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Bluefield Daily Telegraph, W.Va., Jaletta Albright Desmond column: Peace and quiet closure may be discovered through prayer
Oct 02, 2009 (Bluefield Daily Telegraph - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) --
Wouldn't it be great if we had "The Closer" available to us as a consultant? I've never watched the cable TV show by the same name and I'm not even really sure what the character closes, but I liked the title for a life coach or consultant who could assist us in finding closure with troubling issues in our lives.
It can be difficult to move forward if we feel that something, some emotional road block, is in our path. Often, unresolved issues involve another person but it isn't always possible to involve that person in resolving the issue. It's a vicious cycle. One without end or closure.
The Closer I am imagining wouldn't go as deep in treatment as an analyst or therapist. No, this would be a very simple transaction -- just like closing a deal.
I can picture the scene perfectly. The Closer would walk into the room, armed with all the necessary background knowledge of the person or problem (or problematic person) for which we are seeking closure. She would sit down across a metal table with a shining light hovering over our heads, and get down to business.
"What would you like to say about the issue or say to the person?" she would begin matter of factly. We would then describe the situation, recount the facts as we see them, and address our nagging concern. We could provide every tedious detail or offer only a quick sound-bite summary. Part of the closing process is for us to speak as little or as much as we require to resolve the issue.
If necessary, the Closer would role play for us. So we could say to her what we never said to that boss we still resent, the boyfriend who dumped us, the friend with whom we had a fight, or the neighbor we offended. (These are just examples -- don't start reading too much into any of them.)
In my imagination, the Closer would channel the personality and character of the person with whom we'd like to have that final conversation, the person who has the answers to our questions or to whom we need to get something off our chest. Or, if it is an issue without a face or name, the Closer would personify that issue, letting us work out our internal conflict as if it were a talking and thinking being. The Closer would say all the right words in all the right places, everything we need to hear. The cathartic conversation would flow like a movie script -- or a scene from a cable TV show, as it were -- and we'd ask or say everything that we typically think of later, after the fact. We'd have the chance to put the lid on that Pandora's Box once and for all.
When the scene was finished, the director would call "Cut!" the credits would roll, and the screen would fade to black.
The Closer would walk off the set. We'd turn off the lights and return to our regular programming, our regular lives.
Nothing complicated or sticky, no story arc that had "To Be Continued." The End. Closed.
Unfortunately, it isn't that easy. At times, in fact, it requires intense therapy or qualified counseling. But for those little nagging issues that don't require that kind of work, how do we find closure without help?
There are moments I seek a different Closer, one I find in prayer. Occasionally when I'm addressing an issue in prayer, a new insight escapes through an unexpected thought, stream of consciousness-style. Or I may rant and rave, venting to God, releasing pent-up emotions which makes it easier to close things up afterward. I can even ask some of those unanswered questions to God and, sometimes, find suspiciously appropriate answers: in scripture reading, in a persistent thought that seems deeply true and right, or maybe in some affirmation tucked somewhere in my life.
However one prays -- journaling, silently, out-loud -- we can find in God a Counselor who may bring quiet closure.
I believe there are trained professionals with the ability to offer wise counsel and brilliant insight, but I also think God employs his own Spirit in our lives to give us the wisdom and discernment we need. We must be linked to God, though, in order to receive it. We should be attentive to him, his Word, and his day-to-day presence in our lives.
Moments spent with God can give us the peace we need and, usually, that is exactly what we are hoping closure can bring us. We may find it is better to seek our closure with him rather than to go it alone.
Jaletta Albright Desmond is a self-syndicated columnist who writes about faith, family, and the fascinatingly mundane aspects of daily life. She lives in North Carolina with her husband and two daughters. Contact her at jdesmond@bdtonline.com.
To see more of Bluefield Daily Telegraph, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go
to http://www.bdtonline.com/. Copyright (c) 2009, Bluefield Daily Telegraph,
W.Va. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email
tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax
to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave.,
Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.
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