The Narrow Way

Therapy is teaching me how to breathe again.

How to come up for air after years of holding it in.

It’s teaching me how to sit with the silence without fearing it.

How to walk through memories without crumbling.

And most surprising of all, it’s teaching me how to dare to find joy again.

Because for a long time, I believed joy was something other people had the right to.

People who hadn’t lived through betrayal.

People who hadn’t lost their voice.

People whose names hadn’t been dragged through conversations behind closed doors.

I thought joy was something I had to wait for.

That maybe once I was fully healed, fully whole, fully “past it”… then maybe joy would be allowed back in.

But Jesus is showing me something different.

Something radical.

Something holy.

He’s showing me that joy is not a reward for the healed, it’s a companion in the healing.

It’s not something I have to earn.

It’s not something I have to prove I’m ready for.

It’s something He’s offering me now, in the middle of the mess, in the middle of therapy sessions that leave me exhausted, in the middle of prayers where I say, “God, I still don’t understand why.”

And still… joy comes.

Quietly.

Gently.

Like a whisper.

Like a sunrise cracking through a dark room.

Because joy is not the absence of pain, it’s the presence of God.

And He’s always been here.

Therapy is helping me see the moments I used to overlook.

The sacredness of laughter that bubbles up for no reason.

The stillness of a walk outside.

The beauty of doing something just because it makes my soul exhale.

I’m daring to enjoy life again without guilt.

Without shame.

Without waiting for someone to say it’s okay.

Because Jesus already said it. “I came that you may have life—and have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10)

Not just a surviving life.

Not just a functional life.

But a joyful one.

A life with music again.

A life with dancing again.

A life with spark and softness and wonder again.

I am daring to find joy in the places the enemy tried to steal from.

I am learning that it’s not selfish to smile.

It’s not betrayal to feel light.

It’s not fake to laugh while still healing.

It’s freedom.

And it’s holy.

Joy is resistance. It’s rebellion against the darkness.

It’s worship.

It’s warfare.

And the kind of joy I’m reaching for now?

It runs deeper than circumstance.

It’s rooted in Jesus.

It’s rising from the ashes of everything I thought I lost… and blooming into something beautiful.

So no, I’m not waiting for perfect days anymore.

I’m not waiting for apologies or timelines or the final “all clear” before I let joy return.

I’m choosing it now.

In pieces.

In faith.

In defiance of everything that tried to bury me.

I’m not there yet.

I’m still healing.

I still cry.

I still remember.

But I also laugh.

I also breathe.

I also dance a little again.

And that, my friends, is a miracle all on its own.