Faith Venture

I’m writing this on a Tuesday early morning. It’s dark at 6 am. Next Tuesday the first lightening of the dawn sky will be upon me at this hour. For, the US switches from Daylight Savings Time to Standard Time Saturday night.

That means Facebook pages (used mostly these days by older adults who find change difficult to bear) will be filled with the angst of people not wanting to change. Newspaper editors will drag out the semi-annual stories of health risks supposedly caused by changing time. Politicians will jump on the bandwagon and promise to legislate Daily Savings Time into the dustbin of history.

And some, like me, will simply change the clocks Saturday before going to bed—well those that I still have to change—and get on with life.

We worry about so many little things. Sometimes we should emulate the iconic cover boy of Mad Magazine, Alfred E. Neuman, who said, “What, me worry?” For, almost every source of worry never happens.

It’s is healthier not to dwell in worry. 

If we must, how about worrying about what good we will do today? How we will be a little kinder to ourselves and others? How we will avoid being known as the community complainer?

Do you talk to yourself? What do you say? I will walk to a place and back and forget to pick up what I was looking for. I’ll say, “You dummy!”  That seems to be my favorite phrase.

Is yours worse than that? Do you say it too often?

The Irish poet John O’Donohue wrote a line found in his book, To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings,

Be excessively gentle with yourself.

Treating ourselves gently helps us develop the habit of gentleness. We can expand that to the way we approach others. Gently.

For as long as there have been schools with students organized in rows and columns, there have been teachers saying, “Keep your eyes on your own work.”

Once again what we learned in kindergarten is appropriate in life as an adult.

We notice other people’s bodies or relationships or how they keep house and talk (gossip?) with others about them.

The time spent looking, thinking, talking to others is better spent paying attention to our own bodies, our own relationships, our own life. Not in a narcissistic way. In an honest evaluation of where we are and where we can improve. 

We could eat better, exercise just a little more, listen to those around (not just hear, but actively listen), pick up after ourselves.

There are times to think about other people. Not to discuss them with others. Rather to compliment, praise. Also if they are your responsibility to correct or guide. Sometimes to encourage.