The Mutterings

One Monday I was having a particularly bad day at work. I had forgotten something so obvious the previous Friday that I knew would screw up the rest of my week. I banged around a few things on my desk in frustration, certain choice four-letter words popping into my head. Four-letter words expressing my frustration with how I had mismanaged the situation. Four-letter words expressing my resentment at not being perfect. 

Four-letter words come to all of our minds in certain situations. Four-letter words when someone cuts us off. Four-letter words when someone offends us. Four-letter words when we are presented with a situation outside of our control.

On the morning that I am telling you about, I was struck by how the four-letter word indicated my own bad attitude. Of course I forget things. I am human. I am fallible. I am not in total control of every situation.

It struck me after my mutterings of the four-letter word, that those situations which prompt those four-letter words are exactly the situations that should prompt a short prayer for help - the situations that remind us that life is beyond our control - the situations that remind us that we are not perfect - those situations are moments for grace, moments to turn humbly to God and trust in his goodness.

In a strange way that morning, I realized that when I feel like using the choice expletives that I grew up with I should pray. It was a realization that in moments of frustration I ought to raise my mind and heart to God, instead of just spewing forth yet another four-letter word. Time for an attitude adjustment for me, Christine Feltes.