The book ‘When Your Past Is Hurting Your Present’ by Sue Augustine is full of encouraging stories. This is one of them:
An experiment was done with two groups of people who had to hold their hands in a bucket of ice water for three minutes. The first group were told about the three minute limit. The second group were not given a time limit, simply told to hold their hands in the ice water as long as they could.
It turned out that the group that knew they only had to suffer for three minutes were able to keep their hands in the ice water for the whole time and felt that they could have gone longer. The group that weren’t given a time frame gave up early. They quit before the three minutes were up because they had no idea how long they had to endure.
Imagine if they had known how close they were to the end?
If we have hope that things will be better in the future, then we will be able to hang in there a little bit longer. Next time you are going through difficulties, don’t give up. Even if you can only make one small step forward every day, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Nothing lasts forever and tomorrow is another day.
Psalm 3:5 – I lie down and sleep. I wake again because the Lord sustains me.
Carol
