A Late Post Appropriate For Sunday, But Maybe Especially Useful If You-Know-What HIts the Fan

October begins. 2023 is running out of time. So far, not stock market crash, credit crisis, or other of the numerous events that could set off fear and panic, as sometimes happens during September-October. 

So far, relatively "ordered" price action in markets have not led us down the path of utter destruction as some have predicted. But we've also not taken off to stock market heaven as others have insisted we will because...well, it's not all that clear why that might happen.

With that, life has been a lot busier this past week, so this post comes a bit late - indeed on a Sunday. And as such, we've got something posted elsewhere that fits into the sort of Sunday mindset we really should cultivate if we believe - as we should - that Sunday is the Lord's Day. 

It is, you know.

With that, something that could prove to be especially useful if the you-know-what hits the fan before 2023 runs out. And if it doesn't, well, life is full of stuff that we can and typically do fret and fuss over; or, more significantly, worry about and become overwrought with anxiety. So with the appropriate Sunday mindset, here an offering for not simply our sometimes unruly emotions, but for our souls as well:

So many of us fret or fuss over stuff we really shouldn't. If you're exempt from this fussy plague, count your blessings. But I suspect you're in a minority. To the rest of us, needlessly fussing as we do from time to time, read on.

...from Father Gerald Vann, O.P....he'll help us to manage the anxiety and stress which our world seems to spoon out in great dollops to so many of us these days. Father will lead with a situation where we feel helpless in the face of something bad happening that we can't control or avoid.

“Sometimes it is when we are mere spectators that we find it hardest not be agitated and to fret: we see some tragedy impending and we feel powerless to prevent it: but we must try to see that our fretting is really in the last resort a form of egoism, a lack of faith and trust in God and dependence on God: our business should be to pray hard (we need never be mere spectators) but then to try to say, Thy will be done. Sometimes it is when we have started, and slowly built up, some project that we feel convinced is good, is for God, and then it is wrecked by circumstances outside our control, we want to grumble, we want to rebel; but no, we should remind ourselves that we never really know, in our tiny glimpse of God’s plan, what in the long run is really failure and what is success. Sometimes it is over ourselves, our own state of soul, that we become agitated in the bad sense: we cannot seem to cope with this or that temptation, we cannot seem to improve; but once again we must try to live in the present: doing our very best here and now, and neither brooding over our past failures nor letting ourselves sink into a sort of practical despair about the future. All things are in the hands of God.   

“Once again it is a question of training ourselves, and of starting in small ways. Think of some example of the sort of thing that causes you, individually, to become agitated and to fuss. It might be the missing of a train: you are on your way to some important duty, and it seems to be God’s will that you should do it; but you miss the train, and then you begin to fume and fret; you ‘get into a state’, and all to no purpose; whereas you should be telling yourself: Well, I thought God wanted me to catch the train, but He evidently didn’t, and so that’s that; if He wants me here, His will be done. And then you could fill in the time doing something useful instead of pacing up and down the platform like a caged lion and exacerbating your nerves and wasting your time.”

We need not feel helpless if we immediately get down to praying, rather than fretting. Add in "Thy Will be done" and we've made our initial effort complete.

In the case where our own considerable effort - something we deem valuable and important - has been ruined by outside circumstances, switch from grumbling to wondering if perhaps God has deemed a failure to be better for us than a success.

The same applies to the various and sundry temptations we all experience. No need to obsess or fret over them. Inevitably we've likely failed at avoiding one or more in the past, but dwelling on that won't help us in the present. All it might do is push us to despair. If we truly believe all things are in God's hands, we'll have little trouble avoiding all that drama.

If we possess the desire to improve our spiritual lot by responding to difficulties as Father notes, but frequently fall short of our aspiration, we can follow Father's advice to practice, starting with small things. Fussiness - certainly not a sin - provides a good area for focus. The example of missing the train is splendid and captures many like situations we've all faced from time to time.

A simple litmus test to see whether we've made or are making any progress might be to notice when we get worked up over anything - especially the small stuff. If we don't sweat the small stuff, we're doing OK. If we do, then we go back to the drawing board and try, try again. 

And at those inevitable times when we fall short, recall that God uses these to help us get stronger and ultimately grow closer to Him.

Postscript: Hope that helps, especially if and when it's needed.