Discouragement is, hands down, archenemy number one!

Yet, it is so easy to fall into. Time goes on, you put in resumes, you knock on doors and nothing seems to gel. How easy to get discouraged.

Fight it! At all costs.

Why? Because, as the scripture from Proverbs points out, discouragement always results in loss of power. And, that is the last thing you need right now. To loose your power, your energy, your focus, your vitality, your creativity.

Discouragement wipes it all out, leaving you frozen and paralyzed.

“But, discouragement is something that just happens. It isn’t my fault if I get discouraged. It is the discouraging situation. I can’t help it.”

Ah, but there is the beauty in that verse. It IS under your control. Let me explain…

The Hebrew word rendered ‘shown yourself discouraged’ in the verse above is raphah. In various English translations, raphah at Prov. 24:10 is rendered as falter, faint, slack, fail, lose hope, become weary and lose courage, among others.

Per the Hebrew Lexicon, the basic meaning of raphah is to sink, relax, sink down, let drop, be disheartened, abandon, refrain, forsake.

It is basically the antonym of to take courage and in other instances is rendered letting ones hands drop down, meaning “lose courage, become too weak to act.”

The point of note here is that fundamentally it refers not to something that happens to you beyond your control, but is something that you let happen.  You let your hands drop down.  You lose your courage.  You allow yourself to become disheartened.  You abandon, refrain and forsake—all actions on your part.

So, really, to transliterate, Prov. 24:10 could be read as: “If you allow yourself to become discouraged, you will lose your power, your courage and your ability to act.”

Thus, it really is an admonishment:  “Don’t let yourself become discouraged.  You are in control.  You are not a victim of your thoughts.  Fight and maintain courage.  Don’t let your hands drop.”