What Happened When I Stopped Hiding My Struggles

For a long time, I thought being a leader meant I had to look like I had everything together. When teaching, I needed to appear confident, capable, and to have the lessons and skills personally mastered. This often kept me from being transparent about my own struggles.

Then one evening, God showed me just how wrong I was.

As I stood outside the classroom door, I felt completely unqualified to teach. I hadn’t been practicing the very coping skills I believed in. I hadn’t spent time with God. I was exhausted, overwhelmed, and discouraged.

That night, God taught me one of the most valuable lessons of my life:

He doesn’t ask us to lead from perfection. He asks us to lead from honesty.

You don’t have to have it all together for God to use you. Sometimes the most powerful thing we can share is the truth about where we are—and how we’re still learning to trust Him there. #perfection #honesty Share on X

The Opportunity I Had Been Praying For

I had been asked to teach my very first Family Connections™ class—a course that had been life-changing for our family as we learned to navigate the challenges of mental illness.

The skills weren’t easy to learn, but with God’s help I slowly began putting them into practice. As I did, they helped me embrace a life I never expected. For me, faith and these practical skills were never separate. Without Jesus, I don’t believe I would have had the strength to love well or learn healthier ways to communicate.

I couldn’t wait to share those lessons with others.

I couldn’t wait to share these lessons with others.

Still, two questions kept running through my mind.

How could I teach these skills when I hadn’t perfected them myself?

And how could I honor God in a class that wasn’t faith-based?

I respected the curriculum and had no desire to change it. Yet I also knew that every bit of growth I had experienced was because God had met me in my weakness and taught me how to apply those skills with grace.

Then I realized something.

During the fourth week of class, everyone would be invited to share the coping strategies that helped them most.

There it was.

Without changing the curriculum at all, I could share my own experience.

After all, my greatest coping strategy wasn’t a skill at all.

It was spending time with God each morning.

Being in His presence gave me strength, peace, and love for others, especially when life felt chaotic.

I looked forward to that night.

Then Everything Fell Apart

Have you ever anticipated an opportunity to share what God has done in your life only to feel like you had nothing left to give?

That was me.

In week four, life became a chaotic mess. My quiet time with God had been nonexistent. Validating others had hardly happened, radical acceptance felt impossible, and my self-care became absent.

I walked into class exhausted, overwhelmed, emotionally drained, and wondering how I could teach coping skills when I wasn’t using them myself. I was convinced I had failed.

The part that hurt the most wasn’t that I felt like I’d let the class down.

It was that I felt like I had let God down.

I had wanted so badly to point people toward the One who gave me hope, peace, and strength. Instead, I felt like I had nothing to offer.

God Whispered Something I’ll Never Forget

As I stood outside the classroom door, I sensed God whisper to my heart:

“Teach from where you are, not from where you shine.”

What if God isn’t asking you to teach from your strengths? What if He’s asking you to be honest about where you are and let Him work through your weakness? #teach #honesty #perfection Share on X

I wanted to ignore that nudge.

After all, I was the instructor. I didn’t have to share. I could facilitate the discussion and let everyone else talk.

But God kept gently prompting me.

So I did something that felt terrifying.

I told the truth.

I shared that I’d been having a terrible week. Instead of celebrating the coping skills, I admitted I hadn’t been practicing them. My time with God had suffered, healthy habits had slipped away, and I arrived completely worn out.

I expected people to wonder why I was teaching the class at all.

What Happened Next Surprised Me

Instead of losing credibility, I gained connection.

Everyone came back the next week—and the week after that.

Something changed the moment I stopped pretending. The walls came down because mine had.

I realized people weren’t looking for a perfect teacher. They were looking for someone who understood what it felt like to struggle and still keep going. The class wasn’t faith-based, but my faith was part of how I lived out what I was learning. Even when I wasn’t doing it perfectly, I was still learning what it meant to trust God in the middle of the struggle.

Our conversations became more honest. People felt safer sharing their own struggles because they knew they weren’t sitting in a room with someone who had life all figured out.

We were simply people learning together.

That night taught me something I have never forgotten.

The skills still work.

Faith still sustains us.

But none of us practice either perfectly.

Some days we respond with grace. On other days, we react before we think. Some days our time with God is rich and life-giving. Other days we’re just trying to make it through.

We all need grace.

Every single day.

God Uses Honest People

Living with mental illness—or loving someone who does—can leave us feeling like we’re constantly falling short. Sometimes the hardest part isn’t even the struggle itself. It’s the belief that we should be handling it better.

But this lesson reaches far beyond mental illness.

Maybe your struggle is anxiety, grief, burnout, addiction, parenting, a broken relationship, or trying to hold everything together. Whatever your struggle, it’s easy to believe you need to hide it until you’ve figured everything out.

But that’s not how God works.

Throughout Scripture, God consistently used ordinary, imperfect people—not because they had it all together, but because they were willing to trust Him in the middle of their weakness.

Our struggles won’t disqualify us. In fact, they often become places where God’s grace shines.

“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9, NIV)

Those words remind me that weakness isn’t necessarily the end of the story. It can become the very place where we experience God’s strength in a way we couldn’t otherwise.

What Happens When We Stop Hiding

Looking back, that evening became one of the most important lessons I’ve ever taught—not because I had the answers, but because I finally stopped pretending that I did.

I’ve discovered that people don’t connect with someone who appears to have life all figured out. They connect with people who are willing to say. “I’m still learning, but here’s what God is teaching me.”

Maybe you’ve been waiting until you’re stronger, wiser, or more confident before sharing your story.

Don’t wait.

Someone doesn’t need your polished version; they need to know that God meets ordinary people in ordinary struggles.

Your weakness may become someone else’s courage.

Your honesty may become someone else’s hope.

Your story—right in the middle of it—may point someone to Christ in ways perfection never could.

Your struggles don’t make your story less valuable. Your honesty might be exactly what someone else needs to know they’re not alone—and that God hasn’t left them in the middle of the mess. #struggle #honesty #perfection Share on X

What happened when I stopped hiding my struggles?

I discovered that God wasn’t asking me to be impressive.

He was asking me to be faithful.

And that made all the difference.

I’d love to hear from you. Have you ever found that God used one of your greatest struggles to encourage someone else? Share your story in the comments. Someone may need the hope only you can offer.

---