Confession. I have an issue with tucking away my feelings and never going back to them. When something happens to me I typically think to myself “Kyla, you’re fine. Things could be worse. Other people are hurting more than you”, and then I brush off whatever has happened and let it go. It’s not healthy, I know. But I didn’t realize that until coming on the Race when my leader talked to me about it. She told me I need to have the same amount of empathy and compassion because if I have more than the other then it won’t even out.
Let me explain, if I have too much empathy towards myself then I become a victim and I just complain about how awful my life is (which it isn’t, this is just an example) and then I would only think about myself and not have compassion for others. But, if I have too much compassion I won’t know how to help others from a place of authenticity because I’ve never let God lead me through my own issues. So if I can’t get myself through hard times then how am I supposed to let God use me to help others? If I have an even amount of empathy and compassion then I’ll be able to show compassion for others in a better way.
There’s a verse in the beginning of 2 Corinthians that says, “the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” Okay, so for me this verse is teaching me that I need to go to God with my troubles and He will lead me through them with comfort. I’ll learn how to comfort others because He showed me comfort through hard times. So when others need comfort I’ll be able to show them better compassion because He has showed me how. Before that happens though, I need to work on myself and not push away my feelings. Instead, I need to bring them to God so He can help me work through them.
This is all really exciting for me because God’s going to use me in big ways for other people. Lucie told me that this is a spiritual gift of mine and I’m excited for God to use me in this way.
