This morning I sit here and contemplate,  is a physical sickness worse or mental illness and battlefield of the mind?
Either way,  they are both bad, any sickness is bad, and will bring you to your knees. When your physical is brought low often your emotions and mental psyche are brought low, but often when your battle is the mind or mental illness the physical doesn’t matter because the mind will often over rule any and all other systems. The heart is stronger but one must realize it is and find that truth in their mind. They must want that truth.

I sit here knowing that both the physical body and the mind are so vital to living, to life and how everything we do kinda revolve around the other.

When one or both are in jeopardy we suffer, we cry, we get frustruated.  We are in the fire and we wonder if we are made out of enough ‘Stuff’ to endure that fire.
I often think of the story of the silversmith- The Refiner’s fire :

As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities. The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot; then she thought again about the verse that says: ‘He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.’ (Malachi 3:3) She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined. The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire. If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed. The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, ‘How do you know when the silver is fully refined?’ He smiled at her and answered, ‘Oh, that’s easy — when I see my image in it.’    ( Author Unknown)

That story doesn’t answer why little children get sick, why people hurt, why people are depressed or suicidal or angry at the world. I realize that, however God wants us to allow him to refine us, he wants us to find the heart truth,  he wants us to hold on to him as he carries us and though we only see one set of foot prints in the sand, he is carrying us and we have to hold on tight.

You are made of enough stuff to withstand the heat, the fire and the pain. You feel like you are not strong enough but you are-  dig deep, take care of your immediate physical being – get sleep, eat and take a minute or more to pray to lean,  to hope, because in the end,  HE, our Father is and always will be the answer of hope, the steadfast refuge and strong tower to lean upon, to hold on to. This life, this journey is but a vapor and gone, the bigger vast infinitude is the here after and the hereafter or  this life after- is and will be amazing.
Paul says  ” I live for that prize”.
Hang on, hold on, remember he is carrying you right now. ~Abba