Absolutely Yours

Can You Turn Worry Off Like A Faucet?

A few weeks ago, I was talking to my mother about worry. The thing she worried about kept her up all night. “Just stop worrying about it,” I told her, but she couldn’t. At least that’s what she said. She worried herself right into the doctor’s office.

“Mom, you can choose not to worry,” I said. She replied that you can’t turn worry on and off like a faucet: “Allen, you can’t stop worrying by saying you’re not going to worry.”

I thought about it. I asked myself, “Can you really stop worrying about it (whatever it is) just by making a choice not to worry? Is it easier said than done?”

What Has Worry Solved

Reader, have you ever known worry to solve a problem? Did worry about that upcoming medical procedure heal your body such that the procedure was unnecessary? Did worry about the falling stock market alter its course? Did worry about your child’s drinking problem make him put the bottle down? I have worried, but I can’t think of any good it did. WORRY SOLVES NOTHING. That’s your first incentive to STOP WORRYING.

Getting To The Root Of Worry

Now, let’s zoom in on this thing called worry. If you are going to be done with worry, you have to take the axe to its root. Close to the root of worry is fear. All worry is based on fear that something bad is happening, or is going to happen, in the foreseeable future.

Something bad is going to happen. Read that sentence again. Yep, after the second reading you realized that the root of worry is DUALISM – that something is going on (or can go on) other than the Presence and Power of God.

Face it. In the entire worry scenario, God is nowhere to be found. Totally absent. First, the person worrying imagines she is something other than the One Presence and Power that, last week, she said was All. Piling kitty poo on top of dog poo, the worrier Admits that the “it” that might happen is Not the Presence and Power of God. Where is God? Nowhere.

Reader, can you see that worry is inevitable if God is omniabsent? But there’s hope. There is Truth.

Your Reason To Stop Worrying — Wonderful Things Are Happening

Thinking about Mom, and her seeming tendency to worry, brought an old sermon to mind: “Wonderful Things Are Happening.” It’s a sermon I delivered based on a story told by the famed Christian Science lecturer Dorothy Reike.

Here’s the short. A woman beset by problems made this decision. “Regardless of what seems to come up in my life, instead of worrying, I am going to rejoice that wonderful things are taking place.”

It sounds Pollyannaish, I know. But follow her line of reasoning. “Because God is All, and All that can express Itself, the results have to be wonderful.” Reader, you have already agreed with me that worry (based on God’s omniabsence) solves nothing. But look what rejoicing does. This woman was healed of cancer. Her failing business turned around to amazing success, and her son was protected from harm.

Yes, it is possible to stop worrying, but you need a solid reason to not worry. God’s Allness is that reason. God’s Allness is your foundation for not worrying about “it”. To stop worrying requires that your vision is placed on God and not “it”. There is no “it” in God, and no God in “it”.

Reader, why don’t you make a decision right now that you are not going to worry about “it”. Instead, because God is All, REJOICE THAT WONDERFUL THINGS ARE HAPPENING.