Reflection

Today, I want to share something from Carrie McIntyre, a woman who writes on X about Gospel topics. I follow her account for her insightful and thoughtful words, and because she gets it! Recently, she wrote about dealing with pain/frustration/weakness with patience and not fear. I thought it ideal for you and me, and so my reflection today comes from her. I hope you find it as helpful a reminder as I did.

“We may wonder at times, “If the Lord is so capable and so merciful and so ready to answer prayers, then why doesn’t he fix me?”

The Lord’s idea of perfect is not the same as ours. We didn’t come to earth to have perfect health, perfect looks, perfect minds, or perfect relationships. Mortality is a realm where literal perfection has been removed as an option. Everything that lives is also slated to die.

A moment may be perfect (a glimmer of eternity that provides us something to strive after), but absolute perfection is a gift for the hereafter. Nothing that is mortal is static.

He will not heal everything now because He wants us to learn patience, endurance, humility, and empathy even as Christ finalized His empathy through suffering for our sins. The erstwhile-unhealed become better healers because they understand.

On a practical scale, He wants us to think our way through, to work on a problem and discover creative solutions, to learn how the natural world works and how to unlock its mysteries. He wants us to trust Him and trust the process. We’re away at school, remember. He loves us too much to interrupt a lesson when it will contribute to the divine education He sent us here to receive.

We may not always enjoy this process (though sometimes it’ll be great!) But He’s not making bodies preserved for a few fleeting decades. He’s raising His children to be resurrected beings for eternity.

Sometimes He heals bodies. Sometimes He leads us through the wilderness to find healing answers so that we too may become healers. And sometimes he lets the body burn through its weaknesses in order to heal the soul. Whatever method He has employed for you today will, in the future, prove to be exactly what was necessary to save you and build you. You will see how very much He loved you every moment.

Some pain in this life is inevitable—no matter how hard we try to be obedient to His commandments, no matter how “good at life” we try to be. Jesus Himself did not avoid pain. Why should we expect to escape it?

But pain is so much worse when we’re afraid of it! Don’t panic. Answer frustration and resentment with humility and trust. He has not left you alone in the dark. He never would. Let Him wrap His arms around you until the daylight comes. By the light of His dawn, you will see and understand.”

~ Carrie McIntyre, ‘The Relevant Questions’ (X), 3 April

On Instagram

Not Alone

Other accounts

Resource: Mindspot

Mindspot is a government-funded online mental-you chealth clinic that offers free consultations and courses for Australian adults. I like their Instagram page, which provides helpful reminders that are easy to take in and act on. Not everything they share is useful/relevant, but much is. If you use Instagram, I recommend following them.

Here’s an example of their content: Finding your rhythm after the holidays

Turning stress into rest

Using your soothing system to balance a stress response

Our brains work on two automatic response systems: threat and drive. The threat system comes into play when you feel threatened, obviously… but there will be things it responds to as threats that aren’t, or that once were and no longer are. These might be experiences in childhood, or something that happened as an adult that your brain still perceives as a threat and tries to protect you from when something similar happens now. The threat system produces the ‘fight, flight, or freeze’ response. It’s focused on external stimuli, analysing them with the goal of keeping you safe. It’s negative stress that’s necessary (or not) for a short time, but can be drawn out far longer than is healthy.

The drive system motivates us to do things, in pursuit of a goal (leading to the ‘reward’ chemical, dopamine). It focuses outwardly, drawing you towards the world around you, often in a competitive way (whether with others, nature, or yourself). It can be seen as positive stress (unless carried too far, or when caught up with goals like social media recognition).

The soothing system provides recovery from these stress responses. It’s more deliberate - less automatic, not operating on learnt behaviours like the other two. When the soothing system (also called the parasympathetic nervous system) is operating, you feel calm, with open awareness, and in a state of rest, even when active. I think of this as similar to how we feel when open to the influence of the Holy Spirit - after a session of General Conference, or a beautiful musical fireside, heartfelt prayer and scripture study, or time spent with good people or in nature.

To move from the stress responses to a balanced state, regulated by the soothing system, there are a few things you can do. One is to go through the ‘DANC(E)’ process (this is what Wouter de Jong calls it in 'The 12-Week Mind Workout’. It’s translated from Dutch, so the acronym doesn’t work perfectly, but the ideas do). Here’s how it goes:

Determine (I’d call it Identify): what emotion(s) are you feeling? There are 5 basic emotions: fear, anger, sadness, joy, disgust, and surprise. All our emotions are some form of these.

Accept/investigate: let yourself have the emotion; don’t judge it as good/bad, ignore it, or reject it.

No identifying: don’t ‘identify’ with the emotion(s). You’re feeling them; they’re not feeling you. You’re having emotions - you aren’t the emotion.

Calm/soothe: ask, ‘what do I need?’, or ‘what does the situation require?’

Encourage (I’d call it Act): ask, ‘what’s the wise thing to do?’

By the time you get to the end, it will be easy to answer this question. It’s a process of separating yourself from an automatic stress response, one you might have habitually developed, and letting your understanding shine through so you can act on it. Similar solutions involve defusing emotions, focusing on physical sensations (which, paradoxically, helps them stop overwhelming you), and countering unhelpful thoughts.

Practising all of these helps us have tools to use when we’re in situations which usually lead to an automatic, involuntary response. We can soothe ourselves - our bodies and minds - and become more open to all that’s going on around us and within us, in a calmer, wiser way.

Challenge

Practise the ‘DANCE’ process over the next fortnight, with small stressors and chronic situations that you usually just ‘deal with’, but which remain a stressor. Nothing too deep and serious yet. Remember that focusing on physical sensations, as they come up, and being curious about emotions you feel, but not identifying yourself with them, will help, especially if you later want to apply this to larger things.

I find these exercises really helpful; the problem is practising them regularly, so they become familiar and something I can use whenever I need. Because in the moment, overcome by the stress response, I can’t think properly; my mind is all a-whir. I need something known that I can work through deliberately and easily. Just having a process to follow is soothing.