By Emily King-Nobles ’25

I was 17 when I first heard the words, “your life will never be the same.” I was sitting in a dimly lit doctor’s office looking across from the white haired, older man. He watched as my mom slowly grabbed my hand and steadied my shaking leg. It had been months of health problems, hospitals and a brain injury that rocked my world. The girl I had been for 16 years, full of health, life, friends and joy now seemed light years away. My life rapidly became unrecognizable. 

I started living with this question of, who would I be now that I was not ok? 

Who would I be now that I wasn’t the poster child for a perfect pastor’s kid? Now that being sick forced me to give up everything I thought had given me worth. 

Looking back, now six years later, I wish I could tell that girl that she had it wrong. The key to life is not to always be ok. The key to life is not never feeling pain. The key to life is not pushing everything away that could hurt you. The key to life is learning that you can feel it all and still survive.  

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (NIV) says, 

1    There is a time for everything,

and a season for every activity under the heavens:

2     a time to be born and a time to die,

    a time to plant and a time to uproot,

3     a time to kill and a time to heal,

    a time to tear down and a time to build,

4     a time to weep and a time to laugh,

    a time to mourn and a time to dance,

5     a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,

    a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

6     a time to search and a time to give up,

    a time to keep and a time to throw away,

7     a time to tear and a time to mend,

    a time to be silent and a time to speak,

8     a time to love and a time to hate,

    a time for war and a time for peace.

There is a time for everything. It says this so clearly in the Bible, and yet I still think we have trouble believing it. I have no trouble believing in the time of embracing, the timing of laughing, the time of dancing, but tearing down, weeping and mourning are a different story.

I have spent most of my life making sure everyone knew how ok I was. And then when I wasn’t ok, I did everything I could to figure out how to be ok again as quickly as possible. Yet the reality is I have not been ok since I was 17. I have been sick and heartbroken and in grief and depressed and fearful and exhausted and in pain. I have also been hopeful and excited and loved and held and enlightened. 

You can hold both things.

I want to offer you this phrase today. It’s one we say often in the social work world. What this means is that heartbreak and gratitude can co-exist together. Hope and fear can co-exist together. We will always be living in a space where feelings are intersecting and causing friction as they rub up against each other.

As my friends and I began our senior year at St Olaf, we reflected on what we would tell freshman year us. As I picture sweet 19-year old Em moving into her cubicle called Kildahl back in 2021, these are the words I hear myself telling her. “Feel it all. Em. It’s just life.”

Know that the point of life is to not get the prize for being the most ok.

Find your people and hold them closely. Let them walk through the battles with you. Know that the point of life is to not get the prize for being the most ok. What I thought would be the end of my life at 17 turned out to be just one of those detours God likes to give us, leading to a beautiful time to reconnect and heal.

I have to admit I sometimes struggle when I hear testimonies in the church. For I hear how people have been through hell, met Jesus, given a miracle and life was all better. And if that’s you, I am truly so happy and would love to hear about it. But I also want to hold a space to honor these stories with a whole lot of messy middles. I am still in that. And I will not tie this up in a neatly wrapped bow like I have spent years trying to do. I will instead say the truth. I am still sick and the grief of being sick still really sucks sometimes. I have spent months praying for a miracle and it still hasn’t come. That’s real, and that’s messy. But there’s this freedom I have found in breaking the memo that I have to be completely healed to be happy. For my journey has been full of mini miracles giving me hope, even if there is no hallmark ending. I can be scared and fearful and joyful. For there is a season and time for everything. The mourning and dancing can be held at the same time and neither means that the other isn’t just as real. 

But there’s this freedom I have found in breaking the memo that I have to be completely healed to be happy.

This year, I challenge you to listen to Ecclesiastes and give space to all the emotions. May your goal not to be completely rid every uncomfy feeling, but to live with it all. May you honor the sadness in the same way you honor the joy. There is an ache that will live in me all year of fear for the future and having to leave my home and favorite humans in just 9 months to start a new journey. This might be the last time I’m in school and that’s scary. I hold that ache of fear while I also embrace every beautifully simple moment here.

May an ache not be the sign that says you need to change, but instead be the sign that you are feeling the depths of a deeply broken world. A deeply complicated life.

May this be the year that you let yourself hold all the things. May an ache not be the sign that says you need to change, but instead be the sign that you are feeling the depths of a deeply broken world. A deeply complicated life. You are doing it right. 

You can feel it all. It’s just life.