Today I want to add to the foundation built yesterday. Here are some ideas for finishing touches on the greenhouse, for strengthening and for making our lives even more able to grow and sustain the joy we are given.
Cultivate a grateful heart full of thanksgiving for what is good, right, pleasurable or at least better than it was. When feeling like there is nothing or almost nothing to be grateful for, actually writing a gratitude list can help and force us to change our focus and perspective. Have you ever stared at a light for a while and then, when you looked away, it was hard to see what was really in front of you because of the afterimage from the light floating in your field of vision? We can get like that with our mental and emotional vision as well. We've spent so long looking at the problems, the stresses, what's wrong with us, with the people around us, the problems and the things and situations that make us feel ungrateful that when we decide to look somewhere else and focus on solution and our relationship with God, we can't see or feel anything but the afterimage. We feel like there's nothing else to see, and we close our eyes in disappointment, regret and disbelief, and give up before we give our spirit time to adjust and clear the afterimage from our mind and emotions so that the solution can shine through.
Instant potatoes take a few minutes, as does instant rice. Even an instantaneous touch from God might take a minute, but in truth there are few instant fixes in our healing and restoration. Sometimes things progress in such a way that we can not even see that anything has moved or changed. Like a child who wishes he would hurry up and grow bigger, we stare in our mental mirror and wonder why nothing ever changes. But when the grandparents or friends who haven't seen us in a while are shocked at how much we've grown, how much we've changed, we begin to realize the extent of growth in our life. One thing that can help with the image we see when we wonder if our life is changing and if we are moving toward the Promised Land rather than just wandering around in the desert is to use a joy can.
Joy can? Yep. Take a container, such as an empty coffee can (you can be as simple or as fancy as you want, decorate it or not - it just needs to be a solid container that can be easily opened and closed and will keep what is inside relatively safe and dry). Each day take one thing that you are grateful for that day, write it on a piece of paper and put it in the can. Be as specific as possible, especially with things that we are grateful for often. I wouldn't write that I am grateful for Leah. I am. Every day. but writing something like this is better. I am grateful for the way that she loves and cares for my mom. Or, I am grateful that she never leaves for work without letting me kiss her. What an awesome way to begin my day.
In addition to the one item of daily gratitude, on separate pieces of paper, put anything that made you feel especially happy, safe or blessed that day, and any answers to prayer or what you notice of God working and moving in your life and on your behalf. If you don't like the can, this can be done with a notebook/journal, but there is something fun about taking the can during a tough time when everything seems horrible and like it's been that way forever and always will be, removing that lid and dumping all this paper out in front of us and reading scrap after scrap of the goodness of God in our life. Either way though, doing this or something like it will train our eyes to look for the things to be grateful for through the scenes and afterimages of despair and disappointment.
We are not spiritual beings on a physical journey, nor are we physical beings on a spiritual journey. We are also not only what we think or feel. We are thinking, feeling spiritual and physical beings. The spirit is eternal and the spiritual is what matters most, but we can't neglect any aspect of our being and expect not to feel the effects of doing so. Seek to feed and exercise the spirit, work those praise muscles and stretch the spiritual body to reach further and further into gratitude and truth and love. But there are also things we can do for the rest of who we are that can help increase our ability to feel and recognize joy in our life. Mentally do things that make us think rather than simply being fed the thoughts and ideas of others. Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things (Philippians 4:8). Work to redirect your thinking to the things that draw you closer to God. Also do mental exercises to strengthen, quicken and improve mental acuity.
Emotionally strive to learn to deflect the triggers that send us spinning off, or avoid them completely. When we do hit a slippery patch and begin to spin, learn to relax and take your hands away from the controls. What we instinctively do during those times usually only makes things worse, but when we get out of the way and let God have His way and have control we come out of the skid much more quickly and in a safer way.
But we are also physical. Stay active. Move. Do something like yoga or exercise or something to work the body some. Healing and strengthening the body can boost our mood, but it can also slow and reverse the tendency toward depression. Some of us have greatly damaged our bodies over the years. Taking care of our bodies as well as possible, even if injury or illness makes what we are able to do limited, can go a long way to making us better able to feel joy and improve our overall well being.
Serve God and others. Get out of self. If you don't know your purpose at this time, you still know that loving and helping people is always good. Do the little things for others that will brighten their days and lives and please Daddy. It's amazing how much that will turn out to make our lives better as well. Then, as we honor God and obey Him in the things we know to do, we will discover down the road that He has led us into a life or purpose, and that, even if it is hard and unrewarding by financial or other worldly standards, will be a great source of joy.
Remember what misery and despair and bondage there was in life without God and remember what has changed in relationship with Him. I am accepted. I am forgiven and clean before Him. My past is no longer held against me by the One who is the ultimate judge. I no longer face judgment in the future. I do not have to hide from or enhance my life and reality today. I am not doomed to continue to fail at every turn. I have something to offer my wife, my family and my community rather than only sucking the life out of everything and every relationship I touch. I could go on, and your list my be different, but if you have found relationship with God, there are things that have changed that can cause you to take comfort and pleasure in and be grateful for that relationship, if you learn to look that direction.
The clouds come in life, and there is no point in trying to ignore them or pretend they are not blocking our view of the sun or effecting our mood. Lack of sunlight sucks joy away, as does lack of Sonlight. But no matter how cloudy and overcast, we can still see the effects of the sun and proof that it is still there if we look for it. The same is true with God. No matter how much our view of Him is hindered, there are still signs and effects of His presence. In His presence is not just joy but the best and most joy that is possible to be had.
You will show me the path of life: in your presence is fullness of joy; at your right hand there are pleasures for ever more.
Psalm 16:11
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