“I live in consistent fear and dread that something bad will happen,” I told him. “I feel like I’m always waiting for the other shoe to drop. My anxiety is crippling at times.”
Stephen Bell, a spiritual mentor to my husband and me, who was leading the Saturday class on prayer at church, looked at me and, with complete certainty, said, “That’s called foreboding.”
I felt tears instantly fill my eyes. Yes. That was it.
I was familiar with the word, but I had never used it to describe what I had been experiencing for so many years. Foreboding is a strong feeling that something bad or unpleasant is going to happen, even when there may be no specific reason to believe that it will.
After he said that to me, I realized I had been living there for a very long time. Foreboding steals peace and joy from everyday moments. It keeps part of your mind continually scanning the horizon for what might go wrong. Left unaddressed, it can become a mental prison- one you may not even realize you’re living inside.
And honestly, foreboding is an easy mindset to slip into when we live in a world that announces tragic news 24/7. We are constantly exposed to stories of tragedy, violence, illness, accidents, disasters, loss, and uncertainty. It’s on our televisions, our phones, our social media feeds, and in the notifications that pop up throughout the day. When our minds are repeatedly exposed to messages that something terrible has happened somewhere, it can become very easy to start believing that something terrible must be about to happen here. Without even realizing it, our brains can begin operating as though we need to stay on high alert.
Add difficult or traumatic experiences from our own lives to that constant stream of bad news, and it becomes even easier to understand how foreboding can take root.
For me, understanding this has meant looking not only at what I fear, but also at where those fears came from. Much of this year has been about doing exactly that- allowing God to uncover some of the destructive, deeper patterns and beliefs that have shaped the way I think and respond.
Full transparency: this year has included some challenge and discomfort for me, but it has also brought tremendous clarity and understanding. I’m beginning to believe those things often go together. Sometimes we must be willing to lean into what is challenging and uncomfortable to understand ourselves more deeply and eventually get to the other side of whatever issue we are facing; it is part of growth.
Much of 2026 has been that for me. God has been giving me little nuggets of clarity about myself- why I think the way I do, why I see things a certain way, and why I react in certain ways. It hasn’t always been comfortable, but with each new understanding, I feel a little freer. In short, the temporary discomfort has been worth it.
When Vigilance Becomes a Way of Life
One of the biggest things I am beginning to understand is where my foreboding mindset came from. There was a traumatic time in my life when vigilance served a purpose. Life taught me, very dramatically, that everything could change in the blink of an eye. That experience left a deep imprint on me, and somewhere along the way, vigilance became my default setting.
I learned to always scan for the next problem, anticipate what might go wrong, prepare for the worst, stay one step ahead of potential pain, and rarely, truly rest. What may have started as a response to something very real eventually became a way of approaching life, even when the original threat was no longer present.
And that realization has led me to one of the most important truths I am learning:
The past does not equal the present.
Just because something bad happened before does not mean I am predestined for it to happen again. I can acknowledge that there was a season when vigilance helped me navigate what was in front of me without allowing that season to dictate how I live today. I needed vigilance then, but I don’t need to carry it into every tomorrow.
I don’t have to keep paying for yesterday’s pain with today’s peace.
Perhaps this truth applies to you too.
When Fear Steals the Ability to Dream
Living on high alert long enough begins to shape not only how you respond to stressful situations but also, for me, how I viewed the future. Perhaps one of my biggest realizations has been how much foreboding affected my ability to dream.
Somewhere along the way, I developed a fear, even an insecurity, about looking forward to the future. Subconsciously, I began to believe that if I allowed myself to get excited about something, make plans, dream about positive possibilities, or simply believe something beautiful could happen, that might be the very moment the other shoe would drop.
As though worrying could protect me. As though vigilance could prevent heartbreak. As though expecting the worst could somehow soften the blow if the worst ever came, and perhaps most irrationally, as though allowing myself to dream might actually invite or attract something bad to happen.
When I finally began examining those beliefs instead of getting overtaken by them, I realized something:
THAT IS ALL A GIANT LIE.
Worrying about tomorrow does not protect me from tomorrow. Expecting something bad doesn't prevent something bad from happening, and refusing to dream doesn't make me safer- it simply prevents me from experiencing the hope and anticipation that are part of fully living.
More importantly for me, this type of fear-based thinking does not align with what God says. When I continually rehearse worst-case scenarios in my mind, I give things that haven't even happened (and probably won't) the power to steal the peace God has made available to me.
