Live in the Now

Life has busy times, and less busy times. As I write this, I’m looking ahead at what is going to be a very busy month or six weeks. I have been given some amazing speaking opportunities that have just happened to coincide with some family visits and a whole lot of editing work. All of it is good. But all of it is happening at the same time. It’s going to take some doing.

I don’t know about you, but when I look ahead at times like these, I tend to feel exhausted. I start living in the future, thinking about how tired I’m going to feel when I’m doing all these things, and that makes me feel tired now. Often, when the busy period comes around, I feel less tired than I did beforehand when I was just thinking about the busy time.

I turn the days over and over in my mind, wonder just how I’m going to cope with it all and how I’m going to make it work. I ruminate on it, dwell on it, worry about it. All of that takes loads of emotional energy and leaves me depleted.

I live in the future as well as living in the present. And that doesn’t work.

I am trying to teach myself to take a different tack. 

I want to plan for the future, but live in the present.

There’s a lot I need to do to prepare for the busy time ahead. I need to print out worksheets, write sermons, fill the car with petrol, make a cake, and buy a couple of cards. And I’m not suggesting that I leave all that work to the last minute. If I decided just to live in the present and not think at all about the future, I would be making life a lot harder for myself. It is good, in the not-so-busy times, to do what we can to prepare for the future. I have been so grateful for the time I spent writing my course and preparing the worksheets and advertisements. This has made my life easy as I take what I’ve written and tweak it for the next situation.

Planning and preparing for the future is good. If you’ve got a busy time coming up, and there’s something you can do to prepare for it, then do the thing. Act. Get ready. 

But worry is different. That’s like sitting in a rocking chair, rocking and rocking and rocking but getting nowhere. Worry doesn’t help with the future at all. It doesn’t even help clear your head. It just makes you tired.

Worrying also stops your subconscious from being able to be creative about the situation. If you’re always bringing your concerns into the front of your mind, the creative, imaginative subconscious brain doesn’t get an opportunity to work. But if you stop worrying, you’re more likely to come up with creative solutions, if and as they are needed.

So, plan for the future, prepare as you can, do the actions you can do. But once you’ve done that, turn off the worry in your head. As much as you can. I’m preaching to myself here just as much as I’m talking to anyone else. I’m hoping that I can turn the worry off, because I know it can’t do anything, not even add a single hour to my life, as Jesus said.

He tells me, ‘Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.’ Matthew Ch 6.

I’m going to try to live each day as it comes, do the work I can when I can do it, and leave the rest up to him. I’ll plan for the future and try to make wise decisions about just how much I can fit into each day and each week, but I’ll live life now and leave out the worry altogether.

How do you cope with busy times? Do you have a strategy that helps you not to worry?Write to me and let me know at ruth@ruthamos.com.au or tweet me @aquietlifeblog or find me at Ruth Amos Author on Facebook. 

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