Whilst I was off sick the deadline came for my community newsletter article. It was work but I decided to do it – 200 words in which I was open about my depression and discussed how common it was but little mentioned. I sent it off with the usual service dates etc and rolled back under my duvet. It came out at the start of February and I have had the greatest response ever to a piece I have written. I had worried if it was a bit self-indulgent, but at the village coffee morning today I had several conversations with people about themselves or family experiences, others have phoned me to thank me for what I had written. When one person is willing to speak it gives others permission to talk if they need to.
And I have benefited from similar honesty at a meeting of a group of ministers this week, discussing stresses, loneliness, spiritual struggles (as well as the joys). The opening devotions started with a list of the official criteria for being a minister and how wonderful we must be to tick all those boxes, followed by a clip from the first series of Rev where Adam is ready to lose it in frustration at the job. Being real is part of the chaos of life, and each of us has our own variation of stresses, mine don’t look so bad in comparison – or at least they are familiar and I am used to their quirks.
So all in all I feel affirmed in my wobbliness – we all wobble in our own way and this is mine. And I feel loved and cared for by the people I know and work with. Nothing is technically different about any of these things today compared to last time I wrote but today I have been very aware of the good stuff, and enjoying that. Days like today are the life jacket for when the waves crash over and to be savoured.
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