Posts Tagged: distractions

“The Art of Distracting Ourselves with Small White Stones”

On July 5, 2023 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

“Let your eyes look directly forward,

            and your gaze be straight before you.

Ponder the path of your feet;

            then all your ways will be sure.

 Do not swerve to the right or to the left;

            turn your foot away from evil.” (Proverbs 4:25-27, English Standard Version)

A couple of friends of mine were out walking and talking with one another at a park when a very pretty young lady jogged by them. They are trying to be men of integrity, so they both quickly lowered their gaze to contemplate the paved asphalt path below them.

“Hey!” said one of them. “I never noticed that this asphalt has little white stones in it.”

“Me neither!” responded the other guy.

Distractions can be a bad thing, if they are keeping us from doing good things. However, distractions have their good side, too. Sometimes we can distract ourselves from doing things, saying things, or thinking things that we will very soon regret.

Many distractions are external and, therefore, out of our control. But we can also choose to distract ourselves. This doesn’t have to be a big production. In fact, the simpler the better. Years ago, I heard a man who was facing down a terrible addiction say the following: In the early days of his recovery, when the addiction came knocking at the door, this man would start flipping through food recipes in order to distract himself. It worked for him!

We have a saying in twelve-step programs, “Move a muscle, change a thought.” It really is true.

And sometimes, just by noticing what is around us, we are distracted in a holy, healthy way. There are times when a few white stones on the pathway are enough to keep us on The Path. What are your white stones?

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“On Tending to My Knittin’”

On September 17, 2020 by Dteb With 0 Comments - down to earth believer

My fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Manley, often exhorted her students to “tend to your knittin’!” I didn’t understand the metaphor, but I knew what she meant. I needed to stop talking to the pretty girl across from me, and concentrate on my writing assignment!

Distraction is at epidemic proportions these days. Much of what I call “work” is actually just scrolling through the internet looking for cute puppy videos or political news. I imagine some of you occasionally struggle with similar distractions.

Proverb 17:24 has an interestingly worded warning for people like me.

“The discerning sets his face toward wisdom,

            but the eyes of a fool are on the ends of the earth.”

(English Standard Version)

Fools look too far away. I sometimes do precisely that.

But aren’t we supposed to be concerned with what is going on the world? I            would answer that with a definite maybe.

Here is the problem, as I see it. I tend to be more interested in knowing what’s going on in the world, than I am in actually doing something to make the world a better place right where I am. This sort of “knowing” doesn’t sound—or feel—like wisdom to me.

Goldingay has a vivid comment about this verse, and about the folly of looking too far into the distance. He says that folly  “. . . is promiscuous in its interests (17:24) . . . .” And promiscuity is not a good thing in any area of my life.

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