No worries: How to have Joy being “out of control.”

I’m an organized, diligent person.  Someone who can be given a task and see it through without the necessity of someone micromanaging me.  I’m really good at anticipating what’s going to be needed, how it should be set up, the sequence of all the needed steps… and all the ways it could all go very, very, completely and horribly wrong.  Yes, I confess that I tend to be a worrier. Confidence is often eroded by fear.   Like Winnie the Pooh’s scary nemesis the Heffalump, worries frequently swirl around in my brain and sometimes produce so much anxiety that I can barely function.  I HATE it when that happens.  And it’s happening all too frequently and messing up my life. So why am I worrying so much?

Worry is an outgrowth of fear.

In Jesus Calling’s April 24th entry author Sarah Evans observes:  “ Your fear often manifests itself in excessive planning.”

How many of us have been labeled a “control freak”?  The feeling of NOT being in control of our circumstances can be a very real emotion of anguish or apprehension that things might not go as we have planned or anticipated. We worry about how to make sure that every step of the process conforms to how we imagine it should go.  Any when it DOESN’T --- we panic.

Blaise Pascal reminds us of the disastrous consequences of always being wrapped up in excessive planning:  “We think of how we are going to arrange things over which we have no control for a time we can never be sure of reaching. … Thus we never actually live, but hope to live, and since we are always planning how to be happy, it is inevitable that we should never be so.”  From Pensees Number 172.

I plead “guilty” for that one, too.  I get so wrapped up in imagining a time where every thing is going to magically come together and life will be good and I won’t have to worry or plan anymore and…I completely miss the joys and blessings of the moment I’m actually in, or the people I’m with.  It’s very daunting to consider how much of my life I’ve missed or failed to enjoy because I was so consumed with worry about how it might end up going wrong.

Worry is a manifestation of lack of trust.

“Worry is believing God won’t get it right.” Toby Mac (quoting Todd Wagner).

Mark Batterson in Soul Print: “ We play God by trying to control everyone, everything.  But God hasn’t called us to be God.  He’s called us to be ourselves.  And our control issues are really trust issues.  The less we trust God, the more we have to control.”  

I really don’t want to insult God or miss his direction because I’m too busy making my own plans and trying handle everything myself.  And I certainly don’t need to sabotage my chances at happiness because I’m too preoccupied with trying to arrange my life.  I need to let God be God and trust Him.  I need to quash the desire to handle everything myself.  I need to let go and accept being out of control.

Worry is the enemy of happiness.

“Happiness to me was something very abstract, the end of a long equation:  initial self-worth multiplied by X accomplishments, divided by Y dollars, Z loans, minus F hours worked, plus G respect earned.  Happiness, I assumed, would be the end result of a whole list of things I hadn’t gotten around to yet.”  Elizabeth Bard in Lunch in Paris.

“Worrying about something you fear doesn’t prevent it, it does keep you from enjoying what you’re doing right now.”  KJ Dell’Antonia in an interview by Gretchen Rubin.

No worries:  Jesus says worrying is unproductive and unnecessary.

In Matthew chapter 6, Jesus offers a cure for anxiety and fear.  He reminds us about how birds neither sow nor reap nor gather crops, but the Heavenly Father feeds them.  The flowers of the field do not labor or spin wool, yet they are clothed in glory and splendor.   “Therefore I tell you, stop being worried or anxious [perpetually uneasy, distracted] about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, as to what you will wear.”  “And who of you by worrying can add one hour to [the length of ] his life.”  “But first and most importantly seek [aim at, strive after] His kingdom and His righteousness [His way of doing and being right ---the attitude and character of God], and all these things will be given to you also. So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will worry about itself.  Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

Realizing that worry is unnecessary and unproductive frees us from excessive planning and saves us the ridiculous amount of energy needed to try to control every aspect of our lives.  Understanding the futility of using up our energy and refusing to be distracted with trying to control every aspect of our day frees us to live more in the present and actually enjoy the moments we are actually living in our lives.  

You are alive RIGHT NOW and blessed with a moment that will never come again. Enjoy it!  Allow yourself to be out of control. Yes, happiness can be happening right NOW, this very instant… not just at some unspecified moment in the future that we can never actually guarantee will happen. Let’s not miss all those moments that God provides for us.  I need to be “out of control” … because control is not my job.  God needs me to be the person He had in mind when He thought me up.  He has ordered my steps and assigned the number of my days. (Psalm 139)   He has taken that burden (control) off my shoulders so I can be free and travel light on this journey. What a gift --- I don’t want to waste it!

Can you think of ways you try to control or plan things because of worrying?

Do you want to be out of control?

How can you learn to have more trust in God?