Tips for Anxiety during this Time! March 26th Thursday

JUST  BREATH!!!

TOOLS FOR HANDLING ANXIETY!

We would all love to be on a beach somewhere, anywhere right now, RIGHT!  I am hearing from so many about how they are trying to be brave on the outside, but inside, they wake up at night in a cold sweat.  Single moms who do pedicures, and or are servers.  Their living has been snatched away.  Here are some things to consider:   I am diffusing Joy in the kitchen and bedroom daily.  I am getting up in the morning, turning on candles and getting back in bed to seek God through prayer for us all.  Choosing to Rejoice, choosing to be kind in this abnormal new normal.  Choosing to not be anxious, but pray with my requests and give thanks to a God who I know hears us.  He has compassion on our impacted souls right now.  I choose to embrace peace. And choose to think only on right, pure, true, noble, lovely, praiseworthy and excellent things, and then PRACTICE.  Practice Breathing.  Pretend you are on this beach.  Sit back close your eyes. Breath in slowly to the count of 5, hold for five, then slowly breath out.  Keep eyes closed. Wait.  Then repeat three times.  Your serotonin level will calm down and bring peace.  Hold onto that and repeat each time you run out of steam.  Essential oils Peace and Calming, Tranquil and Stress Away are excellent during these times.  NIACIN (Flush Free) found at Walmart, will take away depression, I promise. 

THE CROSSROADS OF UNCERTAINTY - MARCH 16TH, 2020

At my age, I have been privy to the many national scares over seven decades.  Don’t do the math.  I remember the one way back in my thirties when my mother started storing up all those groceries in a secret pantry.  I rolled my eyes and tried not to laugh in her presence.

Another major one, my personal favorite, was in 1999 when at midnight, December 31, 1999, we were to have an internet crash. Everyone was storing up water bottles under their house, or in the attic.  It also made me smirk.  It just didn’t make sense to me that that could be possible in my life time.  We have had so many very serious similar events.  If you took some time you would find them on the internet and find that each one was worse than the other.  And, today am I laughing?  Nope, this one, the Coronavirus 19, is taking my breath away. 

Could this be because now as a widow and living alone for the time being, has made a huge difference?  Maybe it is my age?  I have sincerely grown anxious and could see how the world also is coming apart over this.  Another issue could be, because I have dealt with a cold, virus, fungal infection, and stomach flu since January.  But when Indiana canceled March Madness, the schools stopped for 30 days, And, CHURCH was canceled, I reached for the paper bag and put my head between my legs.  Life as we knew it or hoped for 2020 was stopping.  How can that happen to us?  I am supposed to be this faith based strong Christian woman and Counselor for petes sake.  God, what are you doing?  We need a sit down, right now!  I was just getting a new lease on life; some really neat changes were coming my way.  Why now?  My grandson is graduating from IU Bloomington, there are thousands of competitions canceled, Nascar too?  Look at all the people this affects.  Look at all the ones getting sick and dying.  Losing their jobs, their businesses.   Why?  What are we to do?  How will you, God, bring all this together for good?  Sure, I know Romans 8:28.  You promise to bring all things together for good. Please don’t tell me, “Well, Shirley we need to ask God what we are to learn from this?” I don’t want to learn anything here, I want things to go back to normal.  I wanted to read about Churubusco beating Blackhawk.  Michigan State getting all the way to the top again this year.  Purdue finally winning a State Championship. Girls gymnastics from our area winning top honors.   Church as usual.  What am I or you to learn from this.  Well, when I got done throwing my temper tantrum, guess what?

            My Holy Father showed me through a devotion last week what I want to share with you as well.  We are all in this uncertainty together, we are fragile, He knows we need each other.

            “. . .God isn’t just simply aware of the events in our lives.  He isn’t just watching and sitting back to see how we will react or respond.  He compassionately SEES into our Souls, and knows how this (little or big event, crisis or trauma) affects us!  He knows our age, our past, our wounds, our lack of resources, how scared we feel of the unknown – the uncertainty. 

One of my friends said, “. . .are we going to lose everything!”  Another one said, “my daughter is pregnant, what if she gets the flu?”  I have heard lots of reactions.  My own cousin has adult children living and working in the affected zones overseas,  and are worried sick.

Okay, so lets take a deep breath together and embrace together, that He is our great big Dad, and He knows how this affects us.  He sees us, He gets us, He knows and He wrote a chapter on how to HANG ON.  That whole thing about how He sees into my soul brought tears to my eyes and a peace.  Philippians 4: 4/20.

Please read those verses, slowly and carefully. 

