Life can weigh heavily on our hearts — whether through difficult life circumstances, ongoing stress, grief, or simply the accumulated weight of living in a broken world. In those darkest seasons, it can feel like joy is a forgotten memory and you’re stuck in the depths of a miry pit. In our previous article, we talked about how to help children heal after tragedy, but today let’s turn our focus to adults who may need help rediscovering the joy that God created them for.
When Life Feels Unbearably Heavy
As believers walking through these valleys in darkness, we often find ourselves asking: “How do I find my way back to joy? How do I move from this place of heaviness back to the abundant life that God intends for me?”
In my many years of practice, I am intimately aware that sorrow and difficulty are part of the human experience, but God desires restoration and joy for His children. Scripture reminds us that “weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning” (Psalm 30:5). Yet sometimes that morning feels far away, and we need intentional guidance to find our way back to the light.
Evidence-Based Strategies Rooted in Biblical Truth
1. Create Sacred Space for Lament
Clinical Foundation: Research in grief and trauma recovery shows that suppressing difficult emotions often prolongs suffering. We need permission to feel our heaviness fully before we can authentically move toward healing.
Biblical Wisdom: “A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance” (Ecclesiastes 3:4). The Psalms also are filled with honest expressions of pain that ultimately lead to praise.
Practical Application: Don’t rush yourself toward joy. Create safe spaces in your life where you can express your heaviness without judgment — through journaling, prayer, meeting with a counselor, or conversations with trusted friends. Allow yourself to say, “This is hard, and it’s okay that I feel this way.”
2. Restore Wonder Through Intentional Experiences
Clinical Foundation: Studies have found that experiences of awe and wonder can reset our nervous system by reducing stress hormones and increasing positive neurotransmitters associated with joy and wellbeing.
Biblical Wisdom: Jesus said, “Unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3). Childlike wonder is a pathway back to joy and trust in God, regardless of our age.
Practical Application: Intentionally seek out experiences that evoke wonder — stargazing while reflecting on God’s vastness, watching sunrise or sunset, spending time in nature, listening to music that moves your soul, or engaging with art that stirs something deep within you. Start small and be consistent.
3. Practice Gratitude as Neural Pathway Training
Clinical Foundation: Neuroscience research shows that gratitude practices literally rewire brain structure, creating new neural pathways associated with positive emotions and resilience.
Biblical Wisdom: “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:18). Gratitude is not about denying pain but about training our hearts to notice God’s goodness even in difficult seasons.
Practical Application: Begin with simple, consistent practices. Keep a gratitude journal, share three things you’re thankful for during prayer time, or take photos throughout the day of moments that spark even the smallest sense of appreciation. Remember: we’re retraining our brains to notice light.
4. Cultivate Deep Connection and Community
Clinical Foundation: Research consistently shows that healthy relationships are the strongest predictor of emotional wellbeing and resilience in adults. Social connection releases oxytocin and reduces cortisol levels.
Biblical Wisdom: “Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor. If either of them falls down, one can help the other up” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10). “Pray for one another, that you may be healed” (James 5:16)
Practical Application: Resist the urge to isolate when you’re heavy-hearted. Intentionally invest in relationships with people who can hold space for both your sorrow and your journey toward joy. Join a small group, reconnect with old friends, pray for one another, and/or seek professional Christian counseling where you can process honestly in a safe environment.
5. Embrace Gentle Movement and Embodied Joy
Clinical Foundation: Exercise and movement studies show that physical activity releases endorphins and helps regulate the nervous system, particularly important when processing depression, anxiety, or trauma.
Biblical Wisdom: “I discipline my body like an athlete, training it to do what it should” (1 Corinthians 9:27 NLT). “She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come” (Proverbs 31:25). Joy often begins in the body before it reaches the heart, and we can intentionally move in ways that invite our souls to remember delight.
Practical Application: Start where you are. This might be gentle stretching while you pray, taking walks while listening to worship music, dancing in your living room, or simply sitting outside and breathing deeply. Honor your body as the temple of the Holy Spirit and notice how movement affects your mood.
6. Return to Rhythm and Sabbath Rest
Clinical Foundation: Research shows that predictable rhythms help regulate the nervous system and provide a sense of safety and control, especially important during seasons of emotional difficulty.
