This week, I noticed something: every member of my family is nursing a tweak. A back, a knee, a wrist. Nothing major, just enough to notice. And the funny thing is, we’ve all adjusted the way we move. We favor the stronger side. We lean a little. Limp. Reach carefully. You can see it in our posture, in how we sit, and how we walk. We’re still moving forward, but differently. It's not a big deal and we will all be fine soon. Even so, we will need to be careful to lose the compensating movements and not let them become part of who we are, but just a temporary aid in healing.

I see the same thing happen spiritually, too. When we experience a spiritual "tweak" we tend to move a little differently.

When something hurts, like some kind of loss, a disappointment, a question we can’t quite answer, we tend to adjust. We protect the tender place. We lean into the parts of our faith and personality that feel strong, reliable, and comfortable. We keep moving, but we’re compensating.

Compensating isn’t the same as healing. There are some losses that we may not be able to heal from on this side of eternity and we carry them with us, faithful and limping. That, too, is holy ground.

But there are other places: habits, fears, buried wounds, where healing is still possible. With intention and grace, we can strengthen what’s been neglected. Just as we do physical therapy to strengthen and realign our bodies, we can do spiritual therapy to strengthen and realign our faith with our living. We can relearn how to move through life and faith without the limp. Not because we’ve forgotten the pain, but because we’ve given ourselves permission to reshape how we carry it, or to finally set it down altogether.

Healing doesn’t come from ignoring the tender place; it comes from tending to it. From noticing what we’ve avoided. From gently doing the holy work of forgiving, releasing, and trusting. And from allowing grace to do its slow and holy work.

My wish for you this week, Reader, is that you’ll notice the places where you need a little "spiritual therapy," places in your past and present where you’ve been spiritually compensating. I hope you’ll be kind to those tender places and brave enough to tend to them. May you find space to realign, to breathe, and to trust that healing, slow and sacred healing, is already underway. That's the fiLLLed life.

Live a fiLLLed life, Melissa ​