Peace
I remember when being unavailable was normal. I know I am telling my age. However, there was a time when you could leave the house, and nobody could reach you until you got where you were going. You could sit down for dinner without a phone buzzing beside your plate. You could go for a walk and simply…walk.
Today, I can wake up, reach for my phone, and within five minutes know about a war thousands of miles away, a crisis at work, somebody's political opinion, the latest financial concern, three emails that supposedly need my attention, and what someone I haven't spoken to in twenty years had for dinner last night.
And we wonder why we are tired. Not just physically tired. Mentally tired. Emotionally tired. Sometimes even spiritually tired.
I have been thinking a lot lately about peace. Not the kind of peace that comes when everything is going right. That is easy. I am talking about the kind of peace we need when life is not going according to plan—when the world seems chaotic, work is stressful, people disappoint us, the future feels uncertain, and our phones keep reminding us about everything that is wrong.
I have come to believe that peace is not necessarily found by escaping the chaos. Sometimes peace comes from deciding how much of the chaos we are going to allow inside of us.
This is something I have had to remind myself of more as I have gotten older: Just because I know about something does not mean I have to carry it.
Think about that. We have access to more information than probably any generation in human history. But our minds were not necessarily designed to emotionally process the problems of millions of people every waking hour. We hear about layoffs, violence, political disagreements, economic uncertainty, natural disasters, illnesses, tragedies, and conflicts from around the world.
Then we add our own lives to the mix. Work. Family. Bills. Health. Relationships. Responsibilities. The future. That is a lot to carry.
At some point, I have had to ask myself a simple question: Chip, what can you actually do something about today?
I cannot control the economy. I cannot control world events. I cannot control organizational decisions. I cannot control what another person thinks about me. I certainly cannot control what tomorrow will bring.
But I can control how I treat people today. I can control whether I respond with kindness or anger. I can control what I give my attention to. I can control whether I spend an hour worrying about something I cannot change or spend that hour doing something meaningful. That distinction has become increasingly important to me.
Our Phones Have Become the Front Door to Our Minds
I love technology. I am fascinated by what technology—and now artificial intelligence—allows us to do. I am certainly not suggesting that we throw away our smartphones and move to a cabin in the woods. Although some days that cabin sounds rather good.
But I have started thinking differently about my phone. Our phones are essentially the front doors to our minds. And many of us leave the door wide open all day. Every notification gets to walk in. Every headline gets to walk in. Every email gets to walk in. Every text gets to walk in. Every opinion gets to walk in. Every controversy gets to walk in. And then we wonder why our minds feel crowded.
I have realized that protecting my peace sometimes means protecting my attention. Not every notification requires an immediate response. Not every news story needs to be read. Not every argument needs my opinion. Not every email is an emergency. Not every invitation deserves a yes. And not everyone deserves unlimited access to my time and emotional energy. That is not selfishness. That is a boundary.
One thing technology has almost eliminated from our lives is boredom. Remember boredom? We used to stand in line and just…stand there. Now we reach for our phones. We sit in a doctor's office and reach for our phones. We stop at a traffic light, and some people reach for their phones. We walk, exercise, eat, watch television, and sometimes even have conversations while simultaneously looking at another screen. Every empty moment gets filled.
But I am beginning to think those empty moments were not actually empty. Maybe that was when our minds had time to breathe. I have learned that there is something therapeutic about taking a walk without constantly consuming information. Sometimes I need to sit quietly. Sometimes I need music. Sometimes I need a good conversation. Sometimes I need to laugh. And sometimes I need absolutely nothing. No television. No phone. No podcast. No news. Just quiet.
There is a difference between loneliness and solitude. Loneliness can drain us. Solitude can restore us.
When we are younger, we often imagine happiness as something big. The promotion. The house. The car. The vacation. The accomplishment. The next milestone. Those things can certainly be enjoyable. But the older I get, the more I realize that some of life's greatest pleasures are remarkably ordinary.
A good cup of coffee in the morning. A walk when the weather is just right. The excitement of a dog when you walk through the door—as though you have been gone for six months instead of twenty minutes. A conversation with someone who really knows you. A great song you have not heard in years. Laughing until your stomach hurts. Watching the sun rise. Sitting quietly at the end of a productive day and thinking, Today was a pretty good day.
These are not interruptions between the important moments. These are the important moments. Maybe peace has been sitting beside us all along, but we have been too distracted looking for something bigger.
I have also learned that gratitude and difficulty can occupy the same space. Gratitude Doesn't Mean Everything Is Perfect. You can be disappointed and grateful. You can be grieving and grateful. You can be uncertain about tomorrow and grateful for today. Gratitude does not require pretending everything is okay when it is not. It simply refuses to allow what is wrong to become the only thing we see.
There have been times in my life when things did not turn out the way I expected. I am sure you can say the same. But even during difficult seasons, there were still things worth appreciating. There were still people who cared. There were still lessons being learned. There were still reasons to laugh. There were still blessings that could easily have gone unnoticed. Sometimes gratitude is simply saying: This is hard, but there is still goodness in my life.
I have been thinking about a simple habit that can make a difference: protecting the first and last few minutes of the day. Think about what happens when the first thing we do every morning is reach for our phones. Before we have even had a chance to decide how we feel, we have invited the entire world into the bedroom.
News. Email. Work. Social media. Problems. Other people's priorities.
What if we gave ourselves the first 30 minutes? Pray. Stretch. Read. Drink some coffee. Think. Be grateful. Look out the window. Decide what kind of person you want to be that day before the world starts making demands of you. And maybe do something similar at night. Put the phone down. Turn off the television. Allow your mind to come in for a landing. Reflect. Read. Pray. Be thankful for something that happened that day. Then rest. Tomorrow will arrive soon enough.
These days, I sometimes ask myself a question: Am I carrying today's responsibilities, or am I trying to carry the entire world? Because there is a difference. I want to care about what is happening around me. I do not want to become indifferent to the suffering or needs of others. But caring does not mean carrying every problem every minute of every day. Some things require action. Some things require patience. Some things require prayer. And some things simply need to be released.
As I have gotten older, I have come to think of peace less as a destination and more as a daily practice. Some days I am better at it than others. But maybe that is okay too. Tomorrow, I get another opportunity. So today, I am going to try to do what I can. Enjoy my coffee. Drink my water. Take the walk. Answer the important email. Put the phone down occasionally. Laugh whenever I get the opportunity. Tell people I love them. Notice the ordinary moments. Be grateful for what I have. Pray about the things weighing on my heart. And try very hard not to borrow trouble from tomorrow.
The world will probably still be noisy when I wake up in the morning. That is okay. The world can be noisy without my mind becoming noisy with it. And perhaps that is what peace really is.
Until our next chat.
Take care of yourself and each other!
Chip
