Turning the Page

Are you out of balance? Perhaps what you need for your mental health are more activities that are tangible and tactile.

In the 1980s, my father and I spent many months building new fences on the farm.

We would clear the old post and wire fence away and make a new fence. First, posts would be driven into the soil, wires run out, stretched tight, and nailed to posts. Then, wooden battens would be fixed to the wires, and we would be done.

But not quite.

Then we would stand by the fence, look at it with wires so tight you could play a tune on it, and admire our work.

Something good here needed to be noted and nourished into our souls. We had created, and it felt good to look at our handiwork.

We improved at the craft every time we built a new fence line.

But the absolute joy came when you would come to that fenceline years later, and it would still be there. Proud and true, you could say with some pride, ‘I built that.’ It was tangible and tactile, not intangible and abstract.

It’s forty-plus years since I built that fence. I don’t know if it’s still there or not. I have moved on, and the salt-borne winds have probably eaten away at the shiny steel to the point it will have needed replacing.

But I often think about that fence because here was an achievement that Father and son accomplished together. I remember pausing for a moment to let it sink into our brains and nourish the good.

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God, I need a miracle, but perhaps I need something more, and that is what God offers me and you. Something of depth and hope.

There are times in life when there is a cry from the heart for a miracle. It’s that diagnosis, the loss of a job, a relationship breakdown, a financial loss. Search your heart, and you will know the times when you have cried out, ‘God, I need a miracle.’

What’s a miracle?

One definition describes a miracle as ‘an extraordinary event manifesting divine intervention in human affairs—eg the healing miracles described in the Gospels.

The word miracle comes from words such as mīror (“to wonder at”), from mīrus (“wonderful”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)meyh₂- (“to smile, to be astonished”).

A miracle should cause you to be astonished, smile and wonder. It should cause you to think about something beyond yourself.

Take note that in these definitions, there is no sense of a time frame. We add the time frame, which is usually in the impatient NOW!

We, like impatient demanding toddlers, want it all, and we want it now.

But we look at the stories of Jesus and see the immediacy of people being healed, bread and fishes being multiplied, people being raised from the dead, etc.

We see the outcome, the cessation of struggle, and we want it now, now, now. Yet in God’s poetic economy of time, ‘a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day.’ 2 Peter 3:8

Still, we pray and beg and plead for miracles. We sing, fast, give, and stand on our heads. We are much like those prophets of Baal dancing around the sacrifice, thinking that if they dance more, their God will do the miracle. 1 Kings 18:26-29

Perhaps that version of God has to die or at least be told to leave the building.

Something sad within me gets touched when I sense people are waiting for the miracle to happen. They use language that speaks to some sort of magic God. They are waiting for God’s magic wand to be swept over their problem so that with an ‘Abracadabra,’ the problem disappears.

I want a miracle, but actually, I want to know God more than the relief of earthly struggle, and that is where the tension is. Better life or deeper knowing.

The miracle may not happen according to my terms of reference. The cancer may not go away, the marriage may continue to crumble, and a hard heart refuses to soften to grace.

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So many good things go unnoticed, but when we learn to take in the good and let it nourish, then our whole direction of a life can change. 

My neighbors have some small children.

Yesterday, while walking in the garden, one of the little boys ran up to me to say hello. I then led him over to where some grass seed was beginning to come through the soil. We both got down on the ground and looked at the little seedling poking its way into the world. We were taking in the good.

Then we went over to the roses, and there were multiple rose buds about to burst their way into the world. We were taking in the good and letting it nourish. Finally, we saw a rose that had come out displaying its beauty. I picked it, and we smelt it—no perfume, which was a letdown.

I suggested he give it to his mother so she could take in the good and let it nourish.

I went into the orchard and saw a plum tree ablaze with flowers, then a Kereru (New Zealand Native wood pigeon) landed in the tree. So I stopped and took in the good and let it nourish. That was until I found out it was eating the flowers, which meant I wouldn’t have plums in a few months’ time. So today I am putting some net over the trees.

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It’s a breakdown, a mental health breakdown, and it’s happened again, but there is a way to recover, and it’s something you can achieve.

The end result was exhaustion. They were empty of life and totally drained. So it was no wonder they were depressed and simply wanted to die.

It’s a story I hear all the time.

The body can only take so much. After that, it begins to break down.

You don’t hear this term so much these days, but it was pretty common to be told about someone having a ‘Nervous breakdown.’ For me, it meant someone not being able to cope. To crash into a wall of complete mental exhaustion. Unable to do much at all.

“Nervous breakdown” isn’t a medical diagnosis. But, it’s a type of mental or emotional health crisis. You may feel an overwhelming amount of stress, anxiety, or depression. In turn, you’re not able to function in daily life. Cleveland Clinic

These days we might use the term Burnout to describe what has happened.

But it’s that zone of existence where you have nothing left to go on.

It’s the heap of metal on the side of the road, commonly called a car, but it has broken down. It’s run out of fuel, blown a radiator hose and all the tires are flat.

