Resilience and Peace

Last night, I had a difficult time falling asleep. But unlike most nights, my mind was not overflowing with worried thoughts. Instead, my mind was overflowing with positive memories of something that God has been using to bring peace into my life…Birds.

This song kept coming to my mind last night and this is a song that I have listened to hundreds of times. I used to listen to it and sing it all day long, in the same room where so many of the most difficult times in my life happened. To me, it has always been a reminder that God is always there. Because God is love.

Listen to Twila Paris singing "Love's Been Following You."

As a Christian, I have often been asked when I first believed in God. I have never really been able to pinpoint one point in my life when I knew or when I completely surrendered my life to Him. He has always been a huge part of my life. I have definitely had periods when I have felt closer to Him than others. Sometimes He has seemed as far as He could possibly be, and in those times, doubt crept in. But fortunately those times of doubt usually were very short because God always brought me back. Not because of anything anyone else said. But because of things that He did in my life.

When people have heard my testimony, one of the first words that they say is “Resilience.” I have heard this word a lot throughout the past few weeks. While God has always been a big part of my ability to be resilient, I think the actual first time that I truly devoted my life to Him and surrendered everything to Him was last October, the moment I was praying on my knees asking Him to take my pride away. Ever since then, no matter how difficult things have gotten, I have never lost my hope and there has not been doubt about how He is working in my life.

I had so many nightmares as a child and unfortunately, I can remember quite a few of them. I had quite a few that had variations but I was always being chased by something that scared me. I was overcome by fear and the closer these “bad guys” got to me, the more afraid I became. And there would always come a point when I would bend my knees and jump and I would quickly be soaring in the sky. Sometimes the sky would be dark but most times, the sky would be light as day. I would just fly until my eyes opened and I was back in reality. I am not sure but maybe this is why I have always loved birds. I always wanted to fly like them, to feel the freedom that I felt in those dreams.

The bedroom I grew up in had three windows and it was in the front of the house. There was a huge tree right outside the window. I am not sure how old I was, probably around 9 or 10. I would have to ask my mom, but one day, a bird started to build a nest in that tree. Every day, I would spend a lot of time watching this bird and its babies. I cannot explain what it was like for me to watch the bird take care of its babies and then there came a point when the birds became old enough to try to fly. I was honestly scared for them. They were so little and I feared that they would try to fly and fall and get hurt. No words can really describe my excitement when I saw them fly. I also became sad, because I came to realize that all the time I had spent watching them grow up and transform was coming to an end and that nest would soon become quiet as they flew away.

In the second house I lived in right down the street from the first home I lived in is my second significant memory of a bird. Although this bird was not real. Yet it has still had a profound impact on me to this day. My family argued a lot as I grew up. One night, my mom and brother had their worst argument that I had ever witnessed and at the end of it, my brother came into my room. He gave me a bird sculpture that he had created. He may not have known it at the time, but I felt that through that gift, God was telling me that I had to let him go and give him to God. My brother ended up leaving that night and then my family became just my mom and I. I grew up watching my family literally fall apart. My father was the first to leave, then my oldest brother left, then my other brother left, and then my mom left for a period and it was just me. My brother often apologizes for leaving me when I needed someone. But I am not mad at him, as I am not really angry at any of my family anymore. Of course, I have been angry at them all before, but God has helped me transform that anger into peace and forgiveness.

Over my many years of talking to doctors, therapists, friends, and pastors, many people have come to know that the verse I have thought about the most throughout my life is Isaiah 40:31, a verse that represents “resilience” in a way that is so true and real to me.

“But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; 

they shall mount up with wings as eagles; 

they shall run, and not be weary; 

and they shall walk, and not faint.” 

–Isaiah 40:31 (KJV)

Eagles are supposed to represent strength and resilience. I read once that they also often fly alone. They are known to wait for a storm and once the winds pick up, they use the winds to rise above the storm. I have shared this with so many people and one of my doctors recently told me that whenever she sees an eagle, she thinks of me.

The third home I lived in is right near a lake. We moved into that home after many months of living out of a suitcase. As I shared in another post, I lived in about 8 different homes over a period of a year or so.

God used that lake to transform and heal me through some extremely difficult times. It was at that lake that I met two swans. Every summer, I would walk around that lake watching the babies of these swans grow up. For many years in a row, I would be deeply saddened as I watched the babies slowly disappear. Year after year, none of their babies survived. This past summer, however, they had eight babies. I prayed every time I saw them and my heart was full of joy as I watched all of them survive this summer. I had a chance to visit them when I was home for the holidays. It was like visiting another family of mine.

What I learned through watching these swans was to never give up, especially on family. These swans went through the worst of the worst together, including Hurricane Sandy. There were so many times that I saw the parents protect their babies against people as well as the geese who also inhabited the lake. I have been extremely angry, upset and disappointed with my family at times, but I have never lost hope in them. I never stopped praying for them. I have asked so many of my friends to pray for them that I often felt like a broken record. But I knew that God would work in their lives and do things that I could not do myself.

My mom and my brother have come a very long way and we are learning slowly but surely what normalcy is, if such a thing exists.

Now as I am healing, does it surprise me that God would yet again use birds to speak to me or teach me a lesson? Not at all.

A few weeks ago, I was at my lowest point. I absolutely thought nobody was there for me and I felt completely abandoned. I did not want to see anyone. I did not want to talk to anyone. But I posted on my Facebook asking for prayer. I ended up walking about 4 or 5 miles to talk to someone I knew could help. I do not remember how I walked that far, except that I literally felt like I was being carried. I said “I need support. I need help.”

That day, I found the lake that I have spent the majority of my time at over the past few weeks.

This past week, I was extremely upset. So I went to the lake to cool down. My anxiety was extremely high and negative thoughts were flowing through my mind. I was listening to Pandora and all of a sudden, I felt this urge to look up. The second I looked up, I saw a white bird soaring and my anxiety and the thoughts just stopped… Abruptly stopped. I was overcome by a peace and calm that I cannot explain with words, something you have to experience to understand.

I called my mom and told her and I said it was a white bird. She kept asking me if it was white. I got frustrated and asked her why she kept asking me if it was white. I told her I know white when I see white. She told me she wanted to make sure she heard me clearly and explained that white birds are a symbol of peace. I did not put it all together until I remembered what I had grown up hearing about the Holy Spirit.

I have seen so many white birds this week since that day and every time I do, I am filled with that same peace and calm. Nine of them actually flew and landed close to me yesterday during the sunset.

I want to end this post with a video of my favorite movie of all time, “Fly Away Home.” When I was younger, I used to watch this movie so many times that my family thought I was crazy. One time I rented the VHS tape from the library and watched it 5 times in one day. They asked me, “You’re still watching that?”

At the beginning of this movie, the girl loses her mother in a car crash, one of the most difficult things that a human can endure. She finds peace and meaning in her life when she finds these geese eggs on her father’s farm. She takes care of the baby geese as they grow up. My favorite scene of this movie and the reason I can watch this movie so many times is at the end when she flies with the geese to their final destination after a very difficult journey over many miles.

This scene always makes me cry, not of sadness, but of great joy because throughout my whole life, this scene has always been a scene of overcoming the most difficult moments in our lives. It is in this scene that she finds peace with the loss of her mother and realizes the meaning in her life.