Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
Official Newspaper of Eddy County since 1883
The John Tesh radio show told me about an experiment done on competitive bicyclists. All the participants started by competing in a hot-weather bike ride. Then they were split in half, one group continued to train physically in the hot-weather conditions, and the other group focused their training on mental health, including positive affirmations, and learning how to deal with uncomfortable situations while racing. In the follow-up competition, the group who focused on mental training improved their speed and duration by 25%.
We’ve all heard stories like this, and our culture has taken the “positive thinking” trend to extremes, selling us products that will improve our lives, creating apps, writing books, gratitude journals, etc. etc.
It is good to “stay positive,” and it is scientifically proven that positivity and gratitude enhances our work, our personal lives, and our general outlook on life. But I think we’d be remiss to pass over people’s real pain, their real melancholy moods, and our own suffering.
The gospel tells us that we can acknowledge our deaths, that which is being crucified, our darkness, pain and suffering, before we need to move to resurrection. Because science also tells us that in our darkest times, we often encounter moments of clarity, firing up our desire for justice, and creating space for dependence on God.
In an agricultural community, where we depend so constantly on the weather, we know most clearly that things don’t always go well for us. For those of us who need sunlight and outside time for our moods, April can’t come soon enough.
Death comes before we are ready. Sickness and disease strike when we don’t have time for them. Pandemics, mass shootings, child abuse scandals, younger and younger suicides fill our newsfeed; not to forget that we are more lonely now than ever before in human history.
It’s true, we can count our blessings. There are many things to be thankful for, and we should be quick to remember them.
Let’s move to a place of realistic positivity, instead of a marketable kind, where the world can tell you “just be positive,” so you are not being honest about how you really feel. There is nothing as raw, real, and vulnerable, and honest as the cross of Christ. Let us not forget that we will go through the crucifixion, and that God never leaves us there, alone, and broken. But God is always restoring, always reconciling, always resurrecting, always giving us His righteousness. All glory be to God.
