Faith Will Win, Fear Will Lose

     In this post I'm going to be vulnerable once again, as I feel God is leading me to type out this post.  At the prayer meeting this evening, one of our elders was talking about the concept of "fight or flight".  He used real life examples of how today he came home from work and just felt really frustrated.  Why was he frustrated? He didn't even know? There was no reason. He then began to talk about how if he was frustrated being an elder/husband then he could step down for a bit.  In reality that's not true, that doesn't do anything or help anyone.  It's giving into flight mode. Satan wants us to flee instead of fight. Flee from doing God's work, and instead hiding. God gave me a real analogy in my life on this "flight or fight" mechanism these past two weeks. 

     Satan knows are weaknesses, what makes us want to hide away from life. For me my weakness is my anxiety.  My anxiety was used against me and also for me the past two weeks. (Isn't it great how god can make a bad situation into a lesson?) About two weeks ago was the last day of our family vacation, we had just gotten back from being out in town. I sat down to relax, but my mind was overtaken with panic. I grabbed my guitar, and started playing. (Usually this would soothe me from my panicky thoughts). It didn't. I ran out of the room and to where my mom was. She has dealt with my anxiety before so she knew what to do. My mind kept flickering to that I'd need to go to the hospital to escape this feeling. My mind seems to jump to this irrational conclusion whenever I have a panic attack. I told my mom to take me somewhere...maybe the hospital. (That's never happened). During my panic attacks for some reason my mind tells me running is a good idea.  (I absolutely hate running, and only have the urge when I'm in the middle of a panic attack.) My mom told me we could walk outside. So we did, and that's what I did at first, took off running. (Literally deciding to flight in the fight or flight situation.) My mom shouted at me to stop running, and the rational part of my mind made me stop. It's just like God saying  in points of trial to stop hiding and fight. Don't let your fear win, let your faith win. Faith will win, fear will lose!

         Fast forward one week, still recovering from my last panic attack as the recovery period can take a little time. It happened again. This time my parents and I were in the car on our way home from my aunts at like 9ish. It was dark out. Being in a car at night used to give me anxiety, but it hadn't in awhile so I thought I'd be fine. I wasn't, not really. I started feeling the panic overtaking my mind, I tried to distract my brain with cotton candy (We had been at a festival before going to my aunts house which had cotton candy, no shame). The cotton candy didn't help, and I immediately felt the urge to get out of the car, like my life depended it. So I said just that. I need to get out! My mom made my dad pull over, and she opened the back door. Before the irrational part of my brain got to me and I jumped out of the car and started running down the sidewalk, my rational part stepped up, and I didn't actually step out of the car or my seat. It was like a metaphor for the darkness of sin/Satan coming and trying to consume me, and the urge to run, is to run away from the darkness and hide. Me staying in my seat and not giving in, was God letting me know it's okay and he has me, and he has already won against the darkness, so there's no need to fear.

           Not having a panic attack for 6 months, and then having two within two weeks was frustrating. But if God can use it as an inspiration for someone, then I guess it will all be worth it.  It will also lessen the effect of Satan's tactics.