Bitter Party

From a pity party to a bitter party...

I don't know what is eating at me, but I am so grumpy.  I'm really irritable.  Little things are annoying me so much.  I have this knot in my chest and feel overwhelmed by this anger, and I don't even know where it's coming from.

Nothing has changed in the major situation I have been in for the last several months.  No one has done anything different.  No more moves have been made.  No more words have been said.

Yet for the past two weeks I have just been all around angry.  Angry at the world again.  Am I stuck on the Angry-Go-Round?  I don't even know what I'm angry about. I'm just so....ARGH!

Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. --Ephesians 4:31

I am trying, Lord, but I don't even know where it's coming from.  Please just cleanse me of this desire to hate everything and everyone.  Please relax my body, my mind, and my heart.  Loosen my clenched jaw and release my furrowed brow.  Help me to take deep breaths and feel good.  Fill me with your love and let it pour out of me.  Make it fill me so much that there is no room for anger, resentment, irritability.  During this time, help me to keep my mouth shut.  Let nothing flow from me but your love. Let no one see how dark I am inside right now.

I have come so far in the last five months and I feel it all slipping away because of the last few weeks where I have just felt so negative.  I can't let that happen. I won't.

Positivity

I've already quoted this scripture and written on it in the last couple of weeks, but I had a morning full of resentment and decided I needed to remind myself.

"Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies." --Philippians 4:8-9 (The Message)

Today I looked up another version of the scripture.  The Message tends to put things in the most easily understood way.  I find that if I read several versions of one scripture, I "get it" better.

Without focusing on the negative too much, this morning, someone could have done something for me very easily instead of making me do it.  But it was not done, and I felt pretty annoyed.  I wanted to say something to this person.  I wanted to nag them for sitting around and not helping me out.  But I bit my tongue.  Nagging won't help.

I prayed to God asking for words to use to ask for help effectively.  I kid you not, in mid sentence of this prayer, God gave me this scripture.  It popped right into my head: "Things to praise, not things to curse."  I made a mental list of the things that this person did do this morning that were honorable.

I'm not going to lie and say that this cleared my heart of bitterness.  I wish it did. But it cleared my mind and reminded me that there isn't all bad in this person.

It was also put on my heart to email them and apologize for being cold due to the resentment.  I didn't talk much this morning because I felt so negative.  I didn't want to let the animosity leave my head via my mouth.  But in doing that, I also became terse and standoffish.  I wasn't very pleasant this morning although I wasn't nearly as bad as I used to get.

I'm a work in progress....