Fair warning, this song by Andrew Peterson may make you cry, but I hope it also gives you hope. No matter whether you are on a mountain top of victory, or if you are feeling alone on the valley we have a God who knows what both are like.
Tag: loneliness
Christmas Is For the Broken
Sometimes Christmas is not the happiest time of the year. Though we see commercials of families gathering and tearing the wrapping paper off of presents under elaborately decorated trees and enjoying hot, warm meals together, for some people that isn’t reality. It could be that the reality of Christmas is seen through a different lens. Continue reading “Christmas Is For the Broken”
Influenced Pt 1 – Influenced by Media
We are all influenced. This is a hard truth to deal with as I want to believe that I am my own person. I want to believe that the only influence I have in my life is God. However, this is not true. Unless I were to isolate myself completely and live in a monastery alone, there are things that influence me.
These influencers are both positive and negative. An influencer can be a person or a group of people, but it can also be a thing. We can be influenced by TV shows, ads, music, articles, books, and more different kinds of media. Again, some of these influencers are positive and some are negative.
There was a moment when I realized that I was being influenced by the TV shows, movies I watched and the music I listened to. In high school, I fought against the idea that media had any kind of influence over my behavior. However, it did. I didn’t notice this until I started to shave some things away. I used to be a very bitter and angry person. Then, I stopped listening to music that had hate filled, angry, depressed, hopeless, and shame filled lyrics. There may have been a time in my life when listening to this type of music was cathartic and helpful, but continuing to put these words in my life after the catharsis kept me stuck. I was influenced, and I was stuck in my anger, shame, and depression.
There may be a person out there strong enough to not have these things affect them. However, I haven’t met him or her. I’m not going to write that everyone is the same as I am, but to be influenced by the media seems pretty normal. This is why commercials exist.
Please note that I am not saying that the media is the sole influencer to any of these things. Some could be influenced by physical makeup as well. Depression is a serious condition that can be physical and spiritual in nature. In my story, it was mainly spiritual and I found that filling my head with negative media only worsened my condition.
What media in your life do you think has a negative influence on you? If you struggle with lust, depression, loneliness, anger, or shame, is there something in your life that could be influencing this?
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