I was listening to Pastor Johnny Chang recently, and he spoke on something that hit me deeply: heart posture and the transformative power of gratitude.
If you’ve read my previous posts, you know how often I wrestle with my mental health—how frustrating it can be, how much I’ve wished I were built differently, and how exhausting it is to carry the weight of a complex mind. For a long time, I viewed my mental health struggles and my dark childhood as heavy stains I had to hide or fix.
But I am learning a new truth: I don't have to be ashamed of the dark chapters of my story.
Our darkest seasons teach us things that comfort never could. If I hadn't grown up navigating a toxic, painful environment, I wouldn't hold the true, aching gratitude I feel today for the loving family and supportive community surrounding me. Pain stretches our capacity for appreciation.
This shift in posture has changed how I read the early chapters of Genesis. Society so quickly points fingers at Eve for eating the fruit or listening to the serpent—as if she should have known better. But Eve and Adam lived in a perfect world completely free from lies, manipulation, or hidden motives. They started out in pure innocence.
We all enter this life in that same innocent state. We don't choose the families we are born into or the brokenness we inherit. I don't pretend to understand why terrible things happen to innocent people, but I do know this: this fallen world is not God’s ultimate design.
Yet, even in a broken world, I firmly hold onto the promise that all things work together for the greater good(Romans 8:28). While staying at a hostel in New Orleans, talking with people from wildly different backgrounds and faiths, that single thread remained constant: in the end, things have a way of working out for good.
As someone who spent years trying to control every outcome to stay safe, admitting that I don't know everything used to terrify me. But maybe that's the whole point.
If we had all the answers, possessed perfect wisdom, and could fix our own minds, we wouldn't need God. Maybe the hard, unexplainable seasons exist to gently push us to question our own self-sufficiency. The moment we start relying solely on our own intellect and strength, we fall into a cycle of anxiety, trying to micromanage a world we were never meant to carry. True peace isn't found in having total control; it's found in trusting the One who holds it all.
At His core, God is love. And one of the greatest gifts of being human is the endless cycle of receiving that unconditional love and pouring it right back out onto others.
So much of my current life feels up in the air right now—from wedding planning and career transitions to ongoing mental health journeys. But my prayer is that my faith stops being a knee-jerk reaction to my daily emotions or fluctuating circumstances.
I want a faith that runs deeper than my feelings—an anchor rooted in gratitude, shaped by my past, and held by a God whose love cannot be shaken by anything this world throws at me.