"Don't react. Instead respond out of wisdom, grace and love." -M. Feinberg
Call it the mama-bear in me, but I certainly am one to react. Over the years, I have learned to keep my initial rolling reactions beneath the surface. Mostly. Ok, perhaps only sometimes.
But I certainly know that those reactions usually come from an emotional place. And usually that place is a tangled web of incoherent sporatic experiences, memories or unresolved thoughts. My brain's effort to problem solve, to self preserve or make sense out of the senseless.
In my humanity, I am apt to get it wrong.
More often than not, my secondary reaction is much more reasonable, rational, maybe even wise.
I am loving the new song by Mumford in Sons. To me it epitomizes the exact process my mind goes through. The racing tempo of the chorus representing the frantic, hurried pace at which I tend to respond. The verses the slow, wise revelations.
If I can hold back the surge, my fleshly impulse to react, then my mind can step out of its mental race and my thoughts can reduce their pace. No longer breathlessly sprinting to a destination, I am free to stroll through garden's of wisdom, grace and love.
In God's garden of prayer, scripture and wise counsel, the answers are never wrong. The answers are gifts of peace and reassurance.
That's not to say that the pressure behind the damn grows quiet. The surge still threatens to erupt. Even when I've resolved that I need to wait. In the waiting there are moments when your mind's voice becomes a little frantic. Fearful. The pressure from the surge mounts.
I will wait. I WILL wait.
Ah the waiting is never a passive process, usually requiring monumental efforts of strength and will to pass through.
When in fear or anxiety your heart is pounding so hard that it deafens you. Stop. Don't react. Breath. And as your heart slows, and the world quiets down, that is where you'll hear God's voice rise up in answer to your situation.
Keep your hearts slow my friends.
So I'll be bold
As well as strong
And use my head alongside my heart
So tame my flesh
And fix my eyes
That tethered mind free from the lies
But I'll kneel down
Wait for now
I'll kneel down
Know my ground
Raise my hands
Paint my spirit gold
And bow my head
Keep my heart slow
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