THE STEW OF STEWING

An inveterate ruminator is nudged out of her simmering cauldron and onto the Highway

• Romans 8:1-2:  "there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit . For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death."

  Some people are "Type A" people, dynamic, ambitious, driven, energetic. 
  I am the polar opposite of them, although I sincerely admire much of the Type A template. 

  No, I am what I call a "Type Z", (my own wording, to my knowledge), a person who needs more sleep than average and who is a very deep thinker and too often, in a "stew" (worry, ruminating, stewing) with not enough forceful action taken towards resolve. This is not a great place to live, I will tell you from too many years of experience. The older I get, the more I ruminate in this stew. Habit, yes, but also a mind-set and very difficult to exit from. So many choices, I am exhausted just considering a few of them.

  I must have a "thousand foot high" stew pot that does not move much! Even though I know reasonably how to string a sentence together and to present words of encouragement and solace, I still struggle so deeply with the action needed to exit the stew pot. I have grown too accustomed to living in this round pot of sadness and "giving up before I even get out the gate." Simmering, ruminating for so long is not good, it creates "fossils" of doubt and hence, my clinging to God for help, even broken down to one single day at a time. Yes, I have very deep thoughts, the contemplative that I am...but the action needed to "propel" things is sorely lacking. I go through these terrible hurricanes of negative emotion one day and the next,  feel a bit more stable. Used to be called "manic depression" or some such. I do not feed myself the mountains of sugar I did in my youth but the steep ups and downs continue, more than I would like. I am not and do not want to be on any "pills" to treat this malady, because as an addictive personality, I must refrain from those "solutions" for myself and take the deeper hard road.

  Fortunately, I am a desperate follower of God and His Son. The Holy Spirit of God Himself is an excellent "nudger", as He does not jump on me with a stick but rather gently, relentlessly, nudges and nudges and nudges my fretful "stewing" self out of the Pot and into some kind of action. The tiny actions I have taken have actually presented my very humble life experiences here on Substack, as terrifying as that is for someone wired like me. I have been expecting to live my entire life on "the back 40" and never step even a tiny step into the human Forum to share a tidbit of what my painful life lessons have been at age 71 and to hopefully help even ONE other person to avoid the sorrows I have had in this life. "Darlin', there is a nasty pothole over there, please consider walking around that and not falling in, it is NOT fun or hip or cool! Mud can be good for your skin but a ditch is not that lovely."

  Who would think of God as RELENTLESS?? I tell you, HE IS. Even through this emotional/financial battle I have fought for so many years, as I gradually returned to God from over 35 years of rebellion and wandering, the change is not instantaneous. I heartily wish it were as I am not a fan of the vaunted worship of  "hard work".  I don't mind work but "hard" work I find overwhelming and I give up too blasted easily. I get so tired.  God, however, seems to have other ideas. For some extremely mysterious reason, He tempers His training and love to the individual person, using such gentle and yet relentless methods as...making me laugh, wrapping His loving arms around my sobbing shoulders, reminding me over and over and over again that He loves me, He created me, He did not make me to be a "titan of industry" but the poetic and sensitive soul I am. Even the wounds I have suffered from youth (sudden deaths of Mom and brother two years apart) and so many years of discouragement and depression, each of these God can and does use to not only heal and restore but to show others how it is done. I cannot comprehend this teaching method, as it is not simplistically understood. The Bible says  that "Gods ways are not our ways, His thoughts are not our thoughts."  How else to explain how God works in each of us??

  Humans are extremely volatile and raw and sometimes nasty critters, myself included. My Boomer generation, being a large one reeling off  from our parents coming out of the conflagration of the Great Depression and into WW2, we had such a different experience. The Vietnam War was the crucible for the Boomers, woven with the social-political-sexual revolution, and full chaos of the 1960's. I lost a very dear brother in that war in 1968. I lived through it all and that is much of what I write about, the lies of the devil in persuading youth that his "freedom" really is cool...when in reality, it is utterly a sham and a sorrowful pit. It is a type of emotional slavery that leads to nothing good. 

  How much I will accomplish as I am nudged out of the Stewing, we shall see. I am compelled to take only one single day at a time, even an hour at a time on some days. 

  God does NOT castigate, harangue, hassle, condemn or shove. I do know when I have "missed it" and immediatly repent and get right back next to God, so rumbles do not block my road. Staying clear with God is one of my tidbits of learning, from such a stubborn girl I am. When I pour out my soul before God, as King David did in so many of his Psalms, I feel better, even for the hour. 

  As God is relentless, so must I be, if I am to finish my small race and hopefully help even one person out there.  I don't know who you are but I tell you, partnering with God is real, it is primal and it actually helps you.

  Wendy Williams   1-1-2024

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