Depression wears many faces. For some, it’s a funeral shroud. Their life ends with it. They can’t move or speak. They are completely consumed, eaten away, defeated by a silent foe. Some people wear depression as a cape. They revel in it, allowing it to become the headliner of their life. Depression is the star and she takes all the credit. Every sentence spoken, every mood felt, and every event experienced begins and ends with depression.
Mine is an ocean. Some days it’s calm and I can tread water. My mind is at ease and I think this is a good day, a good life. Some days the waters are rough and I am tossed to and fro. I am barraged by the waves of doubt, disappointment, insecurity and it is all that I can do to stay afloat. Then other days I sink to the bottom of that ocean. And as I lie at its bottom, I find myself wishing that I could be swept away just as easily as sand is swept from the shore. I begin to drown in my emotions and as the waters rush in and fill me completely, the tears begin to pour out. And I wish, oh how I wish, that I didn’t have to be here.
And just as my eyes drift closed and I feel myself beginning to drift away…
I find myself coughed up onto the shore, purged from the water’s depths; the survivor of a shipwreck, blessed with another chance. The hope is hollow and life is barely there; however, as I crawl to my feet and look just beyond me there is a lighthouse.
The lighthouse is a promise of warmth, security, rest and peace. I imagine a lighthouse keeper who will be loving and kind who will greet me with open arms if I just push myself to go farther. Slowly, one foot in front of the other I make my way towards the lighthouse. Stumbling, I push my way forward. I fall and as my knees hit the sand, I know that I can’t push myself any longer, and the tears, they return. As I begin to give up hope, I perceive the gentlest of footsteps and a hand enters my line of vision. Could it really be my lighthouse keeper?
A still, small voice says to me “You can make it. You’re almost there.”
But that hollow hope has left me, that spark of life has flickered out, “I can’t. I’m not strong enough.”
“You can because I’m going to carry you. You need only take my hand.”
Slowly, my hand finds his and I have found security, rest and peace.
My lighthouse keeper, my God, whose strength reaches for me even when I don’t have the strength to reach for Him.
At that moment, I’m home.
I may slip into the ocean again, but like some feat of magic, its waters can never keep me, and my lighthouse and its keeper never waver.
