The Assist

“Then the Lord became angry with Moses. “All right,” he said. “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he speaks well. And look! He is on his way to meet you now. He will be delighted to see you. Talk to him, and put the words in his mouth. I will be with both of you as you speak, and I will instruct you both in what to do… Then Moses and Aaron returned to Egypt and called all the elders of Israel together. Aaron told them everything the Lord had told Moses, and Moses performed the miraculous signs as they watched.” Exodus 4:14-15 & 29-30

I want you to image with me. Imagine that you are in a stressful time but everything is keeping together. You’re almost finished with the long term task at hand, and then life throws you an unexpected curveball that unnerves you. Now, on top of all the stress you’ve been experiencing from the known, this curveball of the unknown has crippled you and you don’t know what to do. Have you ever been in this position before? I know I have. And if it doesn’t do anything else it causes my anxiety to skyrocket like no other. I’m already hanging on by a thread and then this curveball just makes everything harder. But the hardest thing about it is that it doesn’t stop the wheels from the original stressor from spinning. Yup, on top of this brand new bad I still have to keep my composure and get the other thing done.

How do you deal with that? The reality of it is simple, but often hard to accept for some: you can’t do it all. That’s the pill. Swallow it. I know it tastes bitter and it doesn’t go well with the I don’t need anyone narrative you have created for yourself, but I’m here to debunk that myth for you. You cannot do everything all the time; and the sooner you accept that (because let’s be honest, it’s not that you don’t know it, it’s that you don’t want to accept it) the easier it will be to take these next affirmations and get through this difficult time.

#1: It’s ok to take a break and do nothing. Sometimes when we get so overwhelmed our go to is to work harder when it needs to be to stop. Our minds cannot and will not function properly when they are overloaded with information. Think about your cellphone. If you have all the apps running at the same time, battery low, and you’re trying to take a phone call, chances are you’re going to come in contact with a frozen screen. And as annoying as that frozen screen is there’s only 2 solutions: reboot or wait. Either way, the phone needs a break and is going to take one before it starts functioning properly again. You need to do that too. Put yourself on reboot before your mind does it for you. Because the only way the mind knows how to do that is to put your body on frozen and that can be it’s own kind of scary.

#2: It’s ok to let others help you. One of the hardest things for us to do when we think we got it all together is to take an assist. We’d rather leave the task alone completely than to let someone else help us out. So I’ll position it like this for your thought process: what if it’s the other person’s duty or calling to help you? Why would you keep them from fulfilling their destiny because of your pride? I want you to think about Moses. When he was afraid of his calling, God sent Aaron. Aaron had begun to seek Moses out to fulfill this purpose without being sent for, based on what God had told him. Can you image how foolish Aaron would have felt coming to a meeting place in the desert and arriving to no one? Moses had to go to get the help to keep Aaron in conformity with God’s will. Stop messing up other people’s blessing by holding too tightly to something God wants you to let go of.

And #3: It’s not in your control. At the end of the day, God put the plan in motion and He will carry out the vision, with or without your cooperation. The Israelites were going to be freed from Egypt whether Moses did the speaking or Aaron. Whether it took one plague or 10. Whether Pharaoh was willing or not. So just let Him be in control because He already is! No sense in fighting Him on it. So when that curveball comes in, let it. Swing and hit or swing and miss, the important thing to do is to swing. The lesson is always in the swing of the bat, not the striking of the ball. Why? Because you can’t control what life throws at you, only what you do with it.

So remember, it’s ok to take a break, it’s ok to take the assist, and it’s ok to swing and miss. Learn from swinging the bat not trying to control the balls that are thrown at you. As always, I love you and I’m rooting for your daily conquering of Anxiety!