If you’ve been reading my blog or looking at my artwork recently, you will already know that the three words that I’ve been meditating on are beauty, freedom, and abundance. These are the three areas I have been trying to live into and see everywhere. And believe it or not, you can find these things everywhere, if you will just have eyes to see them. Sometimes “eyes to see” just means taking the time to look, sometimes it means shifting your perspective, sometimes it could even mean some serious self-care or mental healthcare.
Today I want to talk about my path of seeing the abundance of God, and even how it relates it to my anxiety. This is just my story, and everyone will have a different story to tell. But I hope it can be an encouragement to someone.
I have heard that anxiety is your body being constantly ready for something to happen, even if there is no immediate threat! I feel this a lot when it comes to time or productivity. My natural inclination when I feel high anxiety is to just go with it and keep doing and doing and doing until I can cross off as many things as possible from my list. Logically, this should make me feel better, right? If I’m anxious about there being enough time to get everything done, then a few hours of high productivity should make me feel better! Unfortunately, that’s never how it works.
I remember the exact moment it hit me that the opposite is actually true. I was starting to get that panicky feeling. It was getting late in the day and I was tired. I started to notice piles of stuff everywhere (that’s usually how it starts for me: noticing all there is to do). It suddenly feels like I am drowning and I will never be free, never get done, never be good enough. My impulse was to get to work and push through. But then it occurred to me that maybe I actually needed rest, instead.
Now, resting when I am feeling panicky or anxious is really hard! Taking deep breaths, putting on music, taking a walk, playing the piano, or even just sitting outside are all things that have helped me in those moments. Audiobooks help a lot, too. I don’t have it in me to read, but listening can be soothing.
My spiritual director helped me come up with a breath prayer for moments like these as well. I told her about a time earlier that week when I was telling myself “I just have to push through the rest of this day” when a very clear thought came into my head: God doesn’t want me living like this. Every moment is a gift, I don’t want to squander them by just “pushing through”.
But the truth is, laundry still has to get done, dishes still have to be washed, children still have to be fed. And honestly, those moments won’t just stop coming. So the next time I feel that impulse, praying in the form of deep breaths:
Inhale: Lord, lift up my head
Exhale: To see your beauty
In taking a deep breath, I literally have to change my posture and actually lift up my head. But I am metaphorically changing my posture, too. I am asking for “eyes to see”, even in those hard moments.
One of my goals this year was to do more things that have no purpose, or that don’t make sense on the outside. And with the aforementioned realization of needing rest instead of more work, it suddenly felt like this goal was the answer! Just taking the time when you feel like there is no time somehow multiplies the time! This is God’s economy at work, friends. This is abundance.
Rob Walker, in The Art of Noticing, claims that taking the time to notice our surroundings in different ways sparks creativity. I say absolutely yes, and so much more. Taking the time to do something different, or seemingly pointless, helps us see the abundance of God! Not just in our time (but that, too!) but in our world!
And I have found that in making an effort to take that time, my anxiety about having enough time has lessened.
Surrendering this to God has been hard, and breaking the patterns of 40 years of living is definitely going to be a process - one that I am doing imperfectly (and that’s OK!). I know God is continuing a good work in me and it’s bigger than I can put in this post. But I have been amazed at how much I have been set free in the surrendering, and how much more I can see of the beauty all around and the abundant life He promises.
This is a little infographic to help me remember that God’s economy looks different from ours. Somehow He multiplies where we hoard.