Words I Kept for Rainy Days: My Pantry of Hope

 For the days when healing feels slow and the mess is still loud.

There are days when the sky outside matches the one inside me — both heavy, both gray.

On those days, I reach into something unseen. A quiet shelf I’ve built over the years.

My pantry of hope.

I didn’t always have one. For a long time, I wandered without any kind of storehouse. I’d let life hit me, and I’d crumble with nothing to soften the fall. But somewhere between the mess and the misses, I started collecting.

Not things. Just… words.

A line from a poem.

A whispered prayer I didn’t finish.

A message I never sent to someone who unknowingly reminded me I mattered.

A journal entry I wrote in the middle of the night, shaking but still writing.

I didn’t know I was stocking up. I just knew that when life felt like famine — of peace, of love, of self-belief — some words fed me. They didn’t fix everything, but they gave me enough strength to sit up. To breathe. To go on.

Some days, all I have is a sentence. A soft one.

“You are not too late.”

Or maybe:

“This is not the end of your becoming.”

And sometimes, I reach for this one — a line I found somewhere, wrote down, and held close ever since:

“No matter how many times life leaves me broken, I will rise amongst the shattered pieces. Holding them together until I am whole again.”

Not all words are dramatic or aching. Some arrive quiet and clear like a compass. I once wrote down a line during a devotion session (the exact name escapes me now, but the message stayed):

“Less of what doesn’t matter and more of what does. What matters most is to be rich in God.”

It reminded me that even in seasons of scarcity or confusion, there’s a richness that can’t be taken from me. And that’s something I can always return to.

We all have a different kind of pantry.

Mine just happens to be made of words.

They don’t always taste sweet. Some are bitter truths, others dry like crackers. But when the soul is starving, even a single line can feel like a feast.

So on rainy days — the inside kind — I remind myself to open the pantry.

Not everything is gone. Not everything is lost.

Somewhere on the shelves, I left myself reminders that I’ve made it through worse.

From My Pantry of Hope: The Lines I Return To

(For the days when I forget, these remind me.)

A Small Note on These Words:

Some of the lines I’ve kept in this pantry are things I wrote. Others, I copied from books, talks, devotionals, or messages that once moved me — often without remembering to jot down who said them first. I don’t claim them as my own. If you recognize a line and know the original author, please let me know so I can give credit where it’s due. I’m simply sharing the words that carried me — in case they carry you, too.

“Spend time with yourself and you will learn that there is so much to love about you.”

“Rejection does not mean you're not good enough — they just can't handle what you can offer.”

“There are no things you can't do as long as you put your heart into it.”

“Let go of the past. Live with the present. Embrace the future.”

“With man, this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.” — Mark 10:27

“Sometimes God wants to do something in you before He does something for you.”

“Your breaking is your blessing. You're broken because God is working miracle for person around you.”

These are just a few. There are more tucked in old journals, voice notes, margins of books.

Some sit sealed like jars I haven’t opened in years.

But these? These have fed me when I had nothing else.

And that’s enough hope to hold me until the sky clears again. - MESSY E.

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