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Steps for the Stuck

I cannot make another choice.

Most of us have thought or said these words a time or two. The circumstances leading to such a declaration are often quite small, like trying to decide what to make for dinner after a day of completing a long list of work tasks. Suddenly, a simple, everyday question becomes a hill we lack the energy to climb.

“When our plans become too much and our days too full, it’s easy to get stuck,” writes Sandra McCracken. “We’re overextended, and we stumble into indecision like it’s quicksand. The harder we try to climb out, the more we sink down. We try to discern what plans to make or which priorities to keep by reducing them to something like a math equation. We ration out resources to our competing desires.”

Sound familiar?

If so, McCracken has a word of wisdom for those stuck moments: take the time to “wonder at the beauty of God.”

“When I stop to wonder about the thoughts God may be having today, in this moment, in real time, my own thoughts are reordered. My priorities change,” she writes.

Such wondering isn’t a magic trick that will make all the pending choices vanish. We’ll still have to decide what to make for dinner. But taking a moment to consider the beauty of God can help make our spirits lighter and our minds a bit less stuck. Rather than frozen, we can be free.

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