God grant me

I’ve been saying the Serenity Prayer a lot lately.

Maybe that happens when you grow older. When loved ones die or get ill. When a pandemic like covid hits. When you’re isolated or alone and you hate cold winter nights and darkness settles in at 4:30p.m.

For those unfamiliar, the prayer goes like this:

“God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things I can. And the wisdom to know the difference.”

Those in recovery live and breathe this prayer. And in a way, we’re all in recovery, whether it’s a formal 12-Step program or simply life. Being human baptizes us into harsh stuff that lures us into niggly escapes like eating a whole sleeve of Oreos or binge watching TV.

Sometimes the latter two are necessary. But just saying. Not always good if they take us away from healthy functioning.

The honest truth is, I’ve never been good at acceptance. At gut level, I’m a fighter. That can be good. But that’s also not good because most things in life can’t be changed.

Think about it. What can you control?

I couldn’t control that Joe died. That my father died. That two brothers have cancer. That I’m growing older and energy levels weren’t what they once were, even as new aches appear.

*******

So, what can I change?

My underwear? My bed? The channel? Yep. I have control over these small things. But what about the bigger stuff?

That’s when it gets scary. Do I have the courage to change my life for the good? Sometimes I get lazy. Nope, don’t want to make the bed. Yep, would rather feel grumpy today and feel like a victim. No judgments here. Again, sometimes these choices are all part of the learning-to-love ourselves process.

It takes courage to change. And courage to be aware of our choices.

Ah, and then maybe after years of butting our heads against a wall, we find it. 

The only thing I can change is my attitude. How I choose to respond to life.

******

Then there’s the rest of the prayer. Perhaps it’s tougher than the first part because it calls us to be present, to accept hardship, to trust that the will of a Higher Power knows best.

A trust that another plan for our good is at work. Even if we don’t see it or understand it. Even if it looks terrible. Like illness. Or death. Or covid.

Or, as someone once said at a bereavement group I attended, “It’s going to be OK even if it’s not OK.”

The rest of the prayer, in part, reads like this:

Living one day at a time.

Enjoying one moment at a time.

Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace …

trusting that He will make things right if I surrender to his will.

And, if the above prayer doesn’t work for you, here’s one by spiritual teacher Tosha Silver:

Change me Divine Beloved into one who willingly embraces what You send (the easy and the hard) as if it had come from My own heart. And let me trust that even the most unfathomable mysteries will be revealed over time. Change me into One who can trust what’s unfolding. I am Yours. You are Mine. We are One. All is well.

******

So here I sit, the cold winter dark outside my window at 4:30 p.m., turning off the TV droning on about politics and covid — and writing, listening, praying.

And as hard as it is, choosing to trust that the Divine will make all things right. That I can trust what’s unfolding.

May that bring me, and all of us, serenity.