BP 138
I remember the day many years ago when I saw a man walking up to my house with a vacuum cleaner in his hands. When he knocked on my door, I opened it.
That was my first mistake.
My second mistake was letting him into my house.
My third mistake was listening to his sales pitch for two hours. Two hours! I heard details and watched demonstrations about the vacuum cleaner that I did not want to hear or see. I answered the door and lost two hours of my life that afternoon. Two hours!
How many of us allow door-to-door salesmen into our homes when we don’t want them to enter? (No personal shade thrown on people who work in sales!) Even more relevant to this post, how many of us allow door-to-door salesmen into our minds? These cognitive salesmen are thoughts we allow into the living rooms of our minds, listening to them for hours, days, years as they nag, accuse, and breed anxiety and depression in us.
The worst thing about these salesmen is that we repeatedly allow them into our minds–against our will. Why would we do that?
Just as we need to erect external boundaries to keep certain people out of our lives, we need to set internal boundaries against the unwanted thoughts that pound on the doors of our minds. Some of these thoughts lure us toward temptation and sin. But for this post, we will dwell on other thoughts that drag us down and distract us from God. They may very well be sin but not as obvious as thoughts to lie, steal, or lust.
Unwanted thoughts insist on entering our minds against our will. But we let them in. Why?
One reason we let them in is that the thoughts that run amok in our brains are often driven by strong emotions that erupt into our minds from our hearts. For example, if we are so angry with someone that we see red, our minds will race as we repeatedly think about the person who cut us off in traffic or made us feel powerless and enraged by stealing our car or our money or our identity.
Related to anger, bitterness can drive us to ponder abuses directed at us in the past to the point that we rehearse the event over and over and over again.
Fear spawns thoughts and grows them by repetition until we are convinced that the ache in our head or the pain in our abdomen is certainly terminal cancer.
I think we all know it is not wise or helpful to mull, relive, rehearse, or memorize unhealthy thoughts by allowing them into our heads repeatedly like so many door-to-door salesmen. But it is difficult not to invite them in when strong emotions or a deep sense of badness or shame keep pounding on the door of our minds.
Maybe that’s one reason Jesus told us to forgive one another as He forgave us. He knew very well that unforgiveness driven by anger, hate, or bitterness will cause our thoughts to focus on the offense done against us and rob us of peace, joy, and the ability to love God and others–all because our emotional soul energy is invested in obsessive thoughts.
So, we need to identify and address the fuel that drives our repeated, obsessive, racing thoughts. How? One way is to heal the emotions that drive the unrelenting thoughts. Another way is to practice dwelling on other things that are beneficial to our hearts and minds (see Philippians 4:4-8!). A third way is to lock the front door of our minds and refuse the door-to-door salesman to enter. All three are usually needed: healing, directing our thoughts and emotions elsewhere, and denying entrance.
So, what about the fuel of grief? Isn’t grief a valid and sometimes intense emotion that can lead us to keep dwelling on the beloved animal or human that left us or died? Are we supposed to resolve the pain of grief quickly and then put a sign on the door of our minds that says, Keep Out, Sadness?
Doesn’t grief normally come and go like the waves of the ocean, sometimes small but other times so tsunami-esque that it can immerse us in deep sadness that makes it difficult to breath? Can grief cause us to obsess unnecessarily and unhealthily about someone, or is grief an exception to all the other emotions that are capable of erupting into our minds and driving unwanted thoughts and obsessions?
Can we over grieve?
There is a lot we could say about grief. If you want to read a more extended post on grief, see the blogpost back in late September of 2021 entitled The Death of Summer. The more concise three points I will make here in this post are the following: do not suppress grief; do not sit in grief; and do not grieve alone.
First, suppressing grief only results in it leaking out in other ways later such as obsessive thinking or anxiety in the form of panic attacks, depression, overeating, and so on.
Second, sitting in grief—dwelling on it without any respite or holding onto it too long with little comfort from others—may lead a person to be disabled by sadness, even paralyzed. You will relive the loss so often and so deeply that you will become depressed and will not be able to think about other things other than those that generate the familiar sadness. This rehearsing of grief can be dangerous, even leading to suicidal ideation or a desire to be with the deceased person or animal.
Throat-constricting, chest-aching sadness will consume you and drive out everything else.
Lastly, do not grieve alone. You may think others will find you weak or overly sensitive if you weep and sob, so you hide, grieve alone, and attempt to appear strong.
Don’t do that.
Grief only heals in the presence of others. Let someone know your pain, hold you, cry with you. I promise that you will heal faster if you allow someone to walk with you through the heart-breaking valleys of grief. Besides, building little membranes around your heart every time you feel sadness will eventually produce a thick wall that protects your heart against everything—even love.
So, the alternative to the healthy “management” of grief and other emotions is the appearance of the obnoxious door-to-door salesmen mentioned above. Unresolved emotions—whatever they are—will not go quietly into the night. They will pound on the door of your mind until you face them and heal them. Heal these emotions in your heart before they interfere with your mind.
I suppose another way to look at it is that the racing thoughts and obsessive cognitions are not the primary problem. No, they are a sign pointing to the primary problem. Honor the cognitive rehearing by identifying it as a symptom that emerges when something in your heart needs tending to but don’t stop there. Go into your heart.
How amazingly good that believers in Jesus have a tender shepherd who walks with us through the deepest anger, bitterness, shame, and grief! He waits to heal our hearts with His presence! I’m talking about even the darkest valleys of groaning and aching aloneness. He comes to you to bring comfort and healing. Then He encourages you to move toward others for their healing and comfort.
Work hard not to open the door of your mind to the salesmen. Open your heart instead to the Savior who stands and knocks. He waits for you to open so He can come in and love you and be with you through the deepest of emotions. Ask others to help you open the door for Jesus if needed. There will be dark opposition to you doing so. Remember, you are not designed to be alone.
”Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls” ~ Matthew 11:28,29
“You are my servant, I have chosen you and not cast you off”; fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand” ~ Isaiah 41:10
