How To Overcome Emotional Pain -

I felt my heart caving inside of my chest and my breathing became shallow- almost still. I felt as if I was drowning in emotional pain. The pain became so unbearable, that I thought I was dying. What was happening to me? That is what I asked God. How did I get here? and why do I feel like giving up on myself? God answered all of these questions for me as I sat looking at scripture verses that seemed to be drowned out by the noise of despair.

Emotional Pain is the trigger but not the end

When my best friend died and returned to God last year, I was devastated! I felt so much grief, shame, and anger. I did not understand how true love, like what I experienced with my friend could be taken away from me. It was in a blink of an eye that she vanished from my life.

I thought about listening to old voice messages, just to hear her voice again. She used to say, ” best friend, why aren’t you picking up your phone! I love YOUUUU! Call me BAAACK!!!” The memories were sweet but they were also triggers to experiencing excruciating emotional pain.

Last birthday celebration together

Her death reminded me that I could no longer experience life with her. I felt all alone, disappointed, and hopeless. But I realized in the stillness with God, that these emotions were the beginning highlights of how God was healing me. He was pulling out poisonous roots and He told me that feeling emotional pain was necessary to transitioning to wholeness.

God needs to pull out the dead root system, the parts of you that are poisonous ( deadly) so that nutrients can flow, and the garden of your heart will be healthy again. The root system are lies that you believed in, bitterness, mother wounds, trauma wounds, and hopelessness about not experiencing your hopes and dreams.

God has to pull out those roots and remove dead plants that are getting tangled up and weaving inside of you, causing chaos, and leaving a wake of upheaval in your soul. This is the beginning of God gardening your soul back to a healed and whole state of being.

You must feel emotional pain to heal

I had a dream of someone driving my car. I was in the passenger seat. The driver drove into a lake and I immediately cried out, “pull your windows down.” I remember the car sinking as I desperately tried finding the button to open the windows. I managed to open it, and I climbed out as the water came rushing in, completely submerging the car. When I got on dry land, I noticed three passengers– one of them was my late friend.

Now looking back at the dream, I realized I experienced this dream symbolically in real life. The water filling in on me was my emotional pain and I was crying out for God to save me from despair. I didn’t want to die, I wanted the feeling of disappointment to die.

I did not want to feel the pain and I was trying to drown it out with getting busy with life. I tried to stuff the emotions further down into the ground of my heart. But you can only bury pain for so long before it spreads and destroys other plants in the garden of your heart.

When emotional pain rises within you, do not stop the process. Some pieces of the dead roots of you will need to be shoveled out and some nearby plants will need to be cut down to prepare the soil for new planting.

Learn to let go to be set free

I was able to finally let go of the negative emotions. I identified with the emotional pain so much that I did not recognize how deadly it was to keep it lodged in my soul. I told the Lord that I was done with trying to make things happen on my own terms. Once I released my desire to control the pain, I was able to experience freedom.

Proverbs 13:12 reads, Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. Putting my hope in myself and how things were not happening fast enough, made my heart weaker and weaker. I had so many unfulfilled hopes and dreams that disappointment began choking up the soil for hope to grow.

You need to release your emotions to God. He is the one that can steward your heart well if you let him.

Allow God’s love to rule your heart

Your desires become God’s desires. Your heart will match the rhythm of God’s heart as you become one with God in thought, will, and emotions.

God is the gardener that wants to heal your heart. He does it by watering your soul with love. As love waters your soul, and hope is firmly planted inside of you, a beautiful tree will emerge from the ground. The longing that you feel ( or hopelessness) is really your desire to be loved.

Your desires become God’s desires. Your heart will match the rhythm of God’s heart as you become one with God in thought, will, and emotions.

God desires for you to allow him into your garden so that he can prune you, cut down unhealthy root systems, and firmly plant you on good soil. God wants you to grow into the maturity of love and to become like a well-watered garden.

The Lord will guide you always;
    he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
    and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
    like a spring whose waters never fail.
Isaiah 58:11

Healing is a process so go at your own pace

Healing is in stages and is similar to gardening. God has to prepare the soil by breaking up the ground and uprooting unhealthy roots. Once the soil is ready, he plants seeds into the ground and removes roots as needed. He then begins the pruning process which can be a painful experience but if you stick with it, God will begin to refresh the soil with water ( His love).

Take all the time needed to allow God to heal your heart. You deserve to be loved and nurtured. God will do that for you and more.

Continue your emotional healing journey:

How To Self Care Your Emotions Now: Emotional Boundaries

Emotional Abandonment: When a Mother’s Love Abandons You

Open letter on Emotional Abandonment for Daughters to Heal Now