“Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?” Luke 12:25-26 (NIV)
“Almost everyone who comes into our office seems to be experiencing high levels of stress,” commented the nurse who was drawing my blood. My local doctor sent me to her recently for a routine blood test. As we were conversing we somehow came to the subject of stress and anxiety.
It’s not very difficult to see why people are under a cloud of so much worry in these times. We are under constant pressure from many sources nowadays. A case in point would be the US presidential race which ended this past week.
Even though I am not currently residing in the USA many people where I live in Ireland were watching the election with interest and I along with them. From my viewpoint, I was aware that many of my Stateside family and friends were profoundly anxious about the outcome of the election – one way or the other.
I’m obviously not the first to discover this, but anxiety is most often fueled by a sense of helplessness in the face of situations beyond our control. The outcome of an event or the fear of “what might happen next?” is reflective of anxiety’s dominance on the stage of our minds.
In recent years I’ve come to realize that worry and stress have had a much firmer grip on my soul than they should have had. Our tendency to worry about the real-life issues we face doesn’t usually have any influence over the situations themselves and in fact makes living in the present much more difficult in the process. Maybe it’s that we have the compulsion to “do something” about what troubles us, even when we realistically have little control in the situation.
It’s a negative cycle that’s not easily broken. Anxiety creates an ever growing snowball that keeps negative thinking growing. The effects of anxiety rob us of happiness that could be ours and influences the lives of those around us. It’s not very fun to be around people who don’t have a positive outlook on life. Anxiety is a toxin that takes away good things and gives nothing in return.
At the risk of being overly simplistic, I think one decision we can make today to start relieving the burden of anxiety on our souls is to examine our own thoughts in light of what they produce in our inner lives.
As reflected in the verse above, Jesus spoke to us very directly about our thought processes, particularly about the things we tend to stress over the most – our basic needs of food, clothing and housing. He spoke about God’s Kingdom, seeking it first, above all things, and trusting God to take care of all of our needs.
Over the past while I made some deliberate decisions about being much more intentional about my own thought life. As a result, I obtained a small notebook as a complement to my own personal journal. It’s specifically for recording positive things I’m seeing God doing in and around me – the signs of His Kingdom, so to speak. Answers to prayer, unexpected surprises, people who are special to me and reasons for celebrating what God is doing all find their way into the notebook.
As you might imagine, my “positive notebook” is progressing, but it doesn’t have nearly enough in it. I’m sure that I am only capturing a fraction of what God is actually doing around me and what could be recorded.
Whenever I’m tempted to let anxiety take root, or allow negative thoughts to dominate, my positive notebook is never far away. Taking time to reflect on the positives gives me a fresh perspective on my current problems and renews a spirit of gratitude within me.
I don’t expect to solve everyone’s problems with anxiety with one essay such as this. Just the exercise of sharing these insights gives me hope that whatever the future may hold for us, stress and anxiety need not have a dominating power in our lives. This is especially true for all who are seeking God’s Kingdom. We can intentionally yield to Him, longing to have His rule dominate our thoughts and hearts.
Lessons for Living 
Leave a Reply