Bear Each Other’s Burdens
Rhythms of Renewal: Connect Rhythm - Bear Each Other’s Burdens
“Be careful what you give the microphone in your life,” (189) Rebekah Lyons cautions in her chapter entitled Bear Each Other’s Burdens.
What a powerful statement! What do you let speak loudest to you? Is it your pain or grief? Is it the negative voices of your past? Is it your dream about starting a new business? Is it your grandma’s encouraging words that echo inside you? This statement could be a daily reminder to you of where you put your focus.
Perhaps a good way to remind ourselves of the importance of putting our eyes on the right things is to try to focus on others – both in their capacity to help us and in our capacity to help them.
“We weren’t designed to beat our fears, our anxieties, and our worries on our own. We weren’t meant for isolation” (190).
Typically when I am grieving or sad, I want to be alone. I don’t want anyone to see the tears streaming down my face or the way my nose turns red and my face becomes blotchy when I cry.
Certainly her statement about tears as cleansing resonated with me:
“If you’re crying, you’re healing. When we allow ourselves to feel, to release, it has positive effects on our emotional state. Crying can be self-soothing and elevate mood better than any antidepressant” (188).
When I was in college, during the summers I worked as a part of an installation crew for an irrigation company that my dad owned, and my foreman once told me, “I never met anybody who cries as much as you.” This rough blue collar guy and I had become surprisingly good friends during these years of working together, and I accepted his blunt words as most likely true and not in the least bit offensive.
My emotions were close to the surface in those years: these were the summers immediately following my 13-year-old sister’s death as a result of her getting hit on her bike by a car. It’s no surprise to me looking back now, that those dusty, dry days stirred up in me the uncontrollable desire to weep, to water the ground with my grief. Combine the emotional struggles I was going through with working long, exhausting hours of manual labor, and it’s perfectly logical that my eyes were often salty with tears.
Aren’t there times in your life when you feel like you are not the one controlling what that microphone in your life is giving amplitude? You’re caught in a web of your brokenness or passion or boredom, and sometimes it’s surprising to even realize other voices are trying to speak to you amidst that dominant tone.
As Paul writes in Philippians 4:8, your microphone should be on these things:
Challenge yourself this week to evaluate where you are putting your focus. Look around you and see if someone needs your help in some way, and perhaps more difficult yet – accept help from others! Allow yourself to reap the blessings of someone else bringing joy and happiness to your day.