God told me to! How crazy does that sound? 2005 was the worst year of my life. Lots of heartache and loss and as I was trying to recover and heal, I started praying for healing. Well, what happened was that God didn't just heal the losses and pain I encounted that year, he went back and healed every wound I had ever experienced. I had always walked around feeling as though I had huge holes in my heart that were constantly oozing blood. I would try to patch up one and another hole would spring a leak. I was unable to be filled because of these wounds/holes in my heart.
This healing occurred over the course of the summer of '06. God started showing me a path to leading a truly healthy life. I had made efforts in the past at trying to be healthy, but they were my efforts and I asked for no divine intervention. But God placed on my heart a series of verses that became my life verses - Prov. 3:5-6 and Rom. 12:1-2. That summer I was drinking too much wine. I had always enjoyed wine, but I had started relying on a couple of glasses every evening when I came in from work to destress. Sometimes it was 1/2 a bottle. Sometimes it was an entire bottle. The most important thing that it was usually 6 or 7 days a week that I was drinking. It was becoming a problem. Also, I was and had been for many years, taking anti-depressants, ADHD medication and meds at night to sleep. And let me say that I truly expected to be on antidepressants for the rest of my life. I couldn't imagine living without them!
As I prayed for healing and for God to show me how to lead a truly healthy life, I started to realize that with God's power, I could overcome my undisciplined, unhealthy lifestyle and as scary as it was, I could stop taking medication. God revealed to me through my prayer and meditation and reading of His word that I needed to stop living in the world and as the world lives and let God guide me to a path of health and healing. He revealed to me several things: I needed to get outside as much as possible and move my body - I need sunshine and nature; I need to exercise hard - releasing all those feel good chemicals is necessary for my peace of mind; I needed to change my diet to a vegetarian diet and eat food as close to the way God made it as possible so as to set myself apart and to stop using food to medicate my moods; I needed to stop drinking; I needed to spend time in God's word daily; I needed to fellowship with other believers by going back to church; my depression was more of a spiritual emptiness caused by my disobedient lifestyle and my distance from God and that once I started getting closer, I would have no need for the medication. God healed me! All I wanted was to make it through the heartache but he took my heart and totally healed it of all its wounds! God is good and he lit my path.
That's why I live the way I do - and I have always understood that my path is by no means the path for everyone. Everyone must make their own way, but God will lead you on your journey if you pay attention!
