What am I grateful for? (Thanksgiving Special)

...It’s one thing to admit it and admit it openly but a whole ‘nother thing to put a label on it. I have now put a label on it. My time at Cornell has been tough. I have struggled and I’m almost coming out on top, still alive and gasping for breath but I made it. Graduation is around the corner; I still have a lot of questions but now I know that I would rather be at Hollywood than at..... I would rather be on TV than in front of it. Also, it took me so long but now I know that Jesus still loves me. He never left my side. I was lonely but never alone. I was always cared for even when I didn’t ask for it.

'Oh you’d be fine’, ‘This too shall pass’,  ‘It’d soon be over’, words that felt like non-existent hugs and fake smiles. You don’t tell that to a girl who wants to sleep all day so she doesn’t have to get out of bed to once again to sit in front of a laptop all day wishing that giving up was an option.  You don’t tell that to the girl who spends her daily bath time wondering what she’s going to make of her life after grad school. You don’t tell that to anyone, anyone at all, for whom their whole semester feels like a blur because they are on the verge of failing a graduation requirement class or dropping out of school.

One thing this season proved to me anyways, is that God is the only thing that fills my void, what a friend I have in Him. Needless to say, I got lucky with my addiction. Some people never have the chance to break away nor come to admit that they need help or a way out. I look back and the only thing I see is the constant of who God was in all of it. I learned to truly kiss the (silent) waves that threw me against the Rock of Ages .On Christ, my solid rock, I stand because all other ground is sinking sand. I’m grateful for my faith and the opportunity to have built my foundation in Him. In Him, I live and move and have my being. Let all strivings cease because I have the mind of Christ. 

Anyway, the music stops now because I am no longer dancing with the one who seeks my downfall or destruction. I am no longer dancing with the devil....

 An excerpt from Dancing with the Devil , written by Tolulope Esther Olukanmi


There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.
-Maya Angelou