my story

The Key to Finding Strength When You Feel Weak

| Rachel Boulos

When it comes to the hustle and power moves of my peers, I just can’t compete. While they’re off growing careers, raising families, volunteering, and serving on the mission field, I’m just hoping to string coherent words together and walk around the block.

As much as I fight to stay strong, the truth is I’m sick. My mental real estate is spent managing pain, energy levels, brain fog, and the symptoms of post-traumatic stress. So when my reality doesn’t reflect my calling to be part of God’s mission on earth, I feel bad. Guilty. Unsuccessful. Like I’m letting God down.

These days, when God invites me to partner with Him, I politely decline because I know someone else can do it better. Play it safe and stay within your limits, I tell myself. To avoid the sting of failure and embarrassment, I take my seat on the bench or just quietly see myself out.

My growing list of fears and failures over the years rendered me last picked for the team.

Or so I thought. Continue reading →

Why “2020 Fatigue” May Be a Good Thing

woman-looking-towards-the-sky-
| Rachel Boulos

A few weeks ago, I drove to the park and wept in my car.

Because, 2020.

I’m guessing you can relate. Maybe you’ve had your own moments of hiding in your closet or alone time in your car. Perhaps the stress of this year is wearing on you, too.

I’ll admit, the last 6 months have been a bit much. My aunt died, most of my family got COVID-19, I lost a friend to cancer, my work dwindled, and the chaos of the world flared my chronic illness and PTSD.

In truth, I’ve got a bad case of “2020 Fatigue”. I’m tired of the stress, tired of the mess, tired of waiting for the next shoe to drop. Each new circumstance cues my anxiety like clockwork.

It’s like the world is on fire (oh wait, it is) and someone just keeps turning up the heat. And this girl can only take so much disaster bingo.

So I cried out all the feels in my car. I asked God to just make it stop. I was too weary, too weak, too inept to handle it all.

And perhaps that’s the point.  Continue reading →

7 Questions to Help You Process and Survive a Crisis

woman drinking coffee looking out the window
| Rachel Boulos

This pandemic getting scary. Many of us are on a roller coaster of emotion as we hear the latest news about loved ones, ICU patients, makeshift morgues, and healthcare workers making life-or-death decisions on the front lines.

When this pandemic hit, I was already neck-deep in trauma recovery. For the last twelve months, I’ve been working through my own post-traumatic stress that had compounded for decades.  Continue reading →

Finding Hope When You Feel Hopeless

| Rachel Boulos

This couldn’t be happening. Not again. Not ever.

My heart beat wildly as I pressed a firm hand to my chest. Like lapsing waves, one hardship rose after the other, sweeping me into a sea of despair.

Anxiety. Depression. Disease. Inability to conceive. Now this.

Panic threatened to overwhelm as inflammation increased and my knee swelled for the third time. After four years of ceaseless prayers, all my hope for the future was shattered.

Again.

I thought I was getting better. But I was still broken. Continue reading →

Finding Joy in the Midst of Pain

woman looking at mountains during sunset
| Rachel Boulos

For many of us, the changing season ushers in a renewed sense of thanksgiving. But what happens when your season of change is marked by pain? When you don’t feel very grateful?

As we approached Thanksgiving, I felt anything but thankful. A serious illness had darkened my door, filling me with disappointment and heartache over what was being lost: hopes, dreams, expectations on how life would be. Yet it was in this difficult season I learned two important lessons about gratitude, discovering that hardship, not happiness, is the forerunner of joy.

Is your season of thanksgiving overshadowed by pain? Are you looking for a way to harvest more joy in your life? Join me on (in)courage to read more and discover how you can find joy in the midst of your hardship!

 

Sign up here to receive free notes from (in)courage, sent right to your inbox daily!

If Your Digestive Pain Won’t Go Away, Try This…

| Rachel Boulos

If digestive pain won't go away try thisTired of bloating, gas, abdominal pain or bowel trouble?

Reoccurring digestive issues can really cramp your style.

So you look to your doctor for help but he tells you it’s “all in your head” (wait…I thought it was my gut?). He labels you with a confusing acronym (IBS, IBD, SIBO) and sends you out the door.

Desperate for relief, you turn to the natural community. You sign up for an enormous amount of supplements, enzymes, cleansing treatments and spend all your money on whatever promises to heal you.

But what if you try it all and you STILL aren’t better?  Continue reading →