It has no use to anyone other than being an obstacle to avoid. You’re that old heap of a car pulled over to the side of the road and have come to the end of your ride. You’re depressed to the point of wanting to die.

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They were always wrestling with comparisonitis, but that changed when they accepted themselves and became a peacemaker to their parts.  

It seemed they were always striving. I was wanting this and wanting that. They couldn’t make peace with the fact they weren’t meant to be superman or wonder woman.

They wanted to be someone else. They wanted something else, and the world’s economy pandered to this lust and obsession.

I think the most dangerous disease in this world is called Comparisionitis. If it doesn’t kill you, it will undoubtedly suck the life out of you.

It’s contagious and affects everyone I know. Yet, we continue to compare ourselves to others.

We look at others and make judgments on a thousand different aspects. You will have made some judgments about me.

I have made peace with myself that I am not someone else and don’t want to be someone else. I want to be fully me.

Is there still work to do? Of course. This Comparisionitis disease is ancient and old.

Are you comfortable with you?

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Words tumble through our thinking to be a soliloquy, but you can change what you meditate on Day and Night when you change the song.

You probably won’t hear this word spoken today, this week, or even this month.

Soliloquy.

But you will hear a soliloquy today, and you will also speak a soliloquy today. Your soliloquy is an expression of what is happening in your inner world.

To me, the word sounds musical. Something to be sung. It also sounds sad. A sad song?

Of course, it’s one of those fancy words that no one ever says, but it has a special appeal or allurement.

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They were sitting with sadness, and life was fading away, but once they recognized its presence, they could accept it and learn from the shadow.  

Do you like shadows?

When I’m working out in the sun’s heat, a shadow provides a respite. A place away from the intensity of light beating on my skin.

But I’ve also noticed, at times, a shadow seemingly hanging over me. I can’t seem to escape it. I try to run from it, avoid it, and pretend it isn’t there, but I know it’s there.

It feels as if it might engulf me and swamp me into itself.

It’s there, and I don’t want to look at it.

But it’s a shadow, and what’s a shadow? It’s where some object has blocked out the light. It could be a tree, building, cloud, a person, or even a planet.

The light loses its intensity and is filtered, blocked, and hindered.

In that shadow lies a feeling I know. Sadness.

Other words link arms in the shadow. Grief, loss, loneliness, despair, depression, abandonment. It can be a pretty dark place in that shadow.

Sadness is the whisper of loss, the song of the ‘less than.’

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We all have a story, and it’s full of ‘and’s, but this is a story to learn from. So, therefore, we notice the ABT framework in ourselves and others.

There is a pattern to our lives; once you see it, you will see it everywhere. It’s in every great story, including your own.

I came across it a few years ago while listening to a podcast about why Donald Trump won his first presidential election. He told a better story. An ABT story. Make America Great.

And, But, Therefore.

Every great story has an ABT.

From a Fairytale to a Thriller.

Cinderella had no dress AND shoes AND coach to go to the ball, BUT her Fairy Godmother waves a magic wand and provides for her. THEREFORE, she has the shoes, the dress, and the coach.

Jason Bourne has a bomb ticking AND has only 30 seconds before it explodes and kills thousands of people, BUT because he has had years of training, he knows what to do. So, THEREFORE, he calls his grandmother for advice.

You will be able to see this sequence in your own life story.

In the simple. ‘I am hungry, but I have food in the pantry; therefore, I will go and have something to eat.’

In the complex stories such as ‘I fell in love, and things were going ok, but then I found out she was a chronic gambler. Therefore I am going to get some help and try and sort this mess out.

Can you see ABT in your life?

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Life can be noisy, full of distraction, and leave you confused, but with the invite to listen, we can hear the whisper of ‘this is the way you should go.’

I have a lot of noise in my life. Not so much coming through my ears, but more so distractions.

It would be overwhelming if I had a list that recorded EVERYTHING I needed to do or felt I should do. The mental noise would be deafening.

Everything from remembering someone’s birthday, calling a friend, tidying my desk, etc., etc., etc.

Are you like that too?

Too much noise can make you want to stop and do nothing. It’s overwhelming to the heart.

Do you find that too?

Donald Miller has a little motto.

If you confuse, you’ll lose.

He is talking about a business having a clear message about what they do.

Perhaps we could adapt this quote to something more personal.

If you’re confused, you’ll feel lost.

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There is a comfort zone in the familiar, but there is a calling to step out of the boat and find a little something to stand on.

There’s always a call to step out of the boat.

The other day I was cleaning some items off a pinboard and came across a printout of my first receipt of money for a book I had sold on Gumroad. It happened back in 2015, and I remember that moment well. The amazement that someone would buy my book.

The paper is something tangible. I can feel that paper between my fingers, like my feet, can feel a stepping stone buried slightly under the surface of a pond I might walk on.

I’ve had many other moments of provision for me as I have taken this faith journey. Sometimes it’s a financial gift or donation, but mostly it has been the provision of work in people’s gardens. It’s always a risk to write. To put my ideas out into the world. It still is, but a compelling YES drove me to write a few words each week and to share my stepping out of the boat.

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