How to Thrive in Every Season

"God sees us. God knows how painful it is. And He doesn't leave us."

Below is part of a conversation with Peg Arnold, an author, speaker and self-proclaimed “Drama Queen” for Jesus.

Peg shares her story of walking through seasons of transition, loss, and unexpected change—and how she’s learned to see God’s hand in every chapter.

She explores what it truly means to thrive in every season—not by escaping pain or pretending everything is fine, but by allowing God to meet us right where we are.

If you prefer listening, you can listen to/watch the full conversation on Apple, Spotify or YouTube.

I liken seasons not necessarily to our age, but seasons are more the circumstances that we are experiencing. And so we can be in a similar season that somebody in a completely different age bracket might be going through as well.

And my dad – he lived till 93 – he was the one who told me that, like Ecclesiastes, every season has joys and challenges. And when you read Ecclesiastes chapter three, it says there’s a time for everything under the sun and a season for everything under heaven.

And it says a time to live and a time to die, a time to dance and a time to mourn. And if you read through all of those seasons, everything has a joy to it and everything has a challenge to it.

And so even though we went through all these hard seasons, through my relationship with the Lord, He was teaching me how to thrive and how to find the joys in the hard seasons.

The thing is, when we go through a season of loss, it’s like we feel like we are dried up and there’s no energy in us at all. But I think our relationship with the Lord, our time with the Lord, is a time that He can show us what we need at that time.

And if you feel that life has just pulled you out by the roots, first off, you have to recognize the shock and you’ve got to give yourself time to feel the feelings, to go through the grief, to allow others around you just to mourn with you. Whether it’s the loss of a job, whether it’s a sudden accident and a tragedy of somebody, there is a trauma that goes with those sudden losses.

So to think that you’re gonna just slide through it without healing — it takes time to heal. And normal doesn’t always look the same. And God takes your brokenness and takes your dryness and He just holds you in His hands. And sometimes He holds us through our relationships with others when the church or friends and neighbors come around and surround you.

And a hint to those that are supporting somebody in a season like that is we can’t solve that season. And so many times we want to solve and make it better and make them feel better. And sometimes it’s just sitting with someone in that broken season, just listening to them and loving them.

And there’s a verse that’s thrown at us sometimes. And it’s not a verse I would recommend sharing when somebody is at the peak of their season. But when you’re looking back at the season or when you’re starting to heal, in James 1: 2-3, it says, ‘When troubles come, consider it joy.’

And that’s the last place we want to go is joy. But James isn’t talking about happy, happy, joy, joy, rainbows and lollipops. James is talking about the joy that’s going to build strength, patience, and perseverance within you. And when we build that strength, we are drawing closer.

So, the joy he is talking about is having that deep faith and hope and trust in a God that sees you in your trouble, that holds you and dries the tears from your eyes and says, ‘I am with you and I’m not going to leave you.’

And God can take our anger, too. God will take angry prayers along with praise prayers. And He’s a big enough God to see us. And like you had mentioned with David, David laments. And there are times he questions God and says, ‘How long, Lord?’ And so to lament to God is important when we are in those hard seasons.

But God is faithful. And finding a verse – not a trite verse – but finding a verse that’s foundational and that means something to you. I think of Isaiah 41:10: ‘Fear not, I’m with you, and I hold you in my righteous right hand, I will give you strength.’

And sometimes that’s all we can do is just repeat those words over and over and over or sing a song that means something to us and just sing the chorus over and over. But God sees us. God knows how painful it is and He doesn’t leave us. And it’s just looking to Him to find, in those moments, where were our joys? Where could we find joy?

And you look for where are those gems or those things that God has already woven into place. And sometimes it’s only when you look back that you see even more gems and more God joys that He had woven into that time.

What other practical things can we do during seasons of grief or loss?

Well, one of the things is to care for yourself. And we think we’re being selfish because we are in grief, but caring for yourself is important.

And it’s taking the time to sit with the Lord. And I use a care acronym, it’s an acrostic: C-A-R-E. So, C is create times to care for yourself, create times to listen, to sit in God’s presence. And that comes from Jesus, He modeled this – one day He went away and went to the mountainside to pray and spend time with God.

And then A is asking God to reveal Himself to you. You know, in Matthew where it says, ‘Seek and ye shall find and knock and the door will be open.’ And in Jeremiah, ‘For I have plans for you, says the Lord, plans to prosper, not to harm you, plans to give you hope in the future.’

But it says, if you seek me with your whole heart, you shall find me. And so it’s seeking God and asking God that you can see Him when you seek Him.

And a lot of people say, well, how do I see God? You might see Him in a friend that drops off a pot of soup for you. That’s the hands and feet of God. You might see Him, if you’ve got children in your life, children can bring spots of joy. Or in a card that somebody writes you. Ask God to reveal where He’s reaching out to you.

And then R — reading His Word. Sometimes we are so devastated, we can’t even focus on reading, so listen to praise music, because His word is woven into many of those songs.

And then E — expect to hear His voice. Expect that. He loves you enough that He cares about you.

And the last one is gratitude. It’s not in the care acrostic, but finding things to thank God for in the midst of things is really important. And it’s one of those things that we have to kind of force ourselves to do, you know, and we don’t always like to force ourselves. We want things to come naturally. We want to feel the feelings. But gratitude is big.

You know, the modern world and the world of today talks about changing your mindset and being aware of things. Well, that’s not new. God talked about mindset a long time ago when He talks about gratitude and seeking Him first.

In Philippians 8, where it says to fix your mind on praiseworthy, lovely, admirable, noble, true, trustworthy, excellent, and right things. That’s all mindset. And the verse, ‘Don’t be anxious, but with prayer and thanksgiving, make your requests known for God.’

So mindset is something God created and created our bodies and our minds to be so strong that if we focus on the positive and look for the joys, it will help us and give us strength to handle and perseverance and patience to handle the challenge that we’re facing.

And the same with kindness. Jesus says to love God with our heart, soul, mind, and strength and to love others as ourselves. And kindness is a fruit of the spirit. When we are kind to people, we actually get more oxytocin and serotonin back when we are kind to people. It’s another way that God has created us.

What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned on your walk with God?

I have spent a lot of my life trying to achieve and thinking that my value was in what I achieved – being productive. And thinking that that’s how God loved me, too, that my value in God was gained through that.

And when you are an achiever or a people pleaser, you tend to do a lot of comparison in your head and you tend to speak to yourself with a negative voice. You’re always down on yourself because you always think you can do better.

So if there’s one thing that I have learned it’s to be kind to myself and speak to myself in ways that I speak to others. You know, we speak to ourselves in these negative voices that we would never use with a friend or our children or even hopefully not our spouse.

And that voice of comparison – there is always going to be somebody on the upper rung. And I love Roosevelt when he says that comparison is the thief of joy, but it’s also the thief of motivation. When we are constantly comparing ourselves and speaking to us ourselves in a negative way, I think it’s motivating me, but that’s not how God created me.

And so if I could talk to the younger me, I’d say to work to get those negative voices out of your head. You are not what you accomplished, you are who God created you to be. And comparison is never going to help you. And it’s something I’m still working with, but I think I’m getting better.

And one thing is catch yourself when you’re doing that and then say, Lord, help me. Because you’re his daughter, he doesn’t want you talking to yourself like that. And when somebody does compliment you, how are you receiving it? Can you graciously receive that compliment and then thank them for it?

Listen to or watch the full conversation Apple, Spotify or YouTube.

Thank you for being here,

Katharine

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