[5 Conversations With Christ] Anxiety and WorryНамуна

Worry Affects Your Whole Self

Why do we worry? We worry, emotionally, because we care. You know, there are things going on in different countries, but you don’t care about them because you don’t know about them. There are things going on in other people’s lives that are amazing or terrible, yet you're not emotionally involved. It isn’t that you don't care because you do, but they just don’t impact you in the same way. You care about your family. You care about your friends, your church, your job, your community, and society. We worry because we care. 

We also worry physically. We can get exhausted by the pace of life, with the stress of work and of home. Maybe we don’t eat or sleep well. Then, physically, something begins to happen. 

You have an alarm system going off in your body. God wired it that way. The fight-or-flight system He designed works when a car is coming at you and you jump out of the way. That’s a good thing. But sometimes, you get stuck in fight-or-flight mode. At work, the problems come non-stop. At home, you’re still checking your phone. Every time you open your email, it could be a hacker or a complaint. The phone buzzes. The text might be bad news. No one knows what the day might bring.

If you live this way over a long period of time, you end up jittery. So you say, “When I go on vacation, I can't really rest. I’ve got to accomplish something.” Or, “I don’t know if I could ever retire because I’m just a worker.” Maybe your gas pedal is stuck. This will turn on you at some point. 

Max Lucado once wrote, “The United States of America is now the most anxious nation in the world. Congratulations to us! The land of the Stars and Stripes has become the country of stress and strife.” Citizens in other countries enjoy a more tranquil life. They experience one fifth of the level of anxiety that Americans experience. We have that achievement gas pedal stuck and we can’t pop it out.