            Here is our outline for each morning, no matter what:

            1.  Rejoice in the Lord ALWAYS.

            2.  Be gentle to all, no matter how you are feeling

            3.  DON’T be anxious, or fretting, or stewing or fussing!

            4.  Give Him your requests (how you are affected) Little or Big.

            5.  Be Thankful that He sees it, has it, knows it.  Praise Him!

            6.  Accept His peace which you can’t understand, let it in – EMBRACE it!

            7.  Know you will be guarded in your heart and mind.  (What all is in

                        Your heart and mind? Your family, what’s happening etc.)

                        8.  SO THEN WHAT ARE WE TO DO NOW?

            Think only:  on what is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy!

            Will this be easy, is your circumstances different, worse somehow. . .sure!

            You will want to put all this into PRACTICE.  Pray, SING, Praise, Listen to Christian Praise music.  Pray some more, Trust, Hang on!  His promises are True, He is Truth.  He spreads His wing out over us.

            What else in Phil 4:  Be content in whatsoever state you are in.  That is tough too!

            I love that one about how WE CAN DO ALL THINGS IN HIM WHO STRENGTHENS US.

            Pray for more strength.  Practice being positive and strong.

            And, finally, He meets all our needs.

            I have to choose Psalm 62: 7 and 8. Because You are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings.  I cling to you; your right hand upholds me.

            And, my tip to you about breathing.  Sit in a comfortable chair, hopefully not where the family is to distract you.  Bathroom maybe.  Not so comfortable, but maybe a bubble bath.  Bedroom, outside behind garage.  Think about your favorite place to be.  A walk on the beach, walk in the woods, sleeping in with covers over your head.  Now, slowly take in a breath to the count of five.  Hold for five and let out slowly to five.  Do that three times slowly.  Pause, wait, and repeat as needed.  The serotonin levels if too high, or stimulated, will come down.  Use this tip often. 

            The other tip I have to use on myself, and for clients is making the choice to be positive, sing, pray and breath.  You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.  You can have that scared look, that anxious face, furrowed brow, and be bitey all day.

 Ask yourself this.  “How is it helping me to be negative, fearful, depressed, mad, and upset?”  If it isn’t then “What do I need to do to change that?”  You have the tools!  “When do you want to change that?”  NOW.  So be it!

           

It always helps to talk to someone, a friend, or whoever you believe can help you relieve some of the anxiety of these times.  We are all experiencing some grave questions and uncertainties.  My Pollyanna nature comes roaring out at times like this.  I don’t want any of us to be holding our breath, scared, having anxiety attacks, stuck in that terrible uncertainty of depression.  What will happen?  Will God see us through?  Does He care?  I know He does, I finally got that last week, as I said.  He sees us to our very soul.  He sees how it affects us.  Think hard on this, feel it, visualize Him doing that.  He loves us, He sings over us.  Zephaniah 3: 17.

 I want to visualize laying back in the warm clear water without a care in the world, like the otter, or like my emotional support dog Jax does when he sleeps all sprawled out on his back.  He is okay with the world.  He isn’t diving to the bottom, to bury himself in the muck.                                             

Don’t beat up on yourself if you are still having high anxiety, just reread all this information and tools.  Get in the Word, Pray lots, sing lots, if that still doesn’t help, I am an email away, or a phone call away.  Your first 20 minutes at $1.00 a minute is free.  Or you can just ask me to pray.  Let’s stick together in this.  Numbers count. 

MARCH 10TH, 2020. - MY TESTIMONY

MY TESTIMONY:

As the only child of teacher parents, you must hold to a certain standard of intelligence and behavior.  None of which I did.  My relationship with my mother was never a good one.  While I am most appreciative to having been a part of this world, it was a difficult journey due to my believing that I probably didn’t do anything well, or fast enough.  My parent tape included “I see I have to finish your chores since you can’t do them well.  You know you probably will never amount to anything in life until you finally decide to do them how I teach them.”  Then I had a 6^th grade math teacher tell me, I had

better find a man in my life and get married, since I won’t be able to do anything of major proportions in life.”  And, so, that is exactly what I set out to do, find someone to take care of me.  I left home at 14 and 16 for good.  Married a serviceman and spent the next ten years letting men make all the decisions for me.  In one way or another.  It did finally occur to me in my twenties that I should give

up the pursuit of the occult, and go back to high school, graduated with good grades, then divorced, and met John Souder at WANE TV.

We married and after some major counseling in life, decided that a relationship to Christ would be important for me to pursue.  And, He led me to the Fort Wayne Bible College where I graduated with a Christian Counseling and Theology degree.  And, in addition to that, I went to the University of St. Francis, where I got my bachelors in Industrial Psychology/Psychology. Then I received a Masters in Counseling/Psychology.  Which led to being licensed by the State of Indiana in Marriage and Family Counseling/ and Licensed in Clinical Social Work.

