Mental Health in the Madness: Five Ways to Cope

Schools are shuttering. Churches are closing. Events are cancelling. I couldn't even find a cart when I went grocery shopping this past week. The fear and hysteria and panic are real. As a person, who's always struggled with anxiety, these things haven't helped my mental health. But I'm trying to keep things in perspective, because I know that stress lowers immunity perhaps more than anything else. And mental health is still health and something to be supported and upheld wherever possible. Here's what I'm doing to that extent:

1) Preparing. No, I don't need to buy toilet paper for a year, but I do want to be prepared. And after my panic last week about barer cupboards and food scarcity, I did what I could. I bought five pounds of pasta, 13 pounds of oatmeal (the rate at which we go through it is unreal!), four pounds of beans, and some barley and extra frozen vegetables. Will it get us through months of isolation? No, but it will get us through some time, and that eases my mind.

2) Praying. Perhaps the most powerful thing we can do, and what can bring peace. Prayer may not halt the spread of this virus, but it can stymie the control fear has on us. I'm all for that.

3) Going to church for as long as we can. Hebrews 10:24-25 has come my way so many times lately. I'm all for quitting non-essential social gatherings (my heart goes out to all those planning weddings at this time), but church is essential. So for now, we'll go, practicing appropriate social distancing protocols. And after that, we'll stream online services or do whatever else we can to stay connected. The Body is important!

4) Getting outside. Yes, social distancing is a thing, but we can right now still walk or run around our neighborhoods or hike (though we might avoid places where we have to touch common surfaces, such as Camelback).

5) Making our home a "virus-free" zone. We don't want the virus, but we don't want fear to control us, either, so last weekend, I asked my husband to hold me accountable to not analyze the situation further outloud. If there are details we need to discuss, we will, but otherwise, we will go on living to the extent that God allows.

Pat Palau, in her book What To Do When You're Scared to Death (which I non-coincidentally started reading before this hysteria) shared the oriental legend of cholera. A traveler met Cholera on the road and said, "Where are you going?"

"To Baghdad to kill 20,000" Cholera replied.

The traveler later met Cholera and said, "You lied. You killed 90,000."

"No," Cholera replied. "I killed 20,000." Fear killed the rest.

Let's be smart. Let's be practical. Let's be wise. But let's not let fear control us. Let's tend to our mental as well as physical health. And if this plague gets us, let's have lived our lives well and rejoice, knowing that we have certainty about our eternal home in heaven.*

*If you don't yet know Jesus as Savior, today's the day! Do the ABC's and receive eternal certainty about your destiny.

Calm

I went to a presentation of Handel's Messiah this weekend. Handel's Messiah has special importance to our family because it's based on Scripture and part of my mom's family Christmas tradition. The performance is special to Arizona because it only comes to our community college in Arizona every few years. I first attended on a random trip home, and I've been back several times since then.

Sometimes, I'm impressed by the presentation of the oratorio. Sometimes, I like the tympani or the horns or the strings. Sometimes the vocalists are amazing, and sometimes not so. Sometimes it's the glitz and glam that strikes me. Sometimes it's the size of the choice. But this weekend, what struck me was the calm.

The calm. It's very rare that I ever sit down for two hours straight and just relax. To be honest, it was a little hard for me to relax in the beginning. I had the program in my lap and was tracking the songs, and it seemed to be taking forever. I had the impulse to grab my phone out of my pocket and take pictures at several points, but I didn't want to be that person disrupting the dark by using a lit device. My jaw kept getting tight and I had to purposefully unclench it. But then at some point, I just let it all go, and I got relaxed, and calm, and sleepy.

Shauna Niequist writes in her devotional Savor about seasons of tiredness, when we get in such a habit of being productive, that we lose our ability to slow down. We consume all the time, and never stop. I think that has been me lately. But the Messiah forced me to slow down, to watch, to wait, to enjoy.

The experience of slowing down took time this weekend. Enjoying the Messiah took effort. But it was worth it. Getting calm is a practice, it seems, and one I probably need to practice more often.

When God Tells You to Stop Praying

It's happened to me twice now. I'm fervently praying about something, banging on heaven's door, and then suddenly it's like the Spirit says, "Stop." It happened when I went to Unshaken, and it just happened again. At Unshaken, I had a strong conviction to pray about a work issue, and at some point I just felt like God said, "It's taken care of." And in the current situation, I've felt unsettled and upset and overall confused for quite some time. But then I saw this quote from TobyMac on Instagram:

God was like, "It's taken care of." And when I tried to pray, the fervor was gone. It wasn't that I didn't care, bit that I just had a sense again that I didn't need to pray about it anymore.

Answers? Nope. I still don't have them. I don't know how things will work out. But in the silence, in the waiting, I have God's peace. I trust Him. He has heard my prayers and He'll answer for His glory and good in His timing. Praise Him.

Jesus is the Prince of Peace.

It's easy to get overwhelmed by all the evil in this world: the killings, the natural disasters, the insult-slinging, the racism, the homophobia, etc. etc. This is all the work of the prince of this world (John 12:31), the "roaring lion" (1 Pet 5:8) who only comes to "steal and to kill and to destroy" (John 10:10).

But then I remember that I, too, have a prince: Jesus, the Prince of Peace. As God's own son, he comes to bring "a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of joy instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair" (Isa 61:3). I choose to focus on and worship Him.

Isaiah 9:6
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Matthew 14:33
Then those who were in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”

Mark 1:1
The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God.

John 1:49
Then Nathanael declared, “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel.”

John 11:27
“Yes, Lord,” she replied, “I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God, who is to come into the world.”

John 20:31
But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

Acts 5:31
God exalted him to his own right hand as Prince and Savior that he might bring Israel to repentance and forgive their sins.

Romans 1:4
And who through the Spirit of holiness was appointed the Son of God in power by his resurrection from the dead: Jesus Christ our Lord.

Hebrews 4:14
Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.

Hebrews 7:3
Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, resembling the Son of God, he remains a priest forever.

1 John 5:20
We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life.