Managing Anxiety And Stress

In our busy, stressful modern world, life feels frantic and under pressure.  Being contactable 24/7 means that we’re never really off-duty.  Work emails ping to our phone in the evenings and any smidgen of time gets soaked up scrolling through Facebook.  Our brains are always fired up and ready, it is in this environment that anxiety, stress and depression can thrive. One of the ways we can use to combat this is through ‘mindfulness’ – a discipline that allows the brain some quiet time, some space to think thoughts and let them pass without dwelling on things.

I always wondered why God asks people to pray to him.  He asks that we praise him, thank him and tell him our worries.  But why would he need us too?  Being an all-powerful, all-knowing God, he already knows our thoughts before we’ve thought them, let alone mentioned them in prayer.

It seems that God really does know what is best for us.  By asking us to meditate on him, he gives us the blueprint for a mindful life.  By asking us to express our worries and to hand them over, shows us how to let our concerns go.  By giving us forgiveness, he lets us forget about our past mistakes and by asking us to forgive others, he knows that it brings mental health benefits to the forgiver as well.  By being kind, you are cheered, by loving your neighbour, you are bolstered.  It seems that God has given us the way to have not only an eternally happy life, but a happy and fulfilled life now.

As it says in Philippians chapter 4, ‘Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus’.

Useful passage to look up: Philippians ch4 vs 6-9

Photo by Hailey Kean on Unsplash