The whole Pollyanna thing was born.  To help people shed their cocoon of addictions, or emotional pain.  Those stuck places we get into and can’t seem to let go of.   As a Christian Counselor with options to utilize the clinical aspects of Psychology, I began a practice in 1982.  I taught at IU one semester, and Summit/Taylor University, and did speaking, wrote two books, worked part time for other small agencies in counseling and human relations.  I also love working with leadership or facilitating in small groups.  Another passion is mentoring and coaching.   Coaching in interviews with pageant women, or for new positions in the work world.  I truly enjoyed the part of executive director for the Miss America Local Pageant theater.  In that genre I also did judging on the local level and working with young women who wanted to make the world different.  That is the one thing I love sharing with women, or anyone who will listen actually. 

Call it compensating for how I was taught in the beginning, or anything you like.  I so enjoy being a part of empowering people in the name

of Jesus Christ to let go of their stuck place.  When my husband passed away in 2018, I wondered what God would do with me then.  Being a widow, I have seen it has brought about a whole new me. The journey was the toughest thing I have ever experienced.  I always wondered about the whole widow thing.  It looked very difficult to me.  And, it was, and still is.  It has been the birth of this blog and desire to reach out to people with learning how to Dance at the Crossroads.

Crossroads – Those places in the middle of the road, with signs pointing everywhere.  Which way should I go, will I make a bad decision, why is this happening? What does God want?  What Lord what?  When Lord when?  Where Lord Where?  Joyce Meyer wrote that in one of her devotionals.  I will never forget that.

I hope you learn from my journey.  Sometimes God has to be the only one that writes on your page, and other times he uses all these wonderful authors who want to save you some time, and also, they want you to know “You are not the only one experiencing this!”

MARCH 9, 2020 INTRODUCTION - FINISH

Introduction Part Two

In my lifetime I have written two self-published books.  The first one was way back in the early 1980’s.  “Shedding the Cocoon of Fretting, Fussing, Stewing and Steering.”  My logo is a butterfly and a friend back then suggested that I was helping people shed their cocoons. . .of emotional distress, emotional abuse, marriage issues, communication deficits, you name it.  I also helped them to stop fretting about

everything, fussing over everything, and trying to control everything by steering at all times.  (Or, controlling everything and everyone)

The second book I wrote was a few years back. I wanted everyone to understand that unforgiveness is a real culprit to breaking apart your emotional walls and rushing in bitterness, anger, and separation.  That separation comes not only in your daily relationships but with your Holy Father God.  “Fix Your Future So It Does NOT Reflect your Past!”

Embracing Emotional Forgiveness.  You see, even though God says to forgive, and diligent Christians do like to say, “Well, I did forgive him, after all, God’s Word says to forgive.” Okay, so then why do you clinch your teeth whenever you see that person, or roll your eyes?  Do you think for one-minute God can’t see you do that?  We can forgive on a clinical side, from our head.  But have you emotionally forgiven that person?  I have used that in my Counseling practice for 25 years.  It is a counseling tool that has saved many relationships that were going down a rabbit hole and never coming back out.

There are many life situations that take us down a rabbit hole and because I have had to learn the hard way many times, my main objective here is to equip you with some possible ideas, and options that will help you practice, practice, practice learning how to get unstuck and get your joy back. . .thus the title!

DANCING AT THE CROSSROADS! WHAT IN THE WORLD DOES THAT LOOK LIKE?

INTRODUCTION PART # 3

      What that looks like for me, is equipping you to process those life surprises much quicker.  I want you to understand/analyze  just what is going on and how did you get drawn down into that rabbit hole.

How to check all that out with God, and then ask Him for truth about what is going on here.  To trust Him by being driven to pray harder, to leave it at the cross, to let it go, and as the Bible says; wait expectantly for His timing.  It is hard, I admit, but I can attest to learning through His word that He does get (us) you through this “life situation you are going through”.  Turning around one day and saying, Wow.  He showed up.  What a Praise, what a blessing.  Psalm 25: 4,5, and 6

Now to be clear, you can have people close to you who make a choice that impacts your life for the positive.  Dancing at the crossroads can be exciting and pleasant.  Perhaps they bring you flowers, cards, kidnap you and put you on a helicopter ride, all kinds of neat bouquets from God.  The Crossroads I am talking about is when we experience those choices in life that throw (us)you under the bus, come out of nowhere, things you didn’t see coming.  They keep you up at night, you can’t eat, you eat too much, you put the car keys in the refrigerator and the milk out on the counter.  You can’t think straight or react with maturity.  It is blank up there in that head of yours.

Here are some examples:

      *     Your teenage daughter/granddaughter gets pregnant

      *     Your son/grandson declares he is gay or wants to be a girl

      *     You are suddenly a widow or a 2 to 10 year care giver

*     Your child dies of an overdose

      *     Your parents die in a car accident together

      *     Your blended family isn’t so blended

      *     Your dream of opening a business – fails

      *     Your husband loses his important job

*     Your wife/husband tells you she/he doesn’t want to be married anymore.

