Life: The Struggle is Real

The other day I was doing some researching for taglines that people from all walks of life “get”. I am learning how to use Twitter a lot more (because I need to be addicted to another social media platform) and I love hashtags that I can relate to. They make me laugh because they speak to a group of people who have know exactly what they are talking about. Like #GrowingUpHispanic, which had me dying laughing. Some of those things are so true and I don’t know if it’s because I grew up Hispanic or if everyone goes through those things, but seeing people post experiences that I’ve had in my life brings this sense of connection to other human beings.

That is what we love about our families even if we fight a lot. They know what we have been through and can related to things that we say in a way that other people can’t because they didn’t live through the same life.This is the reason  I shared so many of my struggles.

Of all the hashtags, the one that everyone gets no matter where they come from is #TheStruggleIsReal. Because The Struggle is a part of the human condition. We all have a struggle. Some people might think that not having WiFi is a struggle while other people are trying to figure out what they are going to eat today, but either way, the struggle of both is just as real even if they are not equal in importance.

I was having a horrible morning and was on the floor looking for a book that I can’t find and crying about my struggle today and I came upon a book about St. Therese. It’s called “Mornings with Saint Therese” published by Sophia Press. The very first devotional read:

“The Faith and confidence of yours which never wavers will one day have their reward-a glorious one. Be quite sure that God will bless you and that the depths of your sufferings will be matched by the consolation reserved for you. For won’t you be well recompensed if God, well pleased with you, give you that great saint which, for His Glory, you have desired so greatly?” 

Struggle is the way that our culture talks about suffering. I really needed to read this today when it feels as if my suffering/struggle is for nothing. When I feel like God had forgotten that I’m even struggling or when I feel like I deserve everything that is coming to be for being such an ungrateful brat most of my life. My struggle right now is trying to figure out how to be merciful and not allow myself to be hurt either at the same time. That is difficult. It’s easy to cut people out or to allow them to continue to hurt you but it is hard to have mercy on them and at the same time not allow them to keep doing hurtful things to you.

It’s hard to love the sinner and hate the sin. It’s practically impossible really, because we are human beings and we either excuse the sin or hate the sinner, even when we have convinced ourselves into thinking that we aren’t doing that.

There are a lot of struggles that we go through on the daily and it’s easy to think that nobody else is going through what we are going through and maybe they aren’t, but we all know that the struggle is real. It’s very real. Sometimes it just sucks and we have to wait until the suck passes. But no matter what, God is faithful. He is there and He will never let us go. We have to remember that and persevere.