10 things I’m learning or re-learning this summer

I’m learning and re-learning ten things this summer. Maybe that sounds boring to you. Or maybe you’re doing the same thing.

The best thing about summer, where I live, is not the weather because it’s suffocatingly hot here in July and August. (That’s why we go someplace cooler for vacation, if we can.) Note Nugget Falls at the Mendenhall Glacier (Alaska) above.

So I don’t crave summer for the weather. I crave it for the pace. Summer is when I get a handle on time again. Or at least I attempt to drag my schedule back toward sanity.

I’ve realized that I’m paralyzed by time. Threatened by time. Haunted by time.  My obsession with time creates most of the stress and anxiety in my life. Unless I go on vacation or a mission trip, I am unable to control time.

I literally have to leave my life in order to breathe.

Hello. That’s messed up.

Stress doesn’t even come from what I’m doing, because I like staying busy, even on vacations. My stress, I’m starting to realize, comes from my messed-up interpretations about TIME (also success, but one problem at a time). Here’s what I’m learning and re-learning about time this summer:

1. Stress comes from the time constraints I put around what I’m doing and the resulting comparisons that happen while I’m attempting to accomplish something within a certain time frame. I make a calendar, which becomes my taskmaster, which shackles me to stress that I’m not meant to carry. I could breathe better if I cut back on demands, but somehow, my priorities, insecurities, and expectations hinder me from eliminating the taskmaster from my life. My calendar owns me. This is what everyone who ever takes a sabbatical realizes. The trick is remembering when you get home. I’m a teacher, so summer is my “sabbatical” time. Only I’m also a writer and other things, so summer is go-time. You see the problem.
2.  My body is not engineered to hurry. Adrenalin is designed for danger, not for motivation, energy, or endurance. That’s why too much adrenalin creates an overactive trauma-response and why most of Americans can’t fall asleep without help from drugs, alcohol, media, or complete exhaustion. Hurrying kills us, emotionally and physically. Anxiety causes disease. It’s common knowledge these days, so I won’t waste time proving it. Just click this Google link and look at all the books about how stress kills us. I’ll mention one book again because I read it this summer:  The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. It’s not a self-help for re-organizing your life. It’s a Biblical look at how Jesus never hurried and why we must stop it. Spoiler: It’s convicting.
3. Lists are not really my friend. This is a monumental discovery and a frightening announcement because I love making lists. As you can see, I’m listing things in this blog right now, so I haven’t really flushed this whole concept out. But what I’m realizing is that my natural ability to organize has, over the last few decades, morphed into perceived control of circumstances and a false sense of pride over achievements through list-making and checkmarks. Seriously, I’m obsessed with checkmarks.(If this graphic just gave you warm fuzzies, you might–like me–have a problem.)
4. I need to share my stories with others. Bear with me, this does relate to time. Of course, I share; I’ve been a teacher for years. High schoolers are compelled to accept my knowledge about literature and writing. Congregants listen, and readers read my take on Bible stories, theology, and practical wisdom. What anybody does with my words is anybody’s guess. The revelation I’ve had this summer is more along the lines of sharing myself rather than my “important information.” In fact, everyone needs to share who we are and what we’re learning because teachable moments disappear, and opportunities for vulnerability vanish if we’re not looking for them. And stories reveal our humanity. They bridge relationship gaps. They restore us. God’s process of transformation (even baby steps) is inspiring to others and critical for ourselves. Okay, problem: our stories invariably implicate other people, so how is sharing possible?
5.  Forgiveness is essential every day. Here’s where our stories get gritty. People hurt us. And very often, injury and insult are committed by people we are compelled to stay in relationship with. Yes, we can break friendships and ignore hurtful relationships. That’s easy–but damaging and complicated. Honestly, who wants to go through life avoiding grocery stores, changing churches, and skipping family functions simply because we don’t want to see someone who has hurt us deeply, owes us an apology, or whom we’ve decided is our mortal enemy? Forgiving your abusers doesn’t give them a free pass. Forgiveness frees the person who forgives. Eventually, a forgiven offender may realize how enslaved they are by jealousy, insecurity, or bitterness and make things right with you. And they might not. This brings me to the next thing I’m re-learning.
6. You can’t control how other people behave or what they think of you. No matter how nice you are. No matter how many parties you throw or gifts you buy. Everyone is bound by their own insecurities. Don’t be bound by yours. I’m old enough that I should have learned this lesson by now, but NEWS FLASH: we are always learning to let go of what people think about us. Isn’t is crazy how opinions and criticisms haunt us? I will be working on this until I die.
7.  Anger is a living organism. In most cases, confronting my anger means addressing its source and making a correction in my thinking. I’m going to be transparent here–perhaps you can benefit from my exposure: I get angry about other people’s choices. I want people to behave in a way that’s kind and helpful to me. I know, that’s selfish and judgmental, but it’s human nature, and we all do it. However, when I’m walking in the Spirit of God, I can set this problem aside; but when I’m not walking in the Spirit, I protect and defend my anger.                                                                                                                                                      How anger can hurt me: Whenever I’m stressed, hurt, unforgiving, and hurrying to accomplish things, I have a tendency to be judgmental toward other people. It’s because I’ve created a fantasy of how life is supposed to go, and I’m frustrated when it’s not going that way. In actuality, whenever we do this, we have succumbed to one of the devil’s great tactics (as outlined in The Screwtape Letters)–we focus on the fantasy as if it’s truth, and we push away truth as if it’s a fantasy. We believe the lie. Anger is a great indicator that a lie has been told to and believed by someone. God designed anger as a warning mechanism for injustice–a prod to point us in the right direction and make things whole again. Instead, most of us hold on to anger because it feels invigorating and purpose-giving, even though it’s damaging.
8.  Multi-tasking is another way of hurrying. I have to work on this. I’m kind of an over-achiever, so the lines blur here for me between high operation and obsessive action. I want to downsize how much I manage. I’m so tired. Summer is 2/3 done, and I haven’t recovered yet. I’m still looking for a way to slow down my pace and my expectations (suggestions welcome!). I wish I could accomplish this with a list, but I’ve been trying that for decades, and it doesn’t seem to work. I only add to the hurry-life.
9.  Walk at nature’s pace. If you follow me at all, you’ve seen a barrage of Alaska pictures from the last 2 weeks. We’ve had a hard year; we knew we needed outdoors activity and breathtaking scenery. Alaska delivered. Alaska has been on our bucket list, but like most destinations, now we feel compelled to return there. We love it. We felt like we belonged there (not saying I can do the winters). It was unseasonably cold for July–we were bundled in layers most of the time–and yet it was perfect. The wilderness, the animals, the people–they all supported a way of life that slows down, breathes deeply, and has absolutely nothing to rush toward. We spent hours bicycling, hiking, savoring food, and whale-watching/porpoise-watching/sheep-watching/moose-watching (