What to Do When Everything Falls Apart (Again)
“Whaaat is that smell?” my husband asked when he arrived home at the end of his work day. Given the stuffiness of a nagging cold, I hadn’t even noticed. His question had briefly distracted me from what had become an unexpectedly heavy phone conversation with a fellow mom. Shrugging, I continued my call with another mom, as together we unraveled a disturbing situation that involved both of our sons and their classmates. To stop to help my husband would mean missing the opportunity to understand the needs of my son and his life skills classmates. And really, what parent isn’t accustomed to living in a house pervaded with a bad smell or two?
My husband’s search that began in the garage continued into the laundry room, inside multiple trash containers, even along the sides of the basement stairwell. Eventually he followed the scent downstairs to a closet that spewed water and he shouted, “Help! Get down here! Bring towels. We have a leak!”
I ended my call, and we both hurried to turn off the main water line and arrange buckets to catch the leak.
We’d uncovered the source of one stinky smell, but my hurried hang up didn’t resolve the unease that my phone conversation had churned up. t In fact, it was only the beginning. The days and weeks that followed brought out educational and emotional messes with our school system. The more digging I did, the worse the stench got. After an overflow of too much discovery, I too reached the point where I cried out loud, “God, get down here! Bring help! We have a mess!”
My husband’s shouted words in the face of gallons of gushing water came back to me. These two messes were mirrors of each other, and in a strange way, this gave me hope.
While the fountain of water flooding our basement felt like the apex of a crisis point, it was only after uncovering the underground issue that we could start to fix the root problem. The solution required heavy machinery, an excavated front yard, and thousands of dollars, but it still led to resolution.
So I realized that when I cried out to God, asking him to bring the spiritual buckets and towels, that if I was at the peak of my crisis, his perfect plan was probably just on the other side.
Struggles can suck the hope out of us like a shop vac on overdrive. The loss of a job or relationship, the shock of a personal failure or disappointment can make things feel as if ev-er-y-thing is catastrophically falling apart and we’re alone in the middle of the mess. It’s often when life feels the messiest that God’s perfect peace is just around the corner.
If you’re in this place now, here are some things that can help:
Pray First
You’ve probably heard that when we’re faced with danger, we respond with fight, flight, or freeze. Before you raise fists, before you flee, be still -- take a deep breath and ask for God’s guidance.
“Help me” prayers don’t have to be fancy or fluffy. God knows what’s really going on and pretty prayers can’t cover desperation. Nor should they.
Prayer transfers the heavy weight of the burden off of me and onto God. Even if you haven’t found faith or if you’re in a crisis of faith, dialoguing with someone who is for you and not against you brings a shift in perspective. Even if all they can offer in that moment is their presence.
Prayer provides insight to know which things are out of my control.
When we pray with confidence, it doesn’t mean we have to understand what God’s up to. Praying with confidence means we can rest in the belief that God’s working in ways that are beyond our ways even if we can’t see – or agree – with those ways. (Isaiah 55: 8-9)
And if you can’t pray confidently and trust completely, God gets it. You can even ask that God would help with your unbelief ( Mark 9:24).
2. Begin naming.
Before things fell apart in the garden, God gave Adam the job of naming the animals. What does it mean to name our world?
When we name what’s happening, we start the process of finding words, which helps to process not only what’s going on physically, but what’s going on emotionally. Are we over-functioning or under-functioning? Is a response connected to a pattern? A feeling? A belief I have?
If you’re standing in the messy middle of something, what is it that you’re feeling? Are you jumping immediately to a to-do list? If you delegated that list to others, would that make things even messier from your perspective? Or maybe your emotions overwhelm your reaction? Do you ride the emotional wave while others take action steps? Is this a pattern?
Rage. Despair. Confusion. Exhaustion. Hopelessness. Misery. Sometimes our emotions can feel so overwhelming that next steps feel murky.Think through whether you need help to determine the next right thing to do. Having trouble finding words? Refer to #3.
3. Ask professionals.
In the midst of these messes, I found myself physically unwell. I became so congested for such an extended period of time, I sought counseling to work through what my body was trying to tell my heart and spirit. In many ways, my physical body reflected my emotional state.
There are times in life when we need to call the experts. Plumbers provide expertise in stopping leaks. Educators provide expertise for individualized programs. Counselors provide expertise in sorting through personal health goals, for the whole of who we are.
Uprooting what’s going on may take tools you don’t have in your tool bag quite yet. Professional counseling can provide those tools and offer guidance on how to use them.
4. Take care.
We all have patterned ways of managing life when we’re in the middle of a mess that we’ve learned within our first families. Whether we tend to respond with lots of activity or very little, whether we’ve historically rushed to problem solve or struggled to know what’s next,, we can choose new habits and learn to practice what it means to be calm so we don’t rely on unhealthy, destructive patterns to get us through the mess.
Taking care may involve finding perspective, practicing mindfulness, and managing emotional reactivity. If developing a calm practice is something that’s a challenge for you, that also can be something you talk through with a counselor.
Small things matter. When you’re in the middle of a mess, you can choose to do nothing and in so doing mirror the mess, or you can choose to work in the mess to get to the other side.
Even the people of God get stuck sometimes. Remember God’s words to Moses before he led the Israelites out of captivity and into the muddy mess of the parted Red Sea? God said, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the people of Israel to move on…” (Exodus 14: 15).
Move on. While we may have started with prayer, there’s a time to stop praying and to get moving! If we’re honest, when we say, “I’ll pray on it,” it can also be an excuse for inaction. God’s words to Moses challenge us all: there’s a place for prayer and there’s a place for action.
Let’s get moving -- through the messy middle -- and onto dry ground.
Resources:
Want some more inspiration? Check out The Messy Middle sermon series from Crossroads Church or make an appointment with The Breaking Ground counselors.