Understanding where my fear came from was important, but understanding alone wasn't going to free me from it. At some point, awareness has to become action.
From Awareness to Action
For me, breaking free from foreboding (which is a process) has involved every part of myself- spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical. I recently had someone pray with me specifically about releasing fear and foreboding, and it was incredibly powerful. I felt an immediate lifting of weight- a sense of release and lightness.
That experience reinforced my belief that I don't want to simply understand foreboding intellectually- I want to actively participate in ridding it from my life. One of the most practical ways I can do that is through awareness.
I am learning to pay more attention to my inner narrative. What am I telling myself throughout the day? What assumptions am I making? What story is my mind creating about something that hasn't even happened?
I have noticed that there is often a progression in destructive thought cycles: a thought enters my mind, I entertain it, I begin imagining scenarios around it, my body responds to those scenarios, and before I know it, I am experiencing anxiety over something that isn't actually happening. If you have ever dealt with this type of thinking, that cycle may sound familiar.
Awareness matters because it gives us the opportunity to interrupt the cycle. Awareness provides a pathway to freedom.
When I notice a foreboding thought creeping in, I don't have to entertain it or follow it down the rabbit hole. I can pray immediately and surrender the fear to God. I can use an anchor statement such as, “The past is not the present. I am safe in this moment. I do not have to predict the future. God is already there.”
I can also interrupt the physical anxiety response. I can put cold water on the back of my neck, step outside, take a short walk, do a workout, stretch, or intentionally slow my breathing. I can ground myself by asking, “What do I actually know to be true right now, not what am I afraid might happen?” And sometimes I can simply recognize the thought and say, “No. I’m not going there,” and redirect my attention.
These may sound like basic things to apply, and in reality, they are. It is often the simple things, practiced consistently, that cultivate the biggest change.
The goal isn't to become fearful simply because I had a fearful thought. And it is important for me not to automatically confuse a foreboding or catastrophic thought with intuition- they are not necessarily the same thing. The goal is to develop enough awareness to recognize these thought patterns, challenge them, and make a conscious decision about whether I’m going to agree with them.
As my awareness has grown, I have also begun to recognize that there is another layer to this for me.
Recognizing the Spiritual Battle
From a biblical standpoint, I believe foreboding can also be used as a weapon and tactic of the enemy, and that is something I want to become increasingly aware of. Think about it: what would the enemy like more than for us to spend our lives in constant fear and dread? If he can keep us anticipating disaster, questioning whether everything is going to be okay, and mentally rehearsing everything that could go wrong, he can keep us distracted from the peace, joy, purpose, and hope God wants us to experience.
Underneath all of that foreboding is a deeper question I have had to confront:
Do I really trust God with what happens next?
That has been incredibly convicting for me. Foreboding tells me I need to anticipate every possible problem so I can protect myself. Faith tells me I don't have to know what tomorrow holds because I know Who does.
When I continually agree with fear, I am essentially believing that my vigilance is what keeps me safe rather than trusting in God's provision and presence in my life. If I live there long enough, that mindset can begin to weaken my faith and affect my intimacy with God, because instead of resting in Him, I am relying on myself.
That is why raising our awareness of foreboding matters so much. We need to recognize not only what these thoughts are doing to us mentally and emotionally, but also where they may be pulling us spiritually.
Fear wants us fixated on the unknown. God invites us to trust Him in the unknown.
This is where something else enters the picture that I believe is one of our greatest weapons against foreboding: biblical hope.
Making Room for Hope
Stephen Bell, the spiritual mentor who first helped me put a name to foreboding, shared something with me that has become incredibly powerful as I work through this. He said:
“Biblical hope is the main weapon against foreboding. When my hope is low, that is an indicator that I am believing a lie about something in my life. When my hope is high, it’s an indicator that I am believing the truth. It’s powerful to be aware of our hope level in specific areas of our lives.”
That gave me another practical question to begin asking myself:
What is my hope level here?
When I think about my children, my marriage, my health, my work, my ministry, or my future, am I filled with hope, or am I expecting something to go wrong? And if my hope is low in a particular area, maybe instead of simply accepting and buying into that feeling, I need to get curious about it. What am I believing about this? Is it actually true? Does it align with what God says? Where is it coming from?
I think this is such a powerful self-check because low hope can reveal places where fear has quietly begun to take root and write the story for us.
