INTRODUCTION

COVID represented a wonderful opportunity to reawaken and rely upon my mental/spiritual/philosophical talisman—or lucky charm—to deal with a challenging problem or circumstance. So, how does one address difficult and bewildering problems in life? One option is to live life “in day-tight compartments,” and, in that day, to do three things: work, pray, and relax.

This “way of life” was engendered out of the necessity to competently deal with the rigors of surgical training that almost always demanded working 100 plus hours a week for over 8 continuous years. Perhaps it might have some relevance to you and any challenges in your life.

LIVING LIFE IN DAY-TIGHT COMPARTMENTS

I try to limit my horizon to a 24-hour day without forward-looking and retrospective thoughts. It is only for this day that I am to ask for my daily bread, and I am guided to limit my thoughts for tomorrow. As Osler and Carlyle exhort:

“The load of tomorrow, added to that of yesterday, carried today, makes the strongest falter. Shut off the future as tightly as the past.”

“Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.”

WORK

The idea here is to get up and get moving, regardless of whether I feel inspired. My attitude sometimes tries to awaken my courage by thinking, “This challenge might kill me, but it won’t hurt me!”

The Bible offers multiple references to the value of work. Perhaps one of the most interesting is that, in the commandment to honor the Sabbath, there are the words to work six of the seven days. Others have offered insights into the value of work.

“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”

“Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle.”

All that I can do is everything that I can do. I periodically ask myself, “Am I doing my best to be my very best?”

PRAYER

Prayer is a common theme in the Bible. It can be a continual conversation with God while I work, as so wonderfully summarized by Brother Lawrence in The Practice of the Presence of God. As I meditate in prayer, I ask the following questions:

Should I retreat so that my next advance is wiser and more clever and more sustainable?
Or should I retreat on my mission altogether so that I can live to fight another day?
Do my goals and vision of the outcome of this challenge need more resiliency or, perhaps, adaptability?
Put another way, does my situation today mandate an iron will or an adaptable will?

I remind myself that God can change anything, but, more often than not, God probably needs to change me so that I can more effectively change the dynamic in front of me.

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RELAX

When I have worked my guts out and prayed my heart out, then I try to relax, listen, and reflect. Sometimes I do this at the end of the waking part of my 24-hour, day-tight compartment. At other times, the day is so challenging that I must withdraw multiple times during the day to relax and recharge. While relaxing, I reflect on the following: Will I get enough sleep to reenergize me for the next day’s work, or will I still be exhausted upon awakening?

If my tough situation doesn’t change after days, months, or years of subscribing to my suggested, philosophical “lucky charm,” then I ask myself the following:

Do I need to change my interpretation of what any suffering means?
Have I considered that, instead of working so very hard to control the outcome of the challenge, I now need to work on changing my attitude about what might be a permanent, undesirable outcome or an outcome that I didn’t anticipate?
Have I chatted with my wise, brutally honest, and esteemed Christian friends about my circumstances and truly welcomed any and all comments?
Do I really believe that “all things work together for those who love the Lord”?

Perhaps equally important for reflection while relaxing is this: Have I embraced the important idea that what should matter most to me is that I “do the right thing; whether the right thing comes to pass should not bother” me? This concept that “the effort is enough” is brilliantly summarized by Ryan Holiday in Ego is the Enemy. Doing what we think is right, and serving God is enough. Any adversity can be endured, and any rewards are considered extra.

“It is a sore thing to have labored along and scaled arduous hilltops, and when all is done, find humanity indifferent to your achievement.”

Accepting nothing less than full appreciation is a dangerous demand of our ego.

“We have only minimal control over the rewards for our work and effort—other people’s validation, recognition, rewards. So what are we going to do? Not be kind, not work hard, not produce, because there is a chance it wouldn’t be reciprocated? C’mon.”

What if I’m ahead of the times, and no one is even supposed to understand what I am doing!

“Do your work. Do it well. Then ‘let go and let God.’ That’s all there needs to be.”

SUMMARY

Of course, my philosophical paradigm is an oversimplification. While I work, I can pray. Prayer can sometimes feel like work, and I can relax while working and praying. It is simply offered as an option for CEF members who are “high achievers with a higher calling,” who are often called upon to tackle challenging problems and, when all is said and done, deeply desire to hear the words, “Well done, my faithful servant” from our loving Father.

Article originally hosted and shared with permission by The Christian Economic Forum, a global network of leaders who join together to collaborate and introduce strategic ideas for the spread of God’s economic principles and the goodness of Jesus Christ. This article was from a collection of White Papers compiled for attendees of the CEF’s Global Event.