At twenty-seven, I was supposed to attend a weekend training conference. Instead, I collapsed on the floor and cried uncontrollably for hours. My wife stood over me, bewildered, as I experienced my first complete nervous breakdown.
The warning signs had been building for months—sleepless nights, anxiety I couldn't shake, feeling like I wanted to crawl out of my skin. My new marriage was struggling, I had no emotional regulation skills, and I was thirty pounds overweight with high triglycerides. Like most driven people, I thought the answer was to push harder. Until my body and mind said
no.
Fast forward twelve years to 2014. I was the senior pastor of a growing urban church, a part-time youth worker, husband, and father. We were launching an ambitious "grand opening" requiring a large sum of money and massive investment of energy. I found myself teetering on the edge of burnout again.
One Wednesday afternoon, during what should have been peaceful prayer time, my anxiety swelled until another breakdown felt inevitable. But then something profound happened. In that moment of crisis, I came to this realization:
" You don't have to understand or control everything to live from a place of rest."
That day changed everything for me. Years of pressure lifted. Peace flooded my soul, and I felt completely at rest.
It was the beginning of something I'd been desperately seeking—learning how to integrate all the essential parts of life and leadership into a sustainable whole.
