On Living One Day At A Time

"Be not therefore solicitous for to morrow; for the morrow will be solicitous for itself. Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof." ~ Matthew 6:34

If there's one thing that makes me stressed, it's trying to live in the future.  There's this little voice in my head that constantly reminds me about all the things I have to do this week, this month, and this year.  It goes something like this: Ursi, don't forget you have six commitments this weekend.  You'd better worry about all of them right now.  And you know you wanted to get a book published before you were 25 and you're almost 24.  And you have to go to the dentist this month.  And tax day is coming up. 

I often try to rationalize this little voice by telling myself that I need to think about all my plans and deadlines.  After all, if I don't plan anything, I'll miss deadlines and not get anything done!  But there's a difference between planning for the future and worrying about the future.  And I think I can safely say that 80% of the time I spend thinking about the future is worrying, not planning.

C.S. Lewis warns about the dangers of focusing too much on the future in The Screwtape Letters.  Screwtape, a senior devil, tells his nephew Wormwood that one way to tempt men away from God is to get them to live in the future.  “The Future is, of all things, the thing least like eternity. It is the most temporal part of time--for the Past is frozen and no longer flows, and the Present is all lit up with eternal rays.” When we concentrate on the future, we miss opportunities to do good in the present.  We can also be led into sin.  Lewis warns, “Nearly all vices are rooted in the future. Gratitude looks to the past and love to the present; fear, avarice, lust and ambition look ahead.”

And then there's that verse from Matthew I quoted at the top of this post.  God doesn't want us to worry about the future.  He wants us to focus on pleasing Him in the present day.

So I'm resolving to stop worrying about the future and start living one day at a time.  I'm still going to write down deadlines and make to-do lists, but apart from that I'm going to make an effort to focus on the present day and trust God to take care of the future.  If you share my problem of worrying too much about the future, please join me!