Episode 3: Every Well I Could Find

Hey, welcome back to the Whole Hearted Woman Podcast. I'm Chris Ray, and this is your heart room. A place where you don't have to have it all together, where your story is safe, your pain is welcome, and healing is not just possible, it's the whole reason we're here. If you are just finding this podcast for the first time, welcome. I'm so glad you're here. Before this episode, I want to encourage you to go back and listen to episodes one and two, because what we're building here is a journey. Each episode carries the one before it, and I don't want you to miss a single step. For those of you who have been with me, welcome back. You already know what this space is, so pull up a chair, bring your coffee, or whatever you're sipping, your journal, and let's continue walking this road together. Last week I left you in a bit of a difficult place. The floor had given way, the structure had collapsed. A 22-year-old woman was in a hospital, carrying the accumulated weight of everything she had never been able to name, and I promise you we would keep going. So today we're going. When I left that hospital, I left with something I didn't expect. Not answers and not healing, not even peace. I left with a hunger, an insatiable, bone-deep hunger to find God. To know and not just believe, not just hope, but to know for certain that He exists, that He is real, and more than anything else, that He knows me. I wanted the answers to life, to existence, and why we are here and why we suffer and where healing actually comes from. I had a desperate need to find something that couldn't reach the place inside me that nothing had reached yet, and so I began to search. It was a mission. What followed were almost two decades of the most sincere, earnest, wholehearted seeking you can imagine. I wasn't dabbling, I wasn't experimenting casually, I was a woman on a quest, and I drank from every well I could find. The first well was meditation. My counselor, who I later discovered followed a Buddhist teaching, though he never told me that directly, spoke about stopping to smell the roses, about admiring the beauty around us, about stillness and presence. And something in me responded to that. I began to meditate, and in that stillness, things began to surface. I started having vivid, intense dreams. One dream in particular has stayed with me for all these years. I dreamt of a little girl sitting on top of a garbage heap she was throwing up, everything inside her coming out. I knew immediately that little girl was me. And even then, even without the language of healing I have now, I understood something. My soul was finally releasing what it had been holding on to for so long. So the meditation opened a door, and behind that door was a little girl with so much inside her that had never had anywhere to go. It was the beginning of something, but it was not yet the thing. And then came the morning on the highway. I want to tell you about this moment because I have never quite found words adequate enough for it, but I'm gonna try. It was an ordinary morning. I was driving a road, I traveled every day. I traveled that road to college and to work, and it was a road I knew so well I could have driven it in my sleep. I had Mozart playing on a cassette tape in the car. Remember what those were? I was merging onto the highway, checking the traffic, glancing up, and I saw the sky, and something happened to me. In an instant, without warning, without explanation, as I was on the highway, I was completely overwhelmed. A sensation washed over me so powerful and so all-encompassing that I can only describe it as being submerged into something invisible. The beauty around me was amazing. Everything, the green of the trees, the green of the grass, everything was so vibrant and so incredibly beautiful. And I remember looking at the grass, the sky, the light. And as I drove, I found myself feeling lost, like I didn't know where I was. It was a road I drove every day, but I felt lost. I didn't pull over, I didn't know what to do. I just held my hands on the steering wheel and kept driving. And gradually, slowly, the feeling began to diminish. But I was not the same woman who had merged onto that highway. I didn't have a name for what had happened. I didn't understand it, but I knew something had touched me. Something beyond what any human explanation could contain. Something was reaching for me, and I was reaching back, and that kept me searching. During that time I discovered something called the Upanishads. They were ancient Hindu sacred texts, something like the Proverbs that we have. I remember reading them and it was full and rich of meaning, full of a longing for the divine that resonated deeply within me. So I studied it. I also studied Eastern religion. I explored the teachings of the universe, of angels, of the sacred sound of om that some tradition believe resonates through all of creation. I found a book at that time also by Louise Hay. She was someone who was just emerging on the self-help scene at that time. And her message was that you can heal your life, and it seemed like I had found the answer. Her method was that the power of the mind, the practice of affirmations, the work of the inner child could transform you from the inside out. She had been healed of cancer, so I thought healing is possible. I want it, I'll do the work, I'll say the words, I want to heal. And then I began reading about quantum physics and the nature of reality and existence, about the power of consciousness in the energy of the universe, about conversations with God and the intelligence behind all things. It seemed fascinating. Another answer that led me deeper into knowing God. Each one offered a glimmer. Each one carried something that felt like truth, a fragment, a piece, a hint of the thing I was looking for. And for a while each well satisfied, but for a little while, because always, always the thirst came back. I would drink deeply and feel something shift, feel something open, feel a moment of relief, of clarity or hope, and then again, gradually, quietly, the desperation returned. The ache, the realization that I was still not healed, still not whole, still not filled, still not fulfilled. And so I would go looking for the next well. Now I want you to understand that I was not wandering aimlessly. I was desperately, sincerely looking for God. I was looking for Jesus. I just didn't know who he was at that time. Every well I drank from, I was looking for the living water that only he could give. And in his mercy, he allowed each well to give me just enough. Just enough truth, just enough light, just enough to keep my heart soft and my seeking alive until he could lead me to the source. Because here's what I want you to know that I couldn't see then. I wasn't lost, I was being led. And then something happened that I could never have imagined or seen coming. After several years of working in a university president's office, a position I loved, in a small team of just three people, I was called in and told my position would be eliminated. They were gracious, they gave me time, they told me I could stay in search for something new for as long as I reasonably needed. So I began my job search. For weeks, for months, interview after interview, door after door, closed again and again and again. I couldn't understand it. I was qualified, I was capable, but nothing was opening. And the desperation that had followed me through two decades of searching for healing now followed me into the job search too. And then finally, a door opened. It was at Columbia College in the development office. A position that on paper looked like simply the next step in an administrative career, but I had no idea it was about to change everything. I want to pause here because I want to ask you something. Where have you been searching? Not for a job, but for healing, for wholeness, for the thing that would finally reach the place inside you that nothing has reached yet. Maybe you have sat in a therapy office for years and felt better for a season and then felt that ache in your heart return again. Maybe you have read every self-help book and Christian breakthrough book on the shelf and practiced every technique, praying, quoting scripture, going to church week after week, and still feeling that quiet emptiness underneath. Maybe you've tried meditation, affirmations, declarations, therapy, inner child work. Maybe you have explored spirituality and its many forms, looking for something true and solid to hold on to. And I'm not saying those things have no value. Some of them offered me real glimpses of truth. Some of them kept me alive and searching when I might have stopped. But they were only glimpses. So I want to ask you gently, are you still thirsty? If you are, if nothing has quite reached the deepest places, I want you to stay with me. Because what I'm about to tell you in the weeks ahead changed everything for me. The door that finally opened did not lead to a career. It led me straight into the arms of Jesus, who had been waiting for me the entire time. We'll walk through that door together next week. But before I go, I want to share something with you. The story I've been telling in these episodes come directly from my book, Heartfully Alive, From Brokenness to a Journey into the Heart of God. So if today's episode resonated with you and you'd like to continue the journey, I've made the first chapter available free of charge, and you'll find the link in the show notes. And if you're walking through a season where your heart feels weary, guarded, or thirsty for something more, I pray this will remind you that God has not forgotten you. He sees you, he loves you, and he is still writing your story. So until next time, take good care of your heart. I love you, and I'll see you next week.