Reverse Anxiety

 I don’t know if reverse anxiety is a real thing or not but I’m coining the phrase now. What is reverse anxiety?  Some may call it regret but for me it’s a true anxiety about what I should have done. It’s silly. It’s not helpful, anxiety of any kind never is, but it’s real. 

I think every mother in the world suffers from this. When your child suffers their first boo boo, what do we moms do?  “I knew I should have put that table out of the way!” as blood is running down his face from running into it.  “I knew I shouldn’t have let her go to that friends house” as she suffers from nightmares from watching a scary movie. And on and on it goes. 

In my case, I roll through every year of Tanner’s life and wonder, “if I would have done this thing or that thing differently, he would have taken this different path and then maybe all those years later he wouldn’t have been in that truck on that interstate...” and on and on it goes as my thoughts spiral out of control. I know it’s ridiculous. I know that it was a freak accident that was completely out of anyone’s control. However, I can’t seem to stop the thoughts. But we are to take captive every thought. We are to not be anxious. 

One of the most famous verses in the Bible is about anxiety. “Do not be anxious”. Easy for you to say Paul! Or was it? Paul most likely wrote Philippians while in jail! In Acts 16:16,  it tells the story of one time Paul was put into jail. He had called a spirit out of a girl and it made her owners mad because they could no longer make money off of her. They complained and Paul was put into jail.  I wonder if he ever thought, while sitting in jail, “maybe I shouldn’t have called that demon out of that girl, then those people wouldn’t have noticed me, wouldn’t have taken me to the magistrates where I was beaten, and I wouldn’t be sitting here rotting in this stinking jail cell.  But...we know he didn’t think that. How do we know?  Because it says in Acts 16:25 that he and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God. 

Don’t miss a very important part of Philippians 4:6. “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, through prayer and petition with THANKSGIVING, present your requests to God. Paul and Silas came to God in a position of thankfulness. They did not weep and moan, “poor me!” They didn’t have reverse anxiety about what they had done to bring attention to themselves.  They were worshiping and praising God and God freed them!  Now, they didn’t get out of jail, that was their choice, they stayed and through that the jailer and his family were saved. Which is a whole other story.

But they did not let anxiety overtake them, not about their past and not about their future. They took captive their thoughts and they praised God. It’s becoming more and more obvious to me after reading Jennie Allen’s book “Get Out of Your Head” and beginning Craig Groeschel’s book “Winning the War in Your Mind”, that we need to be ever vigilant about where our thoughts are taking us. I didn’t think I needed Philippians 4:6 because I don’t have anxiety. Then God showed me that I was in fact worrying over the past!!! That’s even sillier than worrying about the future! We have to stop trying to be in control, whether of our past or our future and let God take control.  If we sit mired in worry, we can’t ever move forward with where He wants to take us. It’s all about the eternal picture. We have the end of the book!  We know how the story ends!  Us in eternal glory forever and ever with Him! Why are we sitting here stewing! 

It doesn’t matter what I should have or could have done differently in Tanner’s life, he is with God. I have to refocus on that thought. I have to praise God that Tanner is living the best life in heaven. There is no point to my worries. I don’t know what tomorrow brings, but I know my redeemer lives! And someday I too will see Him face to face. Keep your eyes fixed on the prize, Philippians 3:13-15. “Brethren I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. Therefore let us, as many as are mature, have this mind; and if in anything you think otherwise, God will reveal even this to you.” 

Ask God to reveal today where your mind may be taking you, then take those thoughts captive and begin to praise God. “Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice!” Philippians 4:4.