Releasing foreboding, then, isn't only about learning to stop expecting the worst. For me, it is also about learning to trust God with what I cannot see and allowing myself to believe that the future can hold something good.
Romans 15:13 speaks beautifully to this:
“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.” — Romans 15:13 (NIV)
I love that Scripture doesn't simply describe God as someone who gives hope. It calls Him the God of hope. I also love the connection this verse makes between trust and hope: “as you trust in Him...” The more I learn to trust God with what I cannot control, the less room foreboding has to convince me that I need to control it. It's cause and effect.
Also, notice what accompanies that trust and hope: joy and peace. Those are the very things foreboding tries to steal.
Giving Myself Permission to Dream Again
For so long, part of me subconsciously believed that dreaming was dangerous; I am beginning to see dreaming differently now.
Dreaming isn't pretending difficult things will never happen, denying reality, or believing I can control the future. It is allowing room for hope and even excitement. It is believing that just because I have experienced painful things in the past, it doesn't mean pain gets to dictate the rest of my life.
So I am giving myself permission to dream again. Instead of dreading or worrying about the future, I can think about everything beautiful it might hold.
I can dream about my children’s futures. I can imagine them building lives they love. I can dream about their future marriages being healthy, vibrant, loving, and deeply fulfilling. I can dream about their children, my future grandchildren, and all the joy those relationships will bring.
I can dream about the years ahead with my husband- the experiences we’ll share, the places we’ll go, the memories we’ll make, and the ways we’ll continue growing together.
I can dream about what God might do through my work and ministry. I can imagine people I haven’t even met yet whose lives might somehow be touched, encouraged, strengthened, or changed through something God allows me to say or do.
I can look toward the future with hope instead of dread, and I can allow my soul and spirit to rest. This inner shift is incredibly freeing and empowering.
Choosing Peace in the Present
That word- rest- has become increasingly important to me because rest means I can stop constantly searching for the next threat. I can stop believing I need to anticipate every possible problem. I can stop treating peace as though it’s dangerous, and I can fully embrace the life I've already been blessed with instead of allowing fear about what could happen tomorrow to diminish what God has given me today.
This is beyond physical rest- this is rest for the soul.
Because one of the greatest pieces of clarity I've gained through all of this is this:
Foreboding doesn't protect us from future pain- it causes us to experience pain that hasn't happened, and may never happen, while simultaneously stealing the joy that is happening right now.
Sometimes foreboding spikes into intense anxiety. Other times it is more subtle- a persistent, low-grade sense of uneasiness whispering that something isn't right or that something bad must be around the corner. When we live there long enough, fear can begin to feel normal, but familiar does not mean healthy, and it certainly doesn't mean we have to stay there.
So, this is another layer of the onion for me this year- another deeply rooted limiting belief being exposed so that I can understand where it came from, recognize when it appears, challenge what it tells me, and choose something different.
Maybe that is what healing and evolving often look like. Not one giant breakthrough where everything suddenly disappears, but a continual process of awareness, acknowledgment, truth, practice, and choosing differently. Deeply ingrained fears don't disappear simply because we recognize them, but recognition gives us a choice. We can continue rehearsing the same fearful story, or we can begin writing a different one.
For me, that means I am no longer willing to spend today's peace trying to protect myself from tomorrow's possibilities.
So if you struggle with foreboding too, I want to encourage you to pay attention to the stories fear is telling you. Challenge them. Pray about them. Interrupt them. Replace them with truth, and begin paying attention to your hope level. Where is your hope high? Where is it low? In the places where it is low, what are you believing?
Bring those places before the God of hope. Ask Him to show you where fear has been speaking louder than truth and where your own vigilance may have replaced trust. Then, little by little, allow your soul and spirit to rest.
We don't have to rehearse tomorrow's pain before it arrives. We are allowed to fully live today while believing something beautiful may be waiting for us tomorrow.
So I am choosing to stop waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I am choosing to stop treating peace like something I can't trust.
I am choosing to believe that my past can inform me without imprisoning me, and I am choosing to trust God with what I cannot see.
I am choosing truth over fear, peace over vigilance, faith over control, and hope over foreboding.
After spending far too long preparing myself for everything that could go wrong, I am finally giving myself permission to imagine everything that could go right.
I am allowed to enjoy today. I am allowed to hope for tomorrow. I am allowed to dream about the future...and so are you.
Be well.
