Post Depression Life: Feeling Good Will Make Life So Easy... NOT!

There was this myth that rolled around in my formerly depression-riddled mind.  It went something like this... once I am no longer depressed, am healthy, and feel good again, everything will be easy.  In some ways this is very true.  Days come and go without much a of a fuss relatively.  They are a million times more pleasant, and I do mean a million times.

However, it turns out that feeling pain is not the only thing thing that makes life hard.  There is something else that makes life hard that I did not see coming.  It is that feeling awesome can make life hard!  

What, Nicholas?  How is this possible?  Feeling good is always good! 

Is it?  Because, if so, then we need to be making drugs legal and get on that ASAP.

Nicholas, you have to understand that, yes, that feels good NOW, but will destroy you later!

(Funny how smart you sound whenever you are having a conversation with yourself via print.  You always win.)

Exactly!  And this principle applies to everyone.  A person's desire to have sex outside of marriage will collide with their desire to not get someone or themselves pregnant, or get an STD, or hurt someone else's feelings, or sin.  A person's desire to be a good friend will collide with their desire to be first, be right, get the last piece of cake, be lazy, not go the extra mile, be entitled.  A person's desire to eat the whole cake collides with the desire to not get diabetes, fat, a sugar rush followed by a massive crash ending with them drooling on their keyboard at work.  A person's yearning for truth will collide with other people's same desire.  

In the end, desire is not a singular track.  It is not do I do what I want or not do what I want, but what do I want the most?  Our desires are not only conflicting with what we hate, but with our OTHER DESIRES.  That conflict of desire has been one of the biggest surprises of being healthy again.  I had forgotten how many times I wished I didn't feel a certain good feeling because it took me away from another desire.  I forgot what it felt like to have those many desires all tugging on you and you want them all at once, and you have to choose which one you want most.  I want to be a good friend and serve others.  I also want to do whatever I want whenever I want.  I want to eat all of the sugar and meat on planet Earth.  I also want to be in shape, not have colon cancer, and keep my teeth.  I want to be obedient to God and remain sexually pure, yet I also don't.  I want to serve God above all else, and yet I want to serve my self above all else.  Everyone struggled with this, no matter who you are. 

Moral being, prepare yourself for the fact that having desires again, while completely wonderful, and being the way it should be, and being a million times better than being in depression, isn't the end of your struggles.  It is just a different battle altogether.  

ROMANS 7:15

15 For I do not understand my own actions.  For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 

This verse is Paul, toward the end of his life, talking about his struggle with this concept.  Paul, one of the greatest men who ever lived, still struggled to with the conflicting desires in his heart.  At least we can take comfort in knowing we are in good company.