Repetition Means Pay Attention
Repetition alerts me to a pattern. A topic brought up by different people in a relatively short time frame, even if in very different contexts. A similar struggle seen in different and unconnected people. A theme in something I read, hear in a sermon or podcast, and watch in a television show or movie. Even mistakes and areas of neglect have patterns alerting me to something that needs my attention.
Many of the topics written about on Struggle to Victory came from exploring the patterns – the repetition – entering my awareness. The writers of the Bible used them for emphasis and to guide focus, and we should pay attention when they do this. The Holy Spirit also uses patterns, both in scripture and in the happenings of life, to direct me. However it comes, repetition always tells me to pay attention to something I wasn’t before.
One of the recent themes of repetition involves organized challenges. An app I’ve used for relaxation in the past announced its Mid-Year Reset Challenge for the month of June, offering ways to relax and restore – to reset – in just five minutes a day. Another is A Framework for Structure Thinking that I’ve been studying for my next book on strategies for a deeper life.
While those two challenges are ones I’m looking forward to participating in and reflecting on, the one I want to focus on for this post is one I’ve incorporated in my life in recent years. It comes from an article titled Scroll Less, Stroll More: A Summer Challenge to Leave your Phone at Home by Brett McCracken writing for The Gospel Coalition.
The Challenge
This habit is one I already employ, but McCracken helped me see the value in encouraging others to pursue it too. Having it come to my attention via repetition reinforced the idea of issuing my own challenge. Here’s the challenge McCracken gave his readers, and I now give mine:
“Spend less time scrolling and more time strolling. Outside. Unmediated. Just you and your walking shoes.”
After issuing this challenge, McCracken discusses “addictive scrollings mainly ill effects” and encourages moving from resigned awareness to action. Let doing so lead to communing with God (vertical attention) and with others (horizontal attention). Allow this action to counteract ‘the degradation of our inner life” through contemplation and daydreaming. Let it revive your creativity, ability to remember, and focused thinking about what is to come.
Going for a regular walk can also revive your default mode network (DMN). The DMN is a crucial part of many of our though processes that is now in atrophy for far too many people largely because of addictive scrolling.
Are You In?
Are you up for the challenge? Let me warn you that while you might initially go for a walk or two without any resistance, you’ll start talking yourself out of them after that. You’ll even forget about going for a walk and, like so many of our resolutions and goals, forget to remember you set them until it seems pointless to pick them up again.
Keep taking that first step out the door. Don’t think, just go. Start with five minutes if 20 seems too long, but keep it as a goal. Once you experience the benefits of this scrolling break – benefits that come with consistency with the habit – you’ll start looking forward to your daily walk.
The biggest benefit for me has been the time to connect with God, others, and myself. More than anything, I spend time listening. Even when walking by myself, which is most of the time, I make valuable connections in each of these areas.
“He restores my soul; He leads me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.” (Psalm 23:3)
Yes, this is what happens when I leave my phone at home and go for a walk. I return twenty or more minutes later feeling restored and refocused. Every time.
“Whatever the mind sets itself on is what the man walks after.” (Watchman Nee)
In other words, focus determines reality. Simply choosing to spend more time strolling and less scrolling will redirect you toward something your body and mind long for even if you weren’t aware of it until you decided to keep taking that first step out the door. Consistency in this habit will change your life.
