Challenges at Work and Our Spiritual Life

Last week we focused on challenges at work, especially of the physical and/or emotional sort. Whoever you are and whatever you do, you've likely encountered these. Maybe you're experiencing them right now. I am.

We made some suggestions for handling such challenges. No matter the particular challenge, those suggestions were intended to cover most, if not all, of them. In short, if we apply ourselves diligently to our work, and have some sort of organized process to getting our tasks done on a regular basis, that discipline will step up to the plate to help us meet challenges.

Of course, some challenges may require us to take extraordinary measures. For example, if someone becomes physically disabled such that they can't negotiate commuting to or using their current work space, things have to be adjusted - assuming they're able to continue at their current occupation. The late Stephen Hawking, a world-renowned physicist, presents a striking well-publicized example. His brain, the center and generator of his work, allowed him to continue working. But he needed a special wheel-chair, along with a remarkable technology that allowed him to express himself in words, even though he couldn't use his normal speaking faculties.

I remember watching video interviews with him and thinking there was no way I could function as he did. Then again, I didn't have to. Maybe I could if I did.

But whether applying our normal discipline, or some extraordinary measure helps us meet those challenges we face, through it all we can't forget the importance of our spiritual life. 

We've approached the relationship of our work life and our spiritual life from many angles in the past. A vibrant spiritual life will steady and strengthen not only our soul, but every part of our work life and our personal lives. Let's look at a couple of examples of how to apply this to those special difficult challenges that our work brings to us. Here's one short-term, intense semi-debacle that recently occurred in our business:

We had to place a trade online. Trading at brokerage firm we were using was out. We called the firm. Their phones were overwhelmed as the market was rather volatile - meaning others likely were trying to place trades that were time-sensitive - as was ours. Each time we called (a total of four times) our call was cut off. An attempt to access the chat function didn't connect (multiple attempts).

The firm is a nationally recognized, huge, corporate behemoth that should have back-ups to their back-ups. Obviously they failed here. Frankly, we were a bit taken aback at this failure. The volatility in the markets wasn't even that bad, really well within "normal" range. To completely cut off customers like this is really inexcusable. As for what ultimately ensued, it's not relevant. Fortunately this ultimately did not negatively impact our clients. It was just for one of our personal accounts.

We first met the challenge by using a step-by-step approach, based on our experience in our business. Our approach was unusual in that we really hadn't faced such a catastrophic failure like this. So we didn't have a "standardized" process to follow. We did however, utilize both our professional experience along with bits of other processes we do have and coddled together a logical process to do our best to take the action we needed to take. There was not panic. A calm handling of the affair kept our mind in line with the event at hand (rather than wildly speculating about what the h_ll was going on). 

Yet even with this rather even-handed response, we knew that somewhere in the drama and fog of this unanticipated and - to put it mildly - unusual occurrence, that the Hand of God was "behind" it all. Yes, we recognized this. Yes, we prayed as we worked. Did we or do we now understand the natural causes? At the time, no. Eventually, we think we did. But crossing the bridge to our supernatural life not only reinforced our naturally-induced calm, but helped us learn a thing or two when the dust finally settled. 

To keep it short and simple, the most important thing we learned was that, no matter the size or shape or intensity of an unexpected debacle, there's some rhyme and reason in the Mind of God. For one thing, since He's always trying to nudge us closer to Him, you can see how this might serve that purpose. Of course, you've got to believe in Him And cultivate the ability and the habit of consistently looking to Him, in this case as work throws out its challenges. Having at least tried to do this for any number of years, doing so during this short intense challenge didn't take any heavy lifting. It was simply something I do all the time - or at least try to do all the time.

While a short, intense, time-sensitive challenge isn't par for the course in my business. they do happen occasionally. Years ago, they caused consternation of major proportions: heavy heart-beats, sweaty brows, mental confusion (derangement sometimes?), headache, back pain, etc. 

For the lack of all this, I can only recognize and thank God that this was not the case this time. OK, so I have put a lot of effort into developing this "spiritual response" over the course of many years. But without His grace, I'd likely have needed a couple (or more) Advil or some other "medicinal" relief. 

More next time, but for now...

Thank you Jesus!