If I got a penny for every time I heard someone say “I don’t feel like doing …”, or “I don’t feel like eating …”, or even, “I don’t feel like being …”, I would be rich. Because half the time, people do not feel like doing what they should be doing. So they express themselves vocally before they perform the action of not doing a task because they did not have the feeling to do it.

I am also very guilty. brushing things I am suppose to do just because I do not feel like doing them.

Just a quick question. Asides eating, sleeping, playing and spending money, do we actually have the feeling to do the things we don’t necessarily love or have a passion for? If your answer is No like I think it should be, just this little revelation should be able to deter us from living our daily lives and carrying out our daily activities based on how we ‘feel’.

Medically and scientifically, feelings occur based on our mood and sometimes just based on the secretion of certain enzymes in our system. It is as biological as that. It is true that occurrences can trigger different moods but it is also true that the body can resist or assist in the secretion of certain enzymes that cause us to feel certain ways at random times.

On the other hand, there is laziness. Just not having the will or desire to do something we should do.

My point? Feelings are just too unstable to be the foundation on which we hold decisions to perform actions in our lives.

For a week or two, I lost the zeal to pray and inwardly, I told myself that I just did not feel like praying. This led me to begin to harbour guilt which made me feel that I had offended God in some way. Because I did not like the way I felt, I began to perform actions in a bid to ‘get back God’s attention’, all the while forgetting that IT IS NOT BY WORKS.

By the way did you notice how many times ‘feel’ or ‘feeling’ appeared in the last paragraph? Sad.

With God, your feeling is actually immaterial. You have to do what you have to do whether or not you have the feeling to do it.

Mind you, whatever you do should never be borne from a place of compulsion or obligation. You need to understand why you do what you do. Knowing why helps you better do it with a cheerful heart still regardless of how you feel in that moment.

Eventually, as we tame ourselves, we get to the point where our desires equate and overtake our feelings, so when it comes to issues, the desire is able to get us to do what we have to do, even if our feelings cannot be bothered.

Sometimes you just have to know. Know that God loves you, whether or not it feels like it, know that you’re beautiful, whether or not you feel like it, know that you are strong, whether or not it feels like it, and know that you will overcome. Again, whether or not it feels like it.

‘knowing over feeling’ is my newest definition of faith. You can share it too, I really don’t mind.