Written 11/25/20
An Improbable Joy
At age 23 when most of her friends were preoccupied with starting careers and families, Allie was fighting lonely battles in the bathroom. Bloody diarrhea struck her ten times per day. She could hardly function in her job as a first year teacher.
After a series of unpleasant procedures, she received a diagnosis of ulcerative colitis, an inflammatory disorder of the large intestine. Despite treatment, her symptoms kept recurring over the next several years, until one particularly bad flare-up required hospitalization. Between the anemia, infection, and a toxic colon, she nearly died. In the end she had her entire large intestine surgically removed.
The pretty young woman awoke with a colostomy bag stuck to her lower abdomen. For the next six months that would be how she evacuated her bowels. There were leakages and embarrassing sounds and smells, and she still frequently had to empty the bag. But at least this cured her ulcerative colitis. Or so everyone thought.
Then came the itching. At night she frantically clawed her skin until the sheets were stained with blood. The whites of her eyes yellowed, her urine darkened, and she had more abdominal pains. The disease had unleashed a final attack on the bile duct system. Toxic gall was backing up in her blood, turning her eyes a sickly yellow and searing her skin with a maddening prickle.
Today she is set to undergo an ERCP, a procedure to open up a scarred bile duct via a fiberoptic scope. I am seeing her before the procedure. Entering her room, noticing the excoriations that cover her arms and how gaunt and jaundiced she appears, I feel a wave of pity and am unsure of what to say.
“I’m so sorry about what you are going through,” I begin.
Allie looks puzzled by my awkward sympathy. Then I see it. Outshining the vivid yellow in her eyes, there is a bright glow of something else, something healthy and improbable. It is joy! Waving her hand, as if to dismiss her suffering like a triviality, she speaks with strength.
“You know, every morning I wake up and immediately thank God for ten things. And I find that once I start, it’s hard to stop. Thanksgiving just flows out of me, and I feel so grateful all day.”
A Challenge Accepted
Allie’s attitude challenged and enticed me. I thought of my own first impressions and actions upon awakening: dread, self-pity, self-abusive motivational talks. Inspired by her joy in suffering, I decided to give thanks a try instead.
The next morning, the instant I awoke, I thought of ten things to thank God for. It took a little work to get up to ten, but I made it. The next day it was a little easier. Over the ensuing days, it took some practice, but gradually it became easier and easier to find ten things to be grateful for.
And then, a change started to occur. During my devotionals, instead of fretting about the challenges of the day (bad) or even begging God for help with them (better), I found more and more things coming to my mind for which to thank him, instead (best). I could not stop at ten things, the dam would sometimes seem to break, and I could pour out dozens of thanksgivings, which continued through the day.
Attitudes and Neural Networks
Everything requires practice. To memorize their vast fund of knowledge, medical students recite or write things over and over. Athletes repeat the same drills endlessly, so that their moves become second nature. Musicians practice for hours, and each session makes their play a little smoother. In the end they don’t think about their routines; they become instinctive.
You don’t have to be a medical student, athlete, or musician to experience this effect. We are all constantly training ourselves in the things we value, until our response occurs without conscious thought. You jerk the steering wheel away from a swerving car without processing the danger or consciously recalling how to steer to the left. You can effortlessly click on the correct spots on your computer screen at work (and on whatever websites are important to you) with hardly a glance at the screen.
The things we value, the things we do repetitively, seem to be hard-wired into our bodies. That is indeed what is actually happening. We speak of “muscle memory,” referring to an unconscious reaction or performance of a task that occurs faster than thought. But muscles do not remember. Brain cells (neurons) do that.
Imagine your neurons as a crowd of people filling a football field. These people are all a few feet from one another, yet not touching. But they can reach out and join hands, thus forming circuits or pathways of connected people. In the same way, the neurons in your brain reach out toward one another and connect to form neural pathways. As we repeat tasks or thoughts, these pathways are physically reinforced. The cells themselves grow new projections, new arms, to reach out to one another, so that their connections are reinforced as the cells literally change their configurations
When we think or do something repeatedly, that circuit in our nervous system is bolstered. In contrast the things we neglect in thought or actions cause those pathways to diminish over time. The axons in those neglected pathways regress in a process known as “pruning.” Thought is not merely an immaterial phenomenon like a computer program. It is also a physical thing that can be hard-wired into us.
Attitudes lead to actions. But it can also work the other way around; actions can influence attitudes. If we are grateful, we will give thanks. But giving thanks can cause us to be grateful.
Romans 12:2 says: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind.”
What is the “renewal of our mind” and how does it occur? God renews our minds through his supernatural power, the power of his spirit and his word. This is a miraculous, immaterial process that is in his control. It also undoubtedly involves practice on our part. I believe that in both a physical and spiritual sense, thanksgiving to God can truly change us. In this spiritual process God ordains a conformational change in the structure of our brains!
What are you hardwiring into your brain? Bitterness, lust, addiction, melancholy, greed, or other sins and destructive attitudes? Let’s give thanks a chance. Let’s be transformed by the renewing of our minds by the power of God working through our actions.
This Thanksgiving let’s exercise our gratitude muscles to the glory of God!
Happy Thanksgiving
Bill Maynard, M,D.