This past week or so I've been practicing mindfulness to help myself overcome the slippery slope of rumination that drives me to foul and sour moods discoloring my days. A testament to the power of mindfulness and reorienting the mind happened today: Mo called me, updated me on her life, and in the course of it she mentioned that she's dating someone, a guy named Steve, and that things are going really well and that she's very happy.
"Are you dating anyone?" she asked.
"No, but I'm not making an effort. Girls don't exactly like up to be with me."
That first part is a half-life: I'm not really making any effort, though I do have my online profiles up. But since I mentioned that I'm a serious Christian looking for a healthy, non-sexual relationship, replies have gone from scant to nonexistent, and I've just stopped trying. Apparently no one's into that anymore?
Hearing that Mo has moved on and is happy, there's two outright emotions. First, there's happiness: I'm happy for her, I really am, and I'm glad she's found someone and is happy with that person. I put her through hell because of my own issues, and I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a relief that she found someone: it shows me that I didn't destroy her life, though that's an irrational fear itself. There's also a sort of sadness: not because she's with someone, because though she's awesome, the two of us just didn't work, and we both know it. The sadness comes at the first spinnings of rumination, thoughts coming, so common and unhindered, that turn my world into a dark and numb place.
She's moved on to better things, a better relationship, a better guy.
I'm just treading water.
Her boyfriend has a real job, and he's even in a band.
I'm stuck at a shitty job, barely have a working car.
I'm surrounded by people whose dreams are coming true.
And, per usual, I'm stuck going nowhere but backward.
These are the first thoughts, and they quickly spiral downwards unless they're fought against. I start thinking to myself, Mandy was smart not to be with me, and Mo's better off without me: so why should I try to make any effort at all? Why should I entertain hope? These are exaggerated and irrational thoughts, and outside the moment I can look at each and point out all sorts of erroneous assumptions and illogical assertions undergirding the thoughts. But in the moment, it feels so real, and there's nothing I can do but to be drawn into the negative thoughts, to hate myself and hate my lot in life. I wonder if that's borderline blasphemy when God has given me so, so much that I so, so do not deserve. These negative currents must be dammed (and damned indeed!) through persistence and prayer.
If I weren't to stop the trainwreck that is so often my mind, this would be a really shitty day. But practicing mindfulness, being aware of what's going on in my mind, and taking steps not only to curb the negative thoughts but replace them with good ones, does wonders. I told the Wisconsinite, "Recognizing those cognitive distortions from the get-go and shutting them down is so important for me. I'm so used to just indulging those irrational and exaggerated thoughts." Whenever the thoughts come, I practice mindfulness: I focus intensely on whatever's present to me at the moment, refusing to give the thoughts a handhold, and they go in one ear and out the other. I can breathe a sigh of relief and continue on with my day. I also told her, "I'm such a friendly, sociable, funny person who people generally like to be around, but those negative thoughts just tear me down, prevent the real me from coming through, and keep me in a sort of psychological and social bondage."
As I've been practicing mindfulness, I can't but be amazed at how we can have so much control over our emotions and moods simply by exercising self-control over our thought patterns rather than being enslaved to them. I keep thinking about that passage in Philippians, where Paul talks so much about joy; and he tells the Christians to focus on good things rather than the bad. Self-control's part of the fruit of the Spirit; but since when did self-control become regulated to those things we do or don't do? Self-control is no less important when it comes to the way that we think and perceive ourselves, and one could argue that it's far more important: if we have control over the way that we think and perceive the world, then our behaviors and decisions won't be the convoluted mess they often are. The New Testament talks repeatedly about "taking every thought captive" and pursuing "the renewal of the mind by the Spirit of God"; Brennan Manning wrote in The Importance of Being Foolish that much of the waywardness and muddledness of Christians comes from an inability to see themselves as they are, to be overcome with the weight of various insecurities. If only renewal of the mind was pursued, if only we took captive those thoughts and reformed our thinking around the gospel, then perhaps this wouldn't be the issue it is today.
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