Sangeetha Ramachandran

View Original

Holding Onto Faith: How to Replenish Your Faith In Chaos

We've all experienced chaos. It feels like an endless struggle strung together by one bad experience after another. 

During these moments, it's tough to see the light at the end of the tunnel. To figure how this will all end up okay because it feels never-ending. 

This may also be the easiest time to lose your faith in anything good happening ever again. But this is actually the best time to have faith. 

Where does faith come from? 

Faith is trust. It's the belief that something will always show up for you in the best way. It means that you have confidence in your life that things will always turn out okay. 

Faith is usually associated with some sort of higher power, whether that's God, the Universe, nature, your higher self, intuition, etc. When people are in tough situations, they might find themselves praying or asking for something from a higher source. This is why I believe that it's really difficult to have faith if you don't believe in a higher power. 

Everyone is different, and we all have a different higher power we believe in. I am not here to preach any form of faith over another, but simply say that I don't think it's fair to burden yourself with all of life's outcomes. 

In other words, if you don't have someone or something to rely on, you are either 1) putting pressure on you or others to show up the way you want or 2) living life aimlessly, believing that life is happening to you rather than for you. 

When you have faith in a higher power, it's like taking some of your stress and releasing it to someone or something else. It's like knowing that no matter what you're going through, you'll always be supported. 

Things never happen by coincidence, and the things you go through are happening for a reason. You know that your life experiences are being orchestrated divinely when you have faith in a higher power. 

Faith is most important during times of chaos.

During times of chaos, it may feel like your world is crumbling. Nothing is going right, and you feel intense highs and lows. 

This is the time people feel like giving up the most. It's so hard to think about the light at the end of the tunnel when all you feel is pain and uncertainty. I've been there. 

You think, "How can there even be a God if this is happening to me? A real God wouldn't put me through this."

I get it 100%. But I want you to know that chaos, although at the moment feels like discomfort, is a blessing. Here's why: 

Nothing is a coincidence; everything happens for a reason. - You are meant to meet every person you meet, read everything you read, and see everything you see. Life has this crazy way of stringing together every moment of your life to get you exactly where you're supposed to be. If you don't have faith, it may seem like things are happening around you, and they have no meaning. And that is so far beyond the truth. 

You need to go through this period to grow. - Sometimes, you are put through difficult times to grow, learn, and heal. Maybe you need to learn something, and the only way to learn it is through this tough situation. If you don't have faith, it's hard to see this as an opportunity. It's tough to know why this is happening, and you begin to question everything. This is when your faith needs to be its strongest. 

Chaotic times mean old foundations are being destroyed. - A new life can't be built on an old foundation. The old has to be destroyed so the new can be created. If you perceive chaos through this lens, you know that there's something good to come from it. You have faith in intense emotions and triggers and "lost" opportunities because you know that something new, something better, is on its way to you. 

Sometimes we have an existential crisis where we start to question everything about life. And it usually happens when we face chaotic times. You begin to question your purpose on earth, your purpose in life, if anything has any meaning. 

It's honestly kind of scary when it happens because no one really knows anything about human life and why we're here. 

But wouldn't you instead look at life as something miraculous? I would much rather believe that my life has a purpose and I'm here to accomplish something. And that I don't have to always count on myself to do everything right because a higher power is helping me along the way. This belief is so much more comforting to me. 

This is how to replenish your faith during difficult times: 

Now, we're all going to go through some difficult times. It's inevitable to avoid them. But instead of going through it with doubt and suspicion, do this mental exercise to alleviate some of that uncertainty. 

Think back on all the times when you felt chaos in your life and see how everything worked out for the best. This could be something as simple as getting stuck in traffic to not getting into your dream school. 

Now go down the line and fit everything together. Maybe you wouldn't have met certain people or learned certain things, or accepted a different job at a place you would've never imagined. Because those things happened, what happened instead? 

It's good to think about these things and piece together the puzzle because life is so amazing in that way. And maybe you're not in a place where you feel like things worked out for the better, and you're trying to figure out where you went wrong. But I want you to know that things will be okay and everything is going to work out. And the best way to understand this is by filling your faith tank more and more every day. 

Navigating difficult times calls for faith. The more faith you have in yourself, your situation, and/or a higher power, the easier it gets. 

Love,

Sangeetha