I’m writing to you on the occasion of my 7th month as your Pastor. My family slid into Huntington in the ice and snow on February 2. Eleanor and Elliot started school a week later, mid-semester. Kristy and I had to fish our bushy, black and white cat out of Carol and Max Mller’s yard more than once. Chester is an indoor cat, but for him like the rest of us, moving was a big deal and freaked him out a bit.

I recently visited in person with my pastoral counselor. That’s a rare treat as she is an ABCUSA minister in Oregon. We got to talking about, “How long’s it been now?” I guessed, “It must be 7? 8? 9?” She emailed me a few days later. “Ten years! Zach, I looked back, and our first session was in April 2016!” Wow. Dad is right. Time really does fly.

Yesterday, I had my monthly meeting with Rev. Margaret Marcuson. She helps me see things from different angles. She asked at one point, “What’s going well for you?” “Oh, many things!” I said. “I feel so in my own skin preaching and teaching. The staff are great people. I’m enjoying making pastoral visits with church leaders. The Church Council had a great fall brainstorming meeting. So many things are going well.”

Today, I talked on the phone with Rev. Guy Sayles. Guy asked, “Are things going well?” I gave a similar answer.

In two days’ time, I got virtually the same question from two friends who live 3,000 miles apart.

If you’re at all like me, you do your fair share of fretting, plus enough to cover the next five people. For me, it’s an old and well-grooved pattern. So is my wanting to change that about me. The brain can and does change, but recent research in neuroplasticity says that old, well-worn neuropathways stick with us no matter how much we learn or how old we grow. So, it is what it is? I am the way I am?

Not exactly. We can’t delete old neuropathways, but we can create new ones elsewhere in the brain. Pastoral theologians know this when they suggest “thickening” the stories we tell ourselves (“thoughts”). In my experience, my worries are usually “thin” stories built atop just a few observable facts that feel threatening. I push back on that by practicing gratitude. Writing down three things I am grateful for interrupts that narrowed focus and “thickens” the story with other facts that worry can’t see.

We all worry. The real question is: “What’s going well for you?”

~ Rev. Zach Bay