Chaplains are no different than other people, we all have days where things do not go well.  Last week I had the constant frustration of my cell phone battery losing 50% of its power in the first 4 hours of the day.  I went to the store and it was under warrant which saved me the cost of buying a new phone.  The service center shipped me a replacement.  It arrived today via Federal Express.  After work I went to the store to have them transfer all my data from the old phone to the new phone.  “Transferring all data” sounds easy, doesn’t it?

What I learned is that “all” did not mean everything.  All my pictures moved from phone to phone, all 93 of them.  But I had them sorted into directories.  On the new phone all my sorting had been undone.  I also use 50+ Android apps on the phone.  Instead of them moving automatically and at one time, each app downloaded separately.  Half the apps did not download on their own and I had to select each one separately and then download them.  Part of what did not move was my ringtone selections, wallpaper design, settings I use for the phone for appearance and functions.  In the end it took me several hours to get the phone 80% restored to the way I had the old phone configured.

As I thought about this frustration with change I realized that helping patient’s deal with change is one of the most important things chaplains try to accomplish.  In a way my cell phone was the illness, and I was the patient waiting for healing and recovery to take place. I needed a chaplain to pray with me to remain calm instead get frustrated.  It would have been nice to have a chaplain to talk to while I was waiting for the seemingly endless amount of time it took for each item to download.

Please write a reply describing a “starting over” experience you have encountered and what skills or resources you used to cope with it.  We can all learn from each other!  Have a great week!