Am I the Only One Feeling This?
Daily Devotional — Tuesday, October 20, 2026
“For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” — Matthew 6:21, NKJV
Heart Change Insight
Sometimes what hurts us most is not obvious from the outside.
Two people can go through something similar and experience it very differently. One person may recover quickly from criticism while another feels it for days. One person may brush off a broken promise while another feels deeply betrayed. The difference is not always that one person is stronger or weaker. Sometimes the difference is what we care about.
We use a simple saying in Heart Change:
You can only be hurt by what you care about.
That doesn't mean every painful experience was supposed to happen. It does not excuse betrayal, abuse, deception, cruelty, or someone else's destructive choices. It simply gives us another question to ask after the hurt: What did this touch in me that matters deeply?
Am I the Only One Feeling This?
If loyalty matters deeply to us, deception can cut very deeply. If relationship matters deeply, rejection or disconnection may affect us strongly. If we value understanding and truth, being misunderstood may stay with us longer than someone else expects. If productivity matters to us, being blocked or surrounded by what feels like carelessness can stir real frustration.
The pain does not make the value bad. In fact, asking ourselves Am I the Only One Feeling This? can become an important movement toward heart change when we notice that other people seem less affected by the same kind of experience. The difference may help us recognize a core value underneath the wound.
Our core values often sit close to the way we understand purpose, calling, relationship, and who God created us to be. That is why something touching one of those values can carry so much weight. The harmful event did not create the value, and recognizing the value does not excuse what someone else did. It simply helps us understand why the wound landed where it did.
Find the Value
We can say, “What happened was wrong,” and still ask, “What does my response show me about what I value?” Those truths do not compete with each other.
The person who hurt us remains responsible for the choices they made. Recognizing what we value does not make us responsible for another person's deception, rejection, abuse, or harmful behavior. It gives us a clearer view of what is happening in our own heart now.
That is where partnering with God becomes practical.
Instead of only reacting to what happened, we begin recognizing what the experience touched. Then we can ask God how that value is meant to be expressed through His life rather than through bitterness, fear, control, resentment, withdrawal, or self-protection.
We might pray, God, loyalty matters deeply to me, and being deceived hurt. Help me understand what is happening in my heart and show me how You want this value to flow through my life now.
The goal is not to stop caring. God may have placed that capacity to care deeply within us for a reason.
The goal is to let the thing we care about become a place of partnership with God, rather than a place where the pain gets to decide what comes next.
Pain may tell us that something mattered.
God can help us understand what.
Reflection Question
What recent hurt has stayed with you longer than you expected? Without excusing what happened, what does your response reveal that you deeply care about? How might God want to meet you in both the wound and the value underneath it?
Prayer
Father, You know what has hurt me and why some experiences have touched me so deeply. Help me recognize the values You have placed within me without minimizing what happened or taking responsibility for someone else's choices. Meet me in the places that are wounded and show me how to partner with You in what comes next. Teach me to let the things I care about flow through Your life rather than through fear, resentment, or self-protection. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Today's Step of Obedience
Think of one situation that has affected you deeply. Complete this sentence without trying to fix or explain the experience:
“This hurt because I deeply value __________.”
Bring both the hurt and the value to God. Ask Him how He wants you to express that value in partnership with Him today.
Grow Deeper
LISTEN
Audiobook, chapter 9
Releasing God's Life Through the Hearts of Men
The primary teaching behind this devotional, exploring spiritual flows, core values, gifting, and the God-created capacities beneath some of our strongest reactions.
Listen to Chapter 9 read by author David A. Case
READ
Greater Than
Go deeper into spiritual DNA, core values, gifts, and partnering with God in the way those values are expressed.
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