I woke up in the middle of the night thinking about stress. After floating in and out of restlessness – I remembered that not too long ago, I had done a speaking engagement on Stress and used the analogy of a water bottle. So, I am thinking to myself, here I am in the middle of the night… flashing back to a workshop on stress where I begin the session with me carrying around a bottle. The whole time I am speaking introductions and agenda for the days events, I am holding this bottle of water.
As I held the bottle of water, it was neither full nor was it empty. It appeared clear and most of the participants were looking at the bottle with concentration and intent to try and come up with new and creative descriptions. It seemed that no matter how we threw out scientific facts, the audience just didn’t have anymore hypothesis’s.
So, I did the next best thing. I put out a question… “what can we not see”. Let me help you. Is this bottle of water able to add stress to it’s environment? I am holding a bottle of water that is half full and I have been holding it for the last 15 minutes above shoulder level. Am I becoming stressed as I hold the bottle above my shoulder? Are the muscles in my arms becoming stressed with the added positional change to maintain above my shoulder? Have you noticed the times I have been switching it from one hand to the other to reduce the muscles strain of holding it in one spot for any length of time.
What about relief… can it be possible that just sitting down the bottle relieves stress? The crowd was eager to state that putting it down would, in fact, provide immediate relief to the muscle fatigue, but the soreness in my arm could remain for several hours and days.
The same is true when we hold on to things that drain our energy.
When we hold all the stress in our lives inside, it will absolutely cause health issues. Many professionals have tried to address this by providing medication for sleeping issues, or depression or fatigue. Some will suggest options to release stress by exercising, or yoga, even meditation. I am not a physician, but I know the greatest physician of all time. He wants us to give all our burdens, worries and challenges of life to HIM. Just like the bottle that is both half full and or half empty, so is life and its journey. We will be running on energy, draining our reserves while watching the tank empty and yet we continue to stuff more stress down into our hearts. Let go is a behavior that isn’t natural. We prefer to wrestle and even become physically sick trying to hold onto the stress. It’s not natural to surrender, yet God wants us to trust and believe that he is bigger than any of the heartbreak we are dealing with and that He alone can change the stress of life’s struggles.
Be strong my friends, don’t fill your half empty bottles with more and more stress, fill it with life giving water. He is your living water, turning all your heartbreak into life lessons and wisdom.
Half full or half empty?