Because technology keeps me functioning well, I didn’t anticipate the challenge of setting up my new home office. I found it very difficult to keep my normal rhythms without my usual connectivity. At one point my internet service provider literally cut the cable to my new house. It took me talking to five different agents over four hours just to convince them that they needed to send someone out to our home to fix it. Every time I was passed on to another agent, I could tell they were reading from the same script.
It literally felt like the movie Ground Hog’s Day, except Bill Murray could make different choices every day. I could not do anything different. It was as if I was locked into an endless loop where there were no choices. I was convinced I was talking to bots, but the agents sincerely told me they were not bots. I finally told the fifth agent that he was reading from the same script the previous four agents had read. Only then did he go off script and finally set up a technician to come to my home in FOUR DAYS! I hung up, it was almost midnight, and I was exhausted. For the first time in my life I felt like throwing my iPhone across the room, I didn’t! I know this was also a symptom of my recent move and all the accompanying stress.
Needless to say, I went to bed that night, wound fairly tight. I could feel how uptight I was, so I took time to reflect on God’s provision throughout my life. As I meditated on Psalm 23, I sensed a quiet peace come over me when I gave up any expectation for a resolution. It is just my internet and the devices in my house. Seriously, it was nothing of eternal significance. The next morning, as I was recalling and journalling these events, I felt my frustration begin to grow. Once again, I remembered these things had little eternal significance.
I have noticed when I tried to figure out what went wrong in this situation or when I attempted to fix it, the stress returned. It wasn’t high anxiety, but it is stress-anxiety, nonetheless. Even as I was journaling about this, there was an orange icon❗️ reminding me the internet connection was lost, and nothing could be saved. The implied message is, FIX IT!
This is part of maturing, learning to let stuff go which is of little eternal significance. I needed to stop trying to fix whatever was causing me stress and let it be. This is where scripture, songs and solitude help me.
I meditate on passages like Lamentations 3:19-24 (NIV):
I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall.
I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me.
Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:
Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.
They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”
I am convinced Jeremiah (the probable author of this passage) didn’t know the psychological processes going on behind the behavior he described here, but it is amazing how as he recalls all the bad things that have afflicted him, his soul is downcast within him.
But, when he chooses to fix his mind on God’s provision, love and presence, he finds himself hopeful. As he reminds himself that God is all he needs, he is able to wait for God and have peace in the process.
We know that God designed the brain in such a complex and miraculous manner. Neuroplasticity is foundational to the physical rewiring our brain by the pathways we mentally think. The neurologist Donald Hebb first wrote in 1949 that neurons that fire together wire together. And since that time research has repeatedly confirmed what Jeremiah described 2500 years ago.
This isn’t mere positive thinking. Notice that Jeremiah said, “…and this I call to mind.” He implied that experientially, God had shown his provision, love, and presence many times before. Jeremiah simply needed to let that truth sink again deeply into his soul.
This internet fiasco occurred almost six weeks ago, and it is now but a faint memory in my mind. Had I not journaled about it, I would have forgotten it. This is the same with so many of the things that can cause us tension. It only hurts us when we don’t follow God’s words through Jeremiah’s lament more often!
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