Comfortable misery seems to be the best description of state of much of our nation today. We're more comfortable than we've ever been in history, but people are miserable - angry, frustrated, depressed, and anxious. We take for granted our houses with central heat and air, soft sheets and thick blankets, fans to cool us while we sleep under those blankets, and pantries full of food. We're so comfortable, we do things like go to special spas to sit in freezing cold water for a few minutes (and post photos) because our bodies are screaming at us that we need some discomfort in our lives!
I like everything to be neat, controlled, and peaceful. Give me my orderly, clean, comfortable house any day. I drive a very comfortable mini-van, although it's getting older and last year I really thought it was time to replace it with a newer, nicer model. I didn't, though. I had a wake up call. It was like a numbed-out, sleeping part of my brain came back to life and I thought, "What am I doing?!"
I was miserable in an extremely comfortable life.
Look around. Are you living in a beautiful world full of non-necessities, yet battling anxiety? Does depression threaten to take over? Are you constantly frustrated with the life you thought you wanted to live? If you said yes, you're living in miserable comfort. It's time to wake up, shake off the fog, stop numbing yourself to LIFE, and get busy actually living.
My life was not always so comfortable. I've had demands made of me that I didn't think I had the strength to give. (I wrote a book about it that you can pick up here, so I won't get into it today.) After things settled down, I started clinging to comfort. It might've been my way of course correcting, but it went too far in the wrong direction. One day I looked around and saw my miserable comfort in startling clarity.
Sickened, I made an immediate course correction. Although it terrified me, I put the brakes on spending money, deciding we need to get out of debt as soon as possible. I didn't know how I'd survive, but I got rid of five of our seven video streaming services. It was summer, so I started working on our landscaping. That led to planting a garden, which led to learning to preserve the produce by canning, freezing, and dehydrating. Being outside, barefoot, helped ground me, and I felt my mental and emotional health improving.
Without my eyes constantly looking at a screen, I started noticing things I'd never seen before - flowers, birds, other people. LIFE felt like it was coursing through my veins again. I got a bicycle and started riding with my kids. My body felt strong and healthy, the brain fog I'd been struggling with lifted, and I had more energy than I'd had in many years.
It's not healthy for us to be too comfortable. When my little guy was old enough to learn to walk, he didn't have strong enough muscles yet to do it. He started hitting us, biting, and banging his head. His physical therapist told us it was because he needed sensory input. His body craved the bumps and bruises a child gets when they're learning to walk, the pounding of their feet on the ground as they learn to run. Without that input, he was trying to find it elsewhere. We'd been treating him like he was made out of glass, so we learned to bounce him on our knees - hard. We learned to drag him around the house on a blanket - fast.
I'd been treating myself like I was made of glass, and I needed the sensory input of pulling weeds! You may already have a great exercise routine and be too busy to spend a lot of time in front of a screen, but you know you have your own ways of living in comfortable misery. It's clear in your mind right now, and you're terrified to step back from it. It brings so much comfort. But it's likely also making you miserable.
I started writing a weekly email newsletter and documented my transformation. It was more than just physical, but spiritual, emotional, and mental. It's been nine months since I started writing that weekly email, and I'm still going strong. If you're craving LIFE too, I invite you to join me on this journey. Subscribe today and we can encourage one another.
And do this, understanding the present time: The hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armor of light. -Romans 13:11-12