*     Your son-in-law takes your daughter to court for custody.

*     Your child is raped and killed

*     Your friend betrays you and gossips about you

*     Your husband wants a divorce and gender change

*     Your live in – for 20 years, leaves and marries his girlfriend/or boyfriend. of 2 months.

*     You are diagnosed with breast cancer

*     Your husband has stage 4 colon cancer

      Do I need to go on, probably, there are all kinds of lists that you could write for me, I haven’t even gotten started here

I have been through all kinds of things I didn’t even list.   Naturally, in 38 years of counseling, I have been through another couple pages of situations that my clients were experiencing.  The worst one, was a gentleman who was married to a woman that he felt was losing her mind.  He had just found out she had not told him everything about her past.   That she had actually been married to seven other men.

One of which was a husband who was homosexual and his significant secret partner came looking to kill her.

SEE MY TESTIMONY NEXT:

MARCH 2, 2020. INTRODUCTION TO WHO FAITH2VOICE REALLY IS!

Faith 2 comes from several different crossroads.  In 1980 when I was forming the whole "I am going to actually be a licensed by the state therapist in Christian Counseling, I had two friends who gave me these ideas.  Rosemary Gerig, my prayer partner at Auburn Missionary thought I should use the butterfly as my logo.  Why?  Because the butterfly or catalyst must squeeze through a very difficult opening in order to strengthen its wings and fly away.  She felt that was what I was doing when I helped people shed their cocoons of stuck places.  I felt it was brilliant.  John always drew all my butterfly logos until this year.  Elaine Larnard, the pastors wife, and worship leader felt I should name my business Faith Enterprises & Counseling Agency.  That I should put Faith 2 on my license plate, indicating that I have the middle name Faith, that my business is named Faith too!, (Pun) Two. So when people see me out and about that they would ask about that license plate and I could witness my Faith and my business as well.  If you knew how many artifacts I have owned in 38 years with the name Faith on it, from key rings, to Cross artifacts, clothing,  and everything in between that you can imagine;  you would be amazed.  When I began writing a blog, it just flowed for me.  Faith2Voice.  This is my voice, my platform.  I want to help people shed their cocoons, their stuck places.

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Part 1

My name is Shirley Faith Souder, and I have over seven decades of life experience to share with you.  As you read in my mission statement, it is all about -   The Three C’s.    Conviction+Commitment= Change!

My Pollyanna role, is that, I can’t stand being emotionally stuck on a life problem.  Nor can I sit in a mud puddle of some life crisis where I can’t seem to get up and brush myself off.  I can’t seem to get out of this Satanic Stupor and move forward.  Not sure when or where this happened in my life, but I get real, almost irreversibly messed up, when someone in my life is in a position to alter my life with their choices.  They impact me with their bad choices and create drama that I did not give them permission to do.  I have learned a whole life time worth of tools about equipping and learning how to manage those things.  It has been quite a challenge.  That is why I am challenged, am excited, am driven to direct and share what I know about Dancing at the Crossroads.  I direct you to read My logo tag line. It reads “Equipping You to Manage the Crossroads of life.”

Crossroads come when you hear yourself say, or stomp your foot at God, or find yourself flying all around the room. . .”Jesus, We need a sit down, now!”  “I can’t stand this!”  “Enough is Enough!”  And, my personal favorite. . .”Why, are you doing this to me?”  “Do you hate me?” “What have I done?”  I must have done some really bad stuff.”

    

If you haven’t been quite that honest with God, and you are thinking, oh my, that would be too much like being a real pushy brat, you may be right?  However, I believe my God hears my bratiness and still loves me.  He held me and you in His hand and created are very being. And, He does hear us, His Word is clear on that.  He loves it when we are specific, He wants us to be honest and specific in our requests.  Phil. 4: 6 is very clear on that perspective.  Let our requests be made known with thanksgiving.  This is a time, right now, that you need to make a choice.  Do I want Conviction, Commitment and Change?  Do I want to dance at the crossroads, or do I want to bury my head.  Numb out, take the road less traveled.  “Oh Ill just wait and see how things go, maybe it will just go away, or I won’t have to do anything major.  It is too painful anyway.”  If you don’t want to dance at the crossroads of life, then you won’t be interested in my dissertation/book.  You can go back to just skating on thin ice, and feeling numb.  It is your free will choice and I am okay with that.  We all learn how to protect ourselves and talk about what we want, but never do anything about it at times.  I had to quit doing that.  I couldn’t stand the pain.  It was more painful to stay stuck then to find God’s answers for pulling me out of the pit I kept falling into.

(Stay Tuned)