eventually happened). But I also re-learned something about myself and Depression that year: It is a lot easier to stay out of the hole than to get out of the hole.

Pursuing Joy

Like probably most people, I find it much easier to focus on the negative than to embrace the positive. My fourth year of college I began to realize how incredibly self-destructive that tendency is, and made some deliberate choices about, of all things, how I would think in the future.

…whatever is true…

Bad stuff happens to everybody; you can’t ignore it, nor is it really healthy to try. Sometimes the bad stuff is a warning that some self-correction is necessary, or that attention is needed where it has been lacking.

…whatever is noble…

But I realized that, though I can’t control a lot of what happens to me, including the bad stuff, I can control how I respond to it.

…whatever is right…

I decided to stop obsessing about the negative, so I could (at least as far as I was able) deny it any power over how I feel.

…whatever is pure…

I chose to surround myself with as many positive influences as I could.

…whatever is lovely…

I determined to embrace Joy, even when Joy seemed elusive.

…whatever is admirable…

This didn’t all happen in a moment of idyllic clarity, of course. It was more of an unfolding awareness of truth rather than a lightning bolt from heaven, at least as I remember it. And I certainly didn’t execute this new approach to life flawlessly; it was three steps forward, two-steps-and-a-stumble back for years. But the trajectory was right, momentum was slowly building, and my mind was being sanctified.

…if anything is excellent or praiseworthy…

For a while, under relentless bombardment in 2007, I lost sight of all that. It was a painful reminder (and reinforcement) of old lessons learned the hard way. Depression is always there in the fuzzy periphery, toting her bullhorn, ready to play havoc with my soul if I lend her an ear. But Joy walks bright as the sun, beautiful and confident, right before my eyes every day if I just care to notice. She likes to play hard to get, of course; Joy can be a playful tease, and Depression is so much easier. But with Joy, much of the joy is in the pursuit.

 

Think About Such Things

Fast forward to October 3, 2013. The details of what happened that day are not important here. What is important is that I’m a little older, a little wiser, and I know myself a little better than I used to. And I saw the hole open up right in my path, deep and dark and potentially devastating. Depression wanted me back, and to get me back she needed me to take my eyes off of Joy.

Remember: It’s easier to stay out of the hole than to get out of the hole.

I needed Joy, and I needed her bad,and I needed to pursue her aggressively, or this year was going to get ugly in one bad hurry. And that’s when #psalmotherapy was born.

If you have followed me on Facebook for any length of time, you know that I rarely try to use my page for anything super-spiritual. It is just an outlet for my whimsy and my snark, and a way to connect with the people in my life who aren’t in my time zone. So, if you are used to crazy stuff my kids say or commentary on the NFL, this might have seemed like a departure for me:

This was the first of 172 days in the Psalms (22 of them just in Psalm 119), each in a deliberate search for Joy. (The idea is hardly original to me; I borrow the term “Psalmotherapy” from a pastor I know in Oregon.) I chose to do it publically on Facebook as a way to hold myself accountable; once it became apparent that I was doing a Psalm a day in order, there was no way to quit without being noticed. Besides, maybe somebody else would find Joy while I was out looking for her (and, based on a few messages from friends, a few somebodies did).

I’m not going to pretend it was 172 days of bliss. There was a very dark day in January, when Depression was whispering quite loudly in my ear, that I got uncomfortably close to Despair. It has been a battle, and when you struggle with Depression the battle is never really over this side of Heaven. But the Psalms are not always green pastures and still waters, either. The Psalmists spoke candidly about the difficulties, the uncertainties, and the discouragements of life. Asaph did. So did the sons of Korah. David most certainly did. And through a dark winter of the soul, the Psalms gave me something to cling to, hope that better days were ahead, and certainty that God listens and knows and cares.

Here’s my suggestion to you, especially if you are a BBC student, especially if you are just hanging on as the school year comes to a crescendo or a thud, especially if Depression is whispering some unholy things in your ear: Pursue Joy.

Counting today, there are 22 two days until graduation. Psalm 119, which extols the Word of God, has 22 sections (one for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet, in case you are wondering why). Spend a day in each. See if it doesn’t help you focus on Joy as she dances before you, rather than the Depression and distractions lurking in your peripheral vision.

photo credit: pixels.com