I Am Afraid To Be Pleased

It came up and you have not let yourself be glad about it.

Not entirely. There has been a small measured amount, carefully issued, and the rest has been held back, and the holding back was not a decision you made consciously. It arrived with the shoot.

And if you put words to the thing that arrived, it goes roughly: do not get attached, because it might not last.

You are allowed to be pleased today, and a loss that has not happened has never once been able to collect in advance.

Let me describe the arrangement you have entered into, because I think seeing the terms will help.

You are paying now, in withheld gladness, against a possible loss later.

And the theory is that if it dies, the fall will be shorter because you never went all the way up. That is the deal. A reduced present in exchange for a reduced future fall.

Now look at what that deal actually delivers.

If it dies, you will pay then. The reduced height does not help as much as people expect and you will still feel it. And you will also have paid now.

And if it lives, you will have paid for nothing at all. You will simply have had a smaller few weeks than were available.

There is no version of this in which the arrangement pays out.

This is the day which the LORD hath made

There is a line in Psalm 118 that is said so often it has gone smooth, and the word to slow down on is the small one.

This is the day which the LORD hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it. (Psalm 118:24, King James Version)

This is the day.

Not the days. Not days in general. This one, the specific one, the one currently underway, singled out and pointed at.

You are being pointed at one particular day rather than at a policy about days, and Scripture has never once asked anybody to rejoice in general. Psalm 118:24 says this is the day, which is a demonstrative rather than a category, and the Holy Spirit is the one who makes a smoothed-over verse land on a woman withholding something at a windowsill.

And then the last two words, which are the ones that answer your arrangement directly. In it.

Rejoice and be glad in it. Inside this day. Not about the run of days, not about how it turns out, not in the general shape of things. In the one that is currently happening.

You are being given a container with a size, and gladness has never once been asked for on account of anything beyond the day it is in. The Holy Spirit is the one who puts a person inside the present one, and the written word ends that sentence with in it rather than leaving the gladness open ended.

And that matters enormously for what you have been doing.

Because your arrangement is entirely about a different day. You are managing Thursday from today, and the verse does not have Thursday in it anywhere.

You are able to be glad in a day without underwriting any of the others, and today's gladness has never once been a guarantee issued about later. The Spirit of God is the one who gives a day at a time, and the word names this one and stops.

The fall is not shorter

Let me press on the actual mechanism, because the whole arrangement rests on a belief that is not true.

Holding back does not shorten the fall.

It feels as though it should. It seems arithmetical: less height, less distance to drop. But grief does not work by subtraction from an emotional altitude. If that plant dies, what you will feel is about the plant and about you, and very little of it will be moderated by how pleased you allowed yourself to be in the previous two weeks.

You are buying a protection that has never once been delivered to anybody, and withheld gladness has never reduced what a loss costs when it comes. The Holy Spirit is the one who tells a person plainly when a defense does not work, and Psalm 118:24 asks for gladness in a day without any hedging clause anywhere in it.

And here is what the arrangement definitely does deliver, which is the part that is certain.

It removes the good part. Reliably, every day, in full. The one thing this deal absolutely achieves is that the next few weeks will be smaller than they could have been.

So it is a certain cost against an uncertain and probably imaginary benefit.

You are paying something certain for something that has never once arrived for anybody, and a smaller present has never bought a smaller future. The Spirit of God is the one who puts a person back into the day they are actually in, and the written word makes its whole request about one specified day.

Say it in the present tense

So here is the assignment, and the tense is the point of it.

Say the words I am pleased about this, out loud, today.

I am pleased about this. Not I was pleased when it came up, which puts it safely in the past where it cannot be taken from you. Not it will be nice if it lasts, which hands the whole thing to Thursday.

I am pleased about this.

You are able to make a statement about right now, and a present tense sentence has never once committed anybody to anything later. Psalm 118:24 says this is the day and asks for gladness in it, and the Holy Spirit is the one at that sill while a woman speaks in the present tense.

Here is why the tense carries the whole exercise.

Past tense is safe because it is finished. Future tense is safe because it is conditional. The present tense is the only one with any exposure in it, which is exactly why it has been getting avoided without anybody deciding to.

Saying I am pleased is standing in the day the verse names.

You are standing inside the day rather than either side of it, and a sentence in the present tense has never once been a promise about the future. The Holy Spirit is the one present in the exposure of a present tense sentence, and the word puts the gladness in it, meaning in the one that is happening.

And if it dies on Thursday, you will have been pleased on Tuesday. That is not a loss. That is two days that actually got had.