Stepping stones
Five years ago, almost to the day, I said a prayer that would change my life forever. I was in recovery from PTSD and OCD, sat on the end of my bed and looking at my National Trust calendar towards the infamous Blue Monday, the day that is considered to be the most depressing in the year. Closing my eyes, I made a simple request: “God, please turn what happened to me into something good.” And an idea fell into my head that I knew wasn’t from me.
Around the time of Blue Monday in 2016, I asked people all over the world to take a selfie with a post-it note on their heads, saying simply #itaffectsme, to show the universality of mental health. Over 3.5 million people joined the campaign which, on what could have been the darkest day of the year, shone brightly as a movement of hope. Emblazoning social media with the bravery and courage of all those who named their collective pain.
During the campaign, I met many people who shared their stories, but one in particular imprinted on my heart. A woman, who had lost her son to suicide.
She spoke of feeling far from God, feeling forsaken and distant. But as she was speaking to me, she reflected on moments in her journey through depression and grief where she had experienced flickers of light. Tiny moments of connection that she didn’t recognise as God at the time but looking back she could see that they were stepping mstones that she could grasp onto. Signs of God’s presence with her as refuge and shelter with every step she took.
What made me smile was that the place she began to recognise them was on the top deck of a bus, when sat anonymously amongst a group of people. She saw Christ in those around her. Something in that communal ‘being’ awoke in her a sense of togetherness: togetherness in pain, togetherness in wilderness, togetherness in God and togetherness in hope. Simply by sitting next to a stranger.
The campaign was fuelled by the voices of strangers, joining together with a resounding cry to be heard, seen and known. No longer the subject of taboo but a visible need in society, which has never felt more pressing than over the past two years.
So on this Blue Monday, no matter how you are feeling, please know that you are never alone. That there are flickers of light, stepping-stones to hold onto and that in it all, you and we are held by God who hears our cries, sees our pain and knows our hearts. As Psalm 139 says, “even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day.”