Reaching Our Limit by Dr. Juan Harrison

Reaching Our Limit

In the midst of 106 degrees this past summer the radio has been telling us to raise the thermostat to help reduce the possibility of brownout and power outage.  We experienced something similar in recent years in the winter with extremely cold temperatures.  Frozen windmills and sun starved solar panels were helpless to avoid power outages.

In these harum scarum days a lot of folks are feeling like they’re having their own personal power outages.  I’ve told you us older guys have often noticed our old legs don’t have the umph and energy of days gone by.  Now the problem of low energy and near exhaustion seems to permeate a lot of the younger couples.  Prosperity can exact it own toll.  Crazy family schedules are over scheduled.  Moms have full-time jobs and are still full-time moms.  The human body and psyche can only handle so much stress.  Marriages crumble and children become alienated as little time remains to strengthen relationships and family ties.

Already struggling couples coming out of the pandemic years and experiencing higher costs of living and reduced buying power feel the money vise squeezing the higher costs and devalued incomes around the struggling families.  Hopefully, even these apparently devastating conditions could lead to something positive.  Out of those growing stressful times families might reevaluate how they are utilizing their family free time.  They may discover that some activities are not giving them much of a bang for their relationship bucks.  Balance is important. Kids still need time to play video games.  Moms and dads, especially younger ones, still could use some uninterrupted date nites while someone watches the kids.

Seems like more and more of us are feeling greater degrees of powerlessness in our personal and work lives.  People are searching for ways to find some semblance of control in an ever increasingly impersonal world of text messages and Zoom.  Continued requests for the public to resume use of face masks at times has reminded us of research telling us of the damage Covid faces have inflicted on young children who missed facial expressions and the sense of personal contact during the pandemic days.

So many older people reflect back on the “good old days” and remember a feeling of attachment to God, country, and family.  Today, all of these are under serious attacks as forces seem determined to destroy all the foundations that make up our society.  Growing feelings of isolation and disenfranchisement from society causes individuals to feel powerless and feel the need to make a statement or create a major calamity or shocking act that no longer shocks anyone.  Many of us feel like our country is at a breaking point.  That might explain why more people seem to be looking to the heavens for some answers or relief.  Like being in a West Texas drought, we keep hoping something or Someone will finally have had enough and decide to mercifully bring it to an end.

 By Dr. Juan Harrison