Are you a worrier?
Did you worry about who your teacher or teachers would be this year, or maybe about who would be in your class? Did you worry about what you would wear the first day of school or about riding the bus?
Maybe you worry about fitting in with a group of friends or maybe you worry about something in your family or something you saw on the news or the internet.
Or maybe you aren’t a worrier at all and you can’t relate…
I hope you aren’t a worrier, but if you are, I can relate.
I have been a worrier since I was young. I have a tendency to worry about all sorts of things from projects at work to my house to my family to how many GUMY’s will come to a Sunday night session J. But l learned something a few years ago. Worry is a learned behavior. If you are a worrier, you learned to worry just like you learned to walk or to talk or to write your name. And just like talking or walking or writing your name seems to be natural worrying now seems to be a natural behavior. But it is not.
When you were in the second grade, you learned to write your name in cursive. Your teacher was no longer satisfied with block letters she wanted you to learn a new way to write. And we can do the same thing with worry. We can “unlearn” worry and learn “unworry”.
Worry starts in your heart…did you know that? Worry pulls on your emotions, your fears, until it becomes consuming, infiltrating all of your thoughts. Worry moves from your heart up to your mind. In Jeremiah 17:9, the Lord tells us that, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” If worry starts in your heart, how do you “unlearn” worry? You start where all learning starts: with your mind.
As I have tried to “unlearn” worry, I have been training my mind to take the worries that my heart sends up and turn them into prayers. The prayers are my way of releasing the worry from my heart and giving it to God. The prayers look something like this.
“God, You know who will be coming to GUMY this fall. You know each of their needs, hopes, and concerns. I pray that You will equip the leaders and me with the wisdom and the tools to support them and to help move each of them to a deeper relationship with You. I pray that everything we do in and through GUMY will glorify You. Amen.”
Sometimes when my worry is super big, I simply begin to take stock of all of the blessings God has given to me and the knowledge of how He has always provided eases my worry and unshackles the burden from my heart.
I will be honest and I often have to pray about the same worry multiple times before my “deceitful heart” will let it go to God, but ultimately the “unworry” will take over and I release the worry to God.
You can “unlearn” worry, but it is a choice you must make with your mind. And just like learning to write your name in cursive took hours of practice, learning to “unworry” will take a lifetime of discipline and practice. But I think we can do it with God’s help.
Are you up to the challenge?
Do you want to be an “unworrier”?
Did you worry about who your teacher or teachers would be this year, or maybe about who would be in your class? Did you worry about what you would wear the first day of school or about riding the bus?
Maybe you worry about fitting in with a group of friends or maybe you worry about something in your family or something you saw on the news or the internet.
Or maybe you aren’t a worrier at all and you can’t relate…
I hope you aren’t a worrier, but if you are, I can relate.
I have been a worrier since I was young. I have a tendency to worry about all sorts of things from projects at work to my house to my family to how many GUMY’s will come to a Sunday night session J. But l learned something a few years ago. Worry is a learned behavior. If you are a worrier, you learned to worry just like you learned to walk or to talk or to write your name. And just like talking or walking or writing your name seems to be natural worrying now seems to be a natural behavior. But it is not.
When you were in the second grade, you learned to write your name in cursive. Your teacher was no longer satisfied with block letters she wanted you to learn a new way to write. And we can do the same thing with worry. We can “unlearn” worry and learn “unworry”.
Worry starts in your heart…did you know that? Worry pulls on your emotions, your fears, until it becomes consuming, infiltrating all of your thoughts. Worry moves from your heart up to your mind. In Jeremiah 17:9, the Lord tells us that, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?” If worry starts in your heart, how do you “unlearn” worry? You start where all learning starts: with your mind.
As I have tried to “unlearn” worry, I have been training my mind to take the worries that my heart sends up and turn them into prayers. The prayers are my way of releasing the worry from my heart and giving it to God. The prayers look something like this.
“God, You know who will be coming to GUMY this fall. You know each of their needs, hopes, and concerns. I pray that You will equip the leaders and me with the wisdom and the tools to support them and to help move each of them to a deeper relationship with You. I pray that everything we do in and through GUMY will glorify You. Amen.”
Sometimes when my worry is super big, I simply begin to take stock of all of the blessings God has given to me and the knowledge of how He has always provided eases my worry and unshackles the burden from my heart.
I will be honest and I often have to pray about the same worry multiple times before my “deceitful heart” will let it go to God, but ultimately the “unworry” will take over and I release the worry to God.
You can “unlearn” worry, but it is a choice you must make with your mind. And just like learning to write your name in cursive took hours of practice, learning to “unworry” will take a lifetime of discipline and practice. But I think we can do it with God’s help.
Are you up to the challenge?
Do you want to be an “unworrier”?
Scripture Reference (click below)
Fun Fact of the Day…
Each year, about 500,000 detectable earthquakes occur in the world. About 100,000 of those can be felt and about 100 of them cause damage.
See…nothing to worry about.
Question of the day…
Did you feel the earthquake last week?
(Answer below in the COMMENTS section….)
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I am not a very good typer Alex said, but I tried to post for him...let's see if it works.
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