Biblical Wisdom: God established rhythms of work and rest, seasons of planting and harvest. “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
Practical Application: Create calming, sustainable rhythms in your life that include time for rest, reflection, connection, and spiritual practices. Prioritize Sabbath rest as both spiritual discipline and mental health practice. Be flexible with yourself while maintaining overall structure.
Understanding Your Processing Style in Joy Recovery
Different personalities will find their way back to joy through different pathways:
- Action-Oriented Individuals: May need to serve others or create solutions to feel purposeful and joyful again
- Verbal Processors: Benefit from talking through their experiences, journaling, reading poetry, or joining discussion groups
- Analytical Thinkers: Find joy through understanding their emotions and developing personal growth strategies
- Peace-Seeking Individuals: Often return to joy through quiet activities, solitude, nature, and contemplative prayer
Understanding your own processing style allows you to be patient with yourself and choose practices that honor how God uniquely designed you.
The Journey Through Spiritual Seasons
Sometimes our heaviness is part of what spiritual directors call “the dark night of the soul” — a season where God feels distant and joy seems impossible. During these times:
Embrace the Mystery
Accept that some aspects of your suffering may remain beyond understanding. ” ‘For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the Lord” (Isaiah 55:8).
Practice Spiritual Disciplines Even When They Feel Empty
Continue prayer, Scripture reading, and worship even when they don’t “feel” as meaningful. Sometimes faithfulness precedes feeling.
Seek Spiritual Direction or Christian Counseling
Professional guidance can help you discern whether your heaviness is circumstantial, clinical, spiritual, or a combination—and provide appropriate support for your journey.
The Theological Framework for Joy Recovery
When you wonder if you’ll ever feel joy again, anchor yourself in these truths:
- God’s Promise of Restoration: “He will wipe every tear from their eyes” (Revelation 21:4)
- Christ’s Understanding of Sorrow: Jesus was “a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief” (Isaiah 53:3), so He intimately understands your pain
- The Holy Spirit as Comforter: “The Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost” (John 14:26) walks with you through difficult seasons
- Joy as Your Strength: “The joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10)
- Beauty from Ashes: God promises “to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning” (Isaiah 61:3)
- From the Cross to Joy: Jesus died on the cross because it would bring joy. “Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.” (Hebrews 12:2)
Moving Forward in Hope
At Cornerstone Christian Counseling, my fellow counselors and I believe that clinical excellence and biblical truth work together to guide individuals from heaviness back to joy. Romans 15:13 captures our heart for you: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
When you intentionally journey from heaviness to joy through both evidence-based practices and biblical wisdom, you develop:
- Emotional resilience that acknowledges pain while believing in restoration
- Healthy coping strategies that honor both your psychological needs and spiritual design
- A testimony of God’s faithfulness that can encourage others walking through darkness
- The capacity to hold both sorrow and joy as you mature in your faith
- A deeper understanding of God’s character through both valleys and mountaintops
Final Encouragement
Remember that returning to joy is often a gradual process, not a single moment. If you’re experiencing persistent depression, anxiety, or inability to experience pleasure in activities you once enjoyed, please consider professional Christian counseling that integrates clinical expertise with biblical hope.
The journey from heaviness to joy is not about pretending pain doesn’t exist or forcing artificial happiness. It’s about learning to trust that God can bring beauty from ashes and joy from mourning. It’s about discovering that you can honor your sorrow while also taking steps toward healing.
Your heaviness is not a sign of weak faith. Your questions don’t disqualify you from God’s love. Your struggle to find joy doesn’t mean you’re doing Christianity wrong. It means you’re human, living in a broken world, and in need of the same grace and restoration that every believer requires.
“Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them” (Psalm 126:5-6).
The seeds you plant in your season of tears — the small acts of faithfulness, the gentle steps toward healing, the choice to remain open to God’s work in your life — these will grow into a harvest of joy that is deeper and more authentic because it has been refined through suffering.
You are not forgotten. You are not abandoned. And your story is not over.
Written by Sean Taylor, LMFT, Cornerstone Founder, and CEO
For additional resources or to connect with one of our licensed Christian counselors, visit christiancounselingco.com or call our office to schedule a consultation.
