How anxiety becomes the sword we carry, what our emotions reveal, and how God redeems what survival taught us.
Yesterday came and went without me posting. To be honest, life is a little messy at the moment. We are dealing with a family crisis, and between trying to support the people I love and keeping all the balls in the air, writing felt difficult this week. But perhaps that is exactly where this post needs to begin.
One of the things I realised at the beginning of this year, after suddenly finding myself with more time at home than I have had in years, was just how normal anxiety had become. I found myself watching my own thoughts, trying to think ahead, trying to solve problems before they existed, trying to prepare for every possible outcome, trying to carry things that belong to tomorrow while still dealing with today. And I realised again how often anxiety tries to direct not only my life, but the lives of many of us. Jesus said, “Put your sword back in its place, for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.” [Matthew 26:52 NIV]
I know Jesus was speaking about a real sword. But lately I have wondered if many of us are living by a different kind of sword: anxiety. We use it to protect ourselves. We use it to prepare ourselves. We use it to stay ahead of disaster. We use it to prevent disappointment. We use it because we think it keeps us safe. But if we spend our lives living under that sword, it eventually begins cutting away at things God never intended us to lose: our peace, our joy, our relationships, even our sense of who we are. Scripture tells us, “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” [Philippians 4:6 NIV]
Yet most of us would honestly admit that we have become anxious about almost everything:
Anxious about how we look.
Anxious about how we present ourselves.
Anxious about what other people think of us.
Anxious about our children.
Anxious about our finances.
Anxious about our future.
Anxious about whether we are coping.
Anxious about whether we are enough.
Anxious about whether we are accepted.
Anxious about whether we are getting life right.
The World’s Swords
In Power Code Living, swords are part of the visual language: open when building community, crossed when actively facing everyday life. The more I think about it, the more I realise how often the world hands us its own swords and tells us they will keep us safe:
The sword of appearance. If I look right, I will be safe.
The sword of achievement. If I succeed enough, I will be secure.
The sword of perfection. If I get everything right, no one can reject me.
The sword of control. If I stay ahead of everything, nothing can hurt me.
The sword of performance. If I do enough, I will finally be enough.
We pick up these swords because we are trying to survive. We carry them because we think they will protect us. But most of the time they cut into the very things we are trying to preserve. They cut into peace. They cut into trust. They cut into relationships. They cut into identity. And then we wonder why we are so tired.
God’s Sword
God does not ask us to live by the swords the world gives us. He gives us something real to live by: The Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God [Eph. 6: 17 NIV], His presence, and the identity He speaks over us.
The world says: achievement makes you worthy.
God says: you already belong to Him. [1 Peter 2:9 NIV]
The world says: perform first, then be accepted.
God says: beloved first. [Matthew 3:17 NIV]
The world says: emotion is weakness.
God shows us that emotion can be information, revealing where care, healing, truth, or boundaries are needed.
While writing Heart Strong, one of the things that became increasingly clear to me was that emotions are not character flaws. They are signals that point towards something real. Anxiety may be pointing towards fear. Anger may be pointing towards a boundary that has been crossed. Loneliness may be pointing towards a need for connection. Grief may be pointing towards something valuable that was lost. The emotion itself is not the enemy. The emotion is information. It helps us understand the reality we are living in. That is why Chapter 4 of Heart Strong spends time sorting and naming emotions more accurately. Many of us have spent years simply calling everything “stress” when, in reality, there may be grief, fear, disappointment, shame, loneliness, frustration, or anxiety underneath it. Chapter 5 begins asking a different question: Where did this come from? What shaped it? What taught me to react this way? What survival skills did I develop because of what I lived through?
Many things I thought were weaknesses were actually survival skills. For example, a person growing up in instability often becomes highly aware of other people’s moods. For years, that can feel exhausting. But when healing happens, that same awareness can turn into empathy. That same sensitivity becomes emotional intelligence. That same survival skill becomes a strength.
As I wrote about one example in Heart Strong Chapter 5: “When healed, you become someone who values loyalty and creates calm spaces for others, because you know what instability feels like.” That has probably been one of the biggest discoveries of this journey for me. Heart Strong started as an exploration of emotions, but somewhere along the way it became a discovery of skills. Power Code Living is, in part, about learning to recognise what has shaped us, what God wants to heal, and what He can redeem into skill and identity.
Even this week, in the middle of my own struggles, I am being reminded that healing is not about getting rid of every difficult emotion. It is about learning to understand what those emotions are telling us, allowing God to redeem what survival taught us, and using those lessons to strengthen the identity He has already given us.
Perhaps that is the invitation here for all of us: not simply to survive our emotions, but to explore them. To ask what they might be revealing. To notice the strengths hidden inside the things we have lived through. And then to let God show us what can be healed, what can be redeemed, and what can become useful skills.