I am thrilled to have my amazing sister, Susan Gygax, write this week for us!!! Thank you so much Sue for sharing your heart with us.

“Your feelings are your feelings, they aren’t right or wrong.
What you DO with your feelings can be right or wrong.” 

Growing up, our mother told us this and I repeated it for years to family, friends and my children. My mother was a one-of-a-kind human. She was fierce, loyal and loving. She struggled, as we all do, with feeling like a failure at times. She was dedicated to her family and loved ones. She is the person with whom I’d like to have dinner…again. She is my role model for so many of life’s situations that I’ve faced since her departure from this world.

It was from this vantage point that I held this saying as an unshakeable truth. Only recently did I realize feelings aren’t always feelings.

During a quiet moment in prayer, I asked a simple question of Father God. “What are You thinking about?”  I scribbled the answer in my journal. Prayers like this have peppered my conversations lately. The answers are sweet and often surprising. It’s in one of these moments that this truth I held dear was challenged.

We already know that feelings are part of our human existence. We try to capitalize on positive feelings. Spending time and energy figuring out how to make a good feeling last or happen more often. And, we attempt to manage negative feelings or worse  – ignore them. 

In this moment, I realized at least in part, I was mistaken. 

You see, I’ve defined anxiety as a feeling. Anxiety isn’t a feeling, it’s a belief system that disguises itself as a feeling. Instead of dealing with it for what it was, I tried to manage it.

Feelings are very difficult to control so managing them is time consuming and exhausting. With this nugget whispered in my spirit, I sought for more clarity.

It was clear that anxiety isn’t a feeling, but it is a thief and a liar. It steals my joy and lies about my future.

If anxiety is a belief that something negative can or will happen, there’s a simple (though maybe not easy) way to deal with it. I’m reminded of:

1 Peter 5:7: Cast all your anxiety on him because He cares for us. 

Casting means to throw upon. And, the meaning behind care is distraction. The picture Peter is painting is that we can literally throw distractions onto Jesus.

As I continued to ponder this truth, the scripture isn’t asking us to ignore or pretend that a situation or relationship is difficult or uncomfortable. If we give over our burdens and anxiety to the loving hands and strong arms of Jesus, in exchange we can experience a life that isn’t weighed down by a false belief. 

I know that my beliefs impact my expectations and expectations impact my actions (or inaction!) and finally, actions impact my outcomes.

Said differently, every belief will bear fruit in our lives, for better or worse. The fruit of anxiety is both a physical and mental strain. But, I have a choice. I can choose to believe the words of Jesus and take hold of a new belief system. One that prioritizes His promises over what I can see, taste, touch, hear or smell.

Following this lightbulb moment, I started carrying around little notecards, I call them my truth cards. They are scriptures that I speak out loud during the course of the day. I’m not trying to pretend that situations or people aren’t a distraction, but I am on a mission to retrain my brain.

Faith comes by hearing after all. 

In Romans 10:17 Paul tells us: “So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing the word of God.” The Kingdom principle of walking by faith requires us to take an active role in building our faith through hearing the Word of God. 

Once I realized that I had mis-labeled my anxiety, I was able to take an active role in changing my perspective.  

When those feelings of anxiety creep up in our minds and weigh on our souls. We can feel stuck, a victim of our feelings. But, we can choose to speak the truth of Scripture because it is an anchor for our souls. The Truth is powerful enough to break strongholds and create a new belief.

What a powerful truth to remember as we walk through our day!
Have an amazing day!
All Our Love ~
Jodi and Sue xo

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A little about Sue:
Susan is a daughter, sister, wife, mom, auntie, cousin, friend and business owner.
Professionally, Susan is a recruiting leader with over 25 years of experience recruiting and
building large, dispersed talent acquisition teams at fast-paced entrepreneurial and multi-billion dollar companies.

Susan founded Spectacle Talent Partners to live out her calling to create a business that serves others and has positive impact in talent acquisition.

Today she splits her time between building a successful business and spending quality time with her favorite people (too many to name!).

A native of New England, she resides in Maryland with her husband, their rescue pup, Asher, their two young adult children who are currently pursuing their dreams and making both of them very proud. She likes cooking and baking almost as much as eating out. www.spectacletalentpartners.com