a blessing for when it’s too much to handle

God, our bodies remember the sleepless nights and cold sweats and unrelenting stress.
Show us how to process all that we suffer.

“How frail is humanity!
How short is life, How full of trouble!”
—Job 14:1, NLT

Blessed are we, when we decide to make room for all of it,
the fear and the gratitude, the complexity and the suffering.

Blessed are we who pour out to you the whole of it—
unedited, all the terrible truths and fears and what-ifs.
The gratitude for those beautiful hearts in action who came willingly,
into the strange and awkward space that is my need.

Blessed are we, learning as humans together that pain is inevitable,
nurses are wonderful, hospitals are loud, people are brave,
and we grow and we hurt and we heal, and then we will do it all over again.
Because this beautiful paradox is what it means to be human.

Adapted for a communal setting from THE LIVES WE ACTUALLY HAVE, page 108