Help for Catechist: August 2010

Gaining It by Losing it All

By Mary Lou Rosien

My computer crashed!  Not just a temporary, pull things up later, delay of work crash. No… a real, honest to goodness, lost everything  CRASH!!  You know the old writing joke, “All writers should be like Jesus, cause Jesus SAVES.”  Well, this is an indication of how far this Christian has to go; I did not save… all gone.

Thankfully, I do most of my writing on a different computer, so my current projects were okay, but all my contacts had disappeared.  At first, I felt sick to my stomach.  How would I ever rebuild everything?  I had no hard copy of emails, nothing to fall back on.  My editors’ emails were gone.  My friends’ emails… gone. My family’s emails, also gone.

Then, it hit me.  My junk mail…gone!  The people I really had no interest in keeping in touch with…gone!  My Christmas email card list… oh, right, I never got around to making one.  Hurray, I thought, I’m free.

Over the next few days I began to realize that I wasted a lot of time and energy on things I didn’t need on my computer.  All those stupid forwards that I never read anyway, no longer cluttered my inbox.  Advertisements for things I would never need (although those deals and pretty pictures made me think I did) weren’t assaulting me on a daily basis.

I began to rebuild, slowly and with more discretion.  I analyzed what I really wanted in my email.  I contacted people by phone…wow, a real person was at the other end… and updated the email addresses I wanted to have.  I connected with people I like and I disconnected with some unhealthy and toxic people that I had clung to.  As advertisements began to come in again, I clicked the “unsubscribe” button with reckless abandon.  It felt great.

I felt I had reclaimed my life, well, at least my life as it was connected to email.  I didn’t check my email as often as it just didn’t seem that important anymore.  I began to see this pattern in other areas of my life.  For instance, in the summer none of my favorite television shows are on (except Warehouse 13, I love that one).  So I made a conscientious effort to go to bed an hour early and read my Bible.  An internal transformation began to take place that mimicked the external one on my computer.  I started questioning what other things I didn’t need cluttering up my thoughts, space and mind.  I began to let go of unimportant things and cling a little more tightly to the things I love.

We never know what will be in our lives the next day.  Who might we lose, what may fall away?  Spending time deciding what should stay, how we should spend our time and who we want to cherish while we can, are valuable lessons for ourselves and our students.  Enjoy the long, hot days of August and God bless you.  As for me, I think I’ll start on that Christmas card list.

Mary Lou Rosien writes from North Chili, NY.  She is the author of Managing Stress with the Help of Your Catholic Faith (OSV Publishing). Email her at mrosien@rochester.rr.com.