Befriend your emotions.

"It is obviously not good to act on your sudden emotions. But you don't have to repress them, either. You can acknowledge them and let them pass by. In a certain sense, you have to befriend them so that you do not become their victim."

- Henri Nouwen, The Inner Voice of Love

My stress during daily activities can be overwhelming at times. Pushing it down and burrowing through the piles of work left to be done is a temptation as tasks pile up, and I'm left feeling I need to do more, be more to everyone else. I've been learning that dealing with stress as it comes keeps me healthier and more balanced.

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Therapy gently reminds those of us dealing with stress that you can become aware of your thoughts, feelings, and sensations without judgment (Seligman, Selecting Effective Treatments). We can choose how we act on our feelings. Each one does not control how we act. My Dad had a saying when I was growing up - "You are only responsible for your response." Acknowledging those thoughts, fears, and attitudes as they come gives me an awareness of what my needs are. This awareness of myself helps in daily tasks, relationships, and living a more balanced and happy life. 

This too can encourage us to draw closer to The Lord. Knowing our strengths and weaknesses, that we aren't perfect and do (and will always) have areas to grow reminds me to trust him. "In my weakness, I am strong," Paul writes in 1 Corinthians. We don't have to be everything. Those daily stressors are a daily reminder. 

Character.

I'm reading a few books for my Spiritual Direction course coming up in a few weeks. I've been interested in how these books present God's character.

One book on contemplative prayer (which emphasizes listening to God rather than always talking at him in our prayer time) discusses the idea that God "slaps us upside the head" to teach us a lesson in certain situations. His character is to intercede on our behalf and guide us out of darkness and into his will for our lives, not the opposite, and not to slap us around any victimizing way, however the consequences to our actions may feel.

"God will correct your behavior, but he never condemns your worth. It is the enemy who sends such thoughts as "I am no good", "I will never amount to anything", "I am a failure", "I am a nobody", "I am not important." But God says you are his "dear one" (he chooses you and knows all about you), his "beloved child," and a thousand other wonderful things." (Peter Lord, Hearing God, p. 132)

His character is good. And as he delights in us, his aim is not to shame us but to grow us up in healthy character like his.

Life planning.

I have friend who recently attended a missions conference to study linguistics.

She met another lady her age who feels called to Pakistan. She said she went to medical school and felt called to a specific, very narrow branch of medical physiology. She had never felt called to Pakistan - literally, she would have gone anywhere in the world but a Muslim nation - but the Lord "gave her the desire of her heart" and she recently found a hospital that was looking for a woman with her very specific training.

What struck my friend is that the Lord literally placed into her new missionary comrade the desire to study a certain branch of medicine & go to a country where she had felt called away from in the beginning.

I'm glad to serve one who gives me specific desires to grow, mold, and shape me into one who brings delight to him by doing the specific will that he places within me.

Sunday morning reads.

"It is manifest that the anxiety that shadowed too many of my days was that I should miss the path of righteousness. Better that anxiety perhaps than a cavalier carelessness, but the years since have proved to me over and over again that the heart set to do the Father's will need never fear defeat. His promises of guidance may be fully counted on."

- Elizabeth Elliott, Passion and Purity, pp. 49-50.

Anointing.

Our God is a God of purpose and intent, and he intends to impact the lives of people. He never gives a blessing, extends a gift, offers an opportunity, or creates a solution without a specific purpose. To whom God has handpicked for specific calling, established with his power, and anointed by His Spirit have been given that privilege of being a conduit through which those blessings can flow to others.

Often servant hood and submission mark the truest test of an anointed person.

I envy their peace in the midst of trial and their ability to make keen decisions with deep spiritual insight and wisdom... Many would consider these rare individuals weak and indecisive. To the contrary, it shows strength. Determining the wisest thing to do is to seek God's direction - having the incredible benefit to access the ear of God.

I feel completely ill-equipped to accomplish this. But in accordance to God's word, I fully believe I have been created, established, pre-designed, and equipped by God to fulfill that purpose. I am not capable in my flesh, but by God's glory I have been anointed. As his workmanship, my main purpose is to glorify God.

- Priscilla Shirer, Anointed, Transformed, Redeemed. 

Encouragement from my ethics book.

"Penderson (2000) reminds us that culture is complex, yet this complexity can be viewed as a friend rather than foe because it helps us avoid searching for easy answers to hard questions" (Corey, Corey, & Callanan, 2011).

My friend Kyndall and I used to sit for coffee and discuss where we thought our lives to be going, to confusion of deciding what to do with our lives, along with the excitement of being able to accomplish anything we put our minds to.

During our sophomore year, she discovered a quote from a speaker that she put up on her wall - "Sometimes the answers are in the questions." Some situations are so complex that the solution is to just keep asking more and more questions. And there is some beauty in that.

Letter to a friend.

You mentioned needing encouragement, and this passage encourages me when I'm not feeling particularly hopeful. It's about David, he's battling some army, but then he stops and "encourages himself in the Lord" (1 Samuel 30:1-6) before going forward. It was impressed upon me how we can "encourage ourselves," and that it isn't our external circumstances dictating our inner emotional state and frame of mind, but our heart that must be continually on guard to stay encouraged, hopeful and determined to walk in the Lord's will. Since we are supposed to know what the will of the Lord is (Ephesians 5:17) - it makes sense that this is something that the Lord would want for us: clarity of mind, heart, and having the wisdom to discern and know his will for our lives.