The Secret Place

Somewhere in the mess… you disappeared.

Between the responsibilities, the heartbreak, the expectations, and the silent battles no one sees—you got lost. Not all at once. But slowly. Quietly. Piece by piece.

And now you look in the mirror and barely recognize her.

Here is the truth no one wants to say out loud:
You will not find yourself in the noise.
You will not heal by staying busy.
You will not rise by pretending you’re fine.

You find yourself in the longing.

That ache deep inside that whispers, There has to be more than this.

We were never called to survive at surface level. Survival keeps you functioning—but it does not make you whole. It keeps you moving—but it does not make you free.

Freedom lives in the secret place.

Not a physical place. A sacred one. The place where only you and the Father have walked. The place you avoid because it feels too deep, too raw, too exposed.

But that is where she is.

The happy, carefree, full-of-life, Jesus-got-this kind of girl. She isn’t gone. She’s buried under fear, disappointment, and exhaustion.

Scripture says,

“He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.” — Psalm 91:1

Dwelling requires staying.
Staying requires courage.

It takes courage to sit still long enough to feel what you’ve been outrunning.
Courage to face the darkest parts of your own heart.
Courage to stop surviving and start seeking.

But healing does not happen on the surface.

It happens in the depths—the place where the tears fall freely and the masks come off. The place where you finally whisper the prayers you’ve been afraid to pray.

And there, in that quiet, the Father meets you.

Not with shame.
Not with disappointment.
But with presence.

Until you choose to rise and visit the hidden places of your soul, you will never rise from the ashes of the life you are living.

It is okay to feel.
It is okay to stop.
It is okay to take time for you.
To be quiet.
To be still.
To search.
To seek.
To pray.

Push yourself toward what makes you healthy. Safe. Stable. Whole.

Turn down the noise.
Shut the door.
Go to the secret place.

And stay.

Because when you do, the pieces begin to settle. The lies lose their grip. The chaos grows quiet.

And one day you will look in the mirror again—

And recognize her.

Not the woman who barely survived.
But the one who went into the depths…
and came back alive.

Her Silence

Silence isn’t harsh.

It isn’t cold.
It isn’t punishment.
It isn’t manipulation.

It is exhaustion.
It is grief.
It is quiet defeat after fighting battles no one else saw.

When her voice has been dismissed long enough…
When her emotions have been minimized…
When her needs have gone unmet…

Silence does not arrive loudly.

It creeps in.

Slowly.

She does not wake up one morning deciding to withdraw. She arrives there after trying. After explaining. After crying. After praying. After hoping.

And when nothing shifts… something inside of her does.

Silence becomes protection.

Not because she wants distance — but because she can no longer survive exposure.

Survivor mode is never a place she longs to be.

No woman dreams of becoming guarded. No wife desires to grow quiet. No heart hopes to become cautious with the very person it once felt safest with.

And yet, survivor mode often finds her.

It finds her when she realizes she must fight not just for the marriage — but for herself.

There is a particular kind of desperation in silence. It is the moment she realizes that if she does not guard her heart, she may lose herself entirely in the longing for what used to be.

But here is the sacred turning point:

If she finds the strength and courage not to disappear inside the silence… she will discover something unexpected there.

She will find herself.

Not the version shaped by disappointment.
Not the version shrinking to be understood.
Not the version constantly over-explaining her pain.

But a woman rebuilding.

A woman expecting.

Expecting growth in the quiet.
Expecting clarity in the stillness.
Expecting healing in the hidden places.
Expecting peace that does not depend on another person’s consistency.

There is hope in her silence.

Because silence is not the end — it is the reset.

Psalm 46:10 says,
“Be still, and know that I am God.”

Be still.

Not because the pain isn’t real.
Not because the marriage doesn’t matter.
Not because the hurt disappears.

But because in the stillness, God begins to restore what chaos tried to steal.

In the silence, He reminds her:

She is not invisible.
She is not irrational.
She is not too much.
She is not alone.

He meets her there — not in the shouting, not in the proving, not in the defending — but in the quiet surrender.

And slowly, what once felt like defeat becomes rebuilding.

She finds peace in the silence.
Growth in the silence.
Joy in the silence.
Hope in the silence.
Laughter in the silence.
A new breath of life in the silence.

The silence that once felt like loss becomes the place she rediscovers her strength.

And when she rises again, she will not rise hardened.

She will rise healed.

And that kind of woman?
She no longer fights to be heard.

She walks in peace — knowing the One who sees her never stopped listening.

The Dirty Window

Oftentimes I sit at the large kitchen island, directly across from a dirty window.

I sit there with great intention — determined to put my thoughts on paper. But more often than not, I find myself just staring… gazing for what feels like an eternity through that dirty window.

And as I sit here again, staring through the smudged glass, I begin to wonder why I have never mustered up enough motivation to clean it.

In an awkward, almost confusing way, I have come to realize something:

I find comfort in the dirty window.

As strange as that sounds, I’ve caught myself rationalizing it more than once. The dirty window has become a quiet form of consistency. And if I am honest, consistency is something my heart longs for more often than I would like to admit.

The window is imperfect — yet unchanging.
The beautiful view beyond it is clouded by spatter and streaks.
The mess blurs what could otherwise be clear.

And yet… it remains the same.

Then it hits me.

Life is the dirty window.

Each day brings its own spatter. Its own streaks. Its own unexpected splashes of chaos that we often have no idea how to cleanse. The more we try to wipe it away, sometimes the more smeared and cloudy it becomes.

We try to fix the mess.
We try to restore clarity.
We try to regain control.

But life lacks the consistency we crave.

Every new day holds unknown variables.
Unexpected conversations.
Unplanned disappointments.
Unforeseen struggles.

And that lack of consistency can create an environment that feels unsteady. Unstable. Unpredictable.

Yet at the end of the day, when I sit back down at the island and gaze through that same dirty window, there is something oddly comforting about its unchanged imperfection.

The mess is still there.
The smudges haven’t moved.
The view is still blurred.

And somehow, that consistency in the imperfection steadies me.

But here is what the Lord has been gently whispering to my heart:

While the window may remain dirty… He does not.

Our days may feel inconsistent.
Our emotions may fluctuate.
Our circumstances may cloud our vision.

But God is not unstable.

“The Lord is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” — Psalm 91:2

Refuge.
Fortress.
Not shifting.
Not unpredictable.
Not clouded.

When life spatters our windows and blurs our view, it is easy to grow accustomed to the mess. We learn to live with the streaks. We adapt to the distortion. Sometimes we even mistake the familiar chaos for comfort.

But our true consistency is not found in the unchanging mess.

It is found in an unchanging God.

Hebrews 13:8 reminds us:

“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”

Yesterday — when the window first got dirty.
Today — as we stare through it.
Forever — long after the smudges are gone.

Life may feel inconsistent.
Our emotions may feel unstable.
Our clarity may feel clouded.

But God remains steady in the middle of our scattered days.

And maybe — just maybe — the dirty window isn’t there to comfort me.

Maybe it is there to remind me that even when my view is blurred, my foundation is not.

Even in the mess.
Even in the unknown.
Even in the inconsistent chaos of each day.

He is steady.

And that is enough.