Tangled
Caught in the Web of Tomorrow
Introduction
There is so much going on inside my head sometimes! Today I am distracted by tomorrow so I decided to untangle those thoughts and bring you through that journey. Thank you for joining me in this issue of The Adventure of Reflection as I reflect on being tangled today in the web of tomorrow.
A Minute of Motivation
Small Stuff
Benjamin Franklin once wrote: “Be not disturbed at trifles or at accidents common or unavoidable.”
A more modern version of this states: “Don’t sweat the small stuff.”
It amazes me how it’s usually the little annoyances of life that really get to people. Like straws that eventually add up to a big enough load to break the camel’s back, so also the small, daily hassles of this life may get you down.
Benjamin Franklin is considered by many to have been a wise man. His advice is to not be “disturbed at trifles.” When little things go wrong, instead of being irritated, try saying, “Oh, well” or try laughing at the absurd glitches in this thing called life. Learn to expect your life will not go smoothly, or as planned, every day. Expect little things will go awry each day and then enjoy the humor in having predicted correctly.
You may think this is negative thinking, but it’s not. It’s being in touch with reality. We’d like to think we live in a perfect world where cars are always reliable, where umbrellas are never forgotten when it rains, and where human beings always do exactly as they say they will do. We’d like to live in such a world, but we don’t. In the real world in which we live there are frequent hassles and un-predicted challenges.
Learn to expect, and consequently not be so frustrated by, the many trivial challenges each day brings. Be not disturbed by trifles. Don’t sweat the small stuff.
Note. Written in 1993 and preserved on dot-matrix printer paper. Published here because of the tangle created in today when things don’t go as planned.
Enjoy Life More
Fight Today’s Mosquitoes, not Tomorrow’s
It’s Monday as I write this; I am driving to Indiana tomorrow. By the time you read this on Sunday I will have already returned from my trip. I’m writing today instead of my usual Thursday writing. Today’s “to do” list also includes packing for tomorrow.
For several days the 7-plus hour drive to my daughter’s home has been draining me in the background. In recent years I find I am more nervous about driving than I used to be. Perhaps that August 2018 accident shifted my perspective. It’s weird because I am always completely fine when I am actually making a long trip by myself. The tension arrives before I hit the road, not while I am on the road.
I have found that tomorrow is not a good thing when it intrudes into today. It’s like some pesky mosquito I cannot seem to eliminate. The famous chorus of “tomorrow, tomorrow, I love you tomorrow, you’re only a day away” is not a refrain I actually enjoy. The more I am distracted by tomorrow while living today the more joy is drained from today.
We can never actually experience tomorrow, only today. When I wake up tomorrow I will find all I need for that day, which will have become today. Meanwhile, all I need for today, which was yesterday’s tomorrow, is in front of me.
To enjoy life more, focus on today and let tomorrow buzz around without becoming too distracted by it. Fight today’s mosquitoes.
Faith Corner
“Give us what we need for today.” (From The Lord’s Prayer)
When the followers of Jesus asked Him to teach them how to pray, He gave them a prayer that became known as The Lord’s Prayer. One of the phrases is usually stated as “Give us this day our daily bread.” What we need for each day is captured in the metaphor of “daily bread.”
Hooray for metaphors! Jesus is my kind of guy! There is so much packed into the phrase about giving us our daily bread. This one phrase could be at least a paragraph.
First, I suggest shifting the focus from just a request to a more complete realization. The prayer can be not only asking for what we need for today but also to help us to see how fully the Lord has provided all we need today. Additionally, the prayer can include a plea to keep us from being distracted by chasing after what we don’t need or He doesn’t want us to have because it isn’t good for us. And, keeping with the theme on the entanglements of tomorrow, we can also pray to keep our focus on today’s battles.
Dear Lord, thank You for providing a model for how to pray. As I ponder the request for “daily bread,” help me to more fully realize what it means. Provide all I need for today and help me see how abundantly You have provided it. Help me not waste today by chasing after what is not good for me. Keep me focused on today’s battles and today’s equipping, and not being distracted by the cares of tomorrow. Thank You for hearing my prayer and sending help my way. Amen.
Poetry Pause
Tomorrow is a Mirage
The path ahead is filled with tomorrows.
But like mirages in the desert
I can never reach tomorrow.
When I get to the spot where I saw tomorrow
It’s gone.
All I find
Is another today.
Tomorrow is a mirage.
By Cindy MacGregor, June 19, 2023
Note. It’s summer time and I am thinking about mirages on the road, those strange, shimmering places on really hot days. There’s nothing there when I get to that point, only the road. Tomorrow is like that. I can never reach it because it always becomes today.
Old Mom to Young Mom
We’ll Figure That Out When We Get There
As children develop they gradually understand time. This includes concepts of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. In the early stages of understanding time, a child might refer to any day behind them as “yesterday” and any day ahead as “tomorrow.” These pre-operational understandings eventually become more concrete and a child “counts down” days until Christmas using a calendar. Soon thereafter, many children begin to fret about tomorrow.
The contentment of today becomes entangled in a web of anticipated complications for the days ahead. Some children are more prone to fretting than others, but the ability emerges naturally in most young humans. What are we going to do? Where are we going to go? What if this happens? What if this doesn’t happen?
And, to be fair, some of them learn fretting from their parents.
Today becomes entangled by a flurry of “what if’s” about tomorrow. “We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it” is a possible response, but the metaphor of a bridge might be too abstract for a child.
As an old mom to young parents, I suggest our response to the “What if’s” about tomorrow be “we’ll figure that out when we get there. We’re HERE now.”
To become untangled from the web of tomorrow’s “what if’s” we need to shift our focus to today. Maybe there’s something we can do today that helps prevent some of tomorrow’s difficulties. But we can’t fight tomorrow’s battles, only today’s. We’re HERE now. Tomorrow is a mirage to which we never actually arrive; it always turns into today.
Dear Dr. Mac
A joke from a reader in response to “Yet-Ness” – when I was growing up, my mother always told this joke (to anyone who would listen): the newspaper headlines said “woman died – bullet in her yet.” What’s a yet?
Dear Dr. Mac,
Your most recent Substack was difficult to read. You spoke of patience beautifully, but as I am in my own period of “yet” I am struggling to find peace. Waiting can feel unbearable at times. Is there a series coming on “yet”? I could use some guidance!
[signed] Laura
Dear Laura,
Thanks for writing! I had actually pondered a “yet” series! Unofficially, this post is along the same theme. Do you remember that Dr. Seuss book Oh, the places you’ll go? There’s a painful set of pages that has spoken to me at times of delay and difficulty. The “bang-ups and hang-ups” pages and the terrible “waiting place” come to mind. If you don’t have a copy I suggest you get one. It is perhaps the best motivational book ever written. IMHO.
[signed] Dr. Mac
Dear Readers:
You can find “Yet-Ness” and all my previous posts at Archive
You have two ways to share your thoughts with me. You can leave a comment (see box below) or you can email me at: drcjmacgregor@outlook.com; I will respond to your email, and post our dialogue in a future newsletter (with your permission, of course). I love to hear from you!