Worries
I hated reading books as a kid. If I ever had a choice between reading and anything else, I picked else. Every. Single. Time. I'm not sure if I was too impatient, too worried, or if this was some kind of personal anxiety...but I could not handle the suspense found in books. Not knowing what was going to happen to which character was agonizing. Did she live? Did her dog die? Was her mother really going to just leave her kids? Would he find her? My brain would go crazy with questions, and I closed the book. However, I also was a good student, and that required me to read.
I found a way around this little bit of lunacy. I would read the last page of the book. I started reading the book like normal, but after I had read a few chapters, I would flip to the end and see how things turned out. My mom couldn't believe what I was doing. I suppose it does seem like a bad idea, but for me, it calmed my mind and my worries; I could enjoy the rest of the book.
Watching sports makes me stressed in a very similar way. Because I married a serious sports lover, we have spent a great deal of time watching games. Well, to be clear, Brian has spent a lot of time watching. I clean, do dishes, check my phone, delete emails. I pick anything else. Sometimes I go to bed. In the morning, after I know the final score, I will go back and watch. Those are the best games! I know the outcome, so bad calls and stupid mistakes don't make me upset. I can just watch and be calm.
I want to not worry.
I worry about everything. I worry about my mom and about my kids. I worry if they have friends, or if their friends are good kids. I worry about teaching them to work, and to cook, and clean. I worry about my cluttered house. I worry about the bad haircut I just gave Landon. I worry and I worry and I worry.
Unfortunately, life doesn't have workarounds like reading the last page or watching an old basketball game. The stories that make up our own life don't have a skip forward button. I'm exhausted from worrying.
So in 2021, I'm trying to cut out the worry.
Corrie Ten Boom wrote, "Worrying is carrying tomorrow's load with today's strength--carrying two days at once. It is moving into tomorrow ahead of time. Worrying doesn't empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength."
Here I go. I need all the strength I can get.
