Winter Months Only Last for a While...

   Spring is full of life and hope, summer is full of contentment and peace, fall is full of beauty and closure, but winter reminds us of our human existence.

   I had a difficult day last week. I had decided that I needed to cut back in some areas of my life. One of those was work; I can’t help but feel guilty about it, and more than that just a deep sadness.

I don’t want to give up working with the little girl I work with. I love her; she teaches me about peace and joy, but my body is wearing down and I can’t physically keep up any longer.


I have feelings of failure and brokenness, and have found myself scrambling for peace.

There have been moments I was worried about working in my field because it is simply just hard; hard to leave clients, to see them struggle, to see some pass away. I was worried I wasn`t strong enough, and that too many tears would be shed, but maybe they don`t need strength. Maybe they need those tears to be shed for them.
I had felt dumb for crying most of the day, but then I remembered reading in a book by Philip Yancey about his wife’s work. She worked with vulnerable people as well, and he said she came home crying almost every night. He describes sitting with her during those nights and doing what he calls “eating her tears”; in other words sitting and feeling the pain with her. She would often have similar feelings to me about guilt and feeling stupid for crying over her clients, but Yancey said “Someone has to cry for them.”

I will take your words of advice as well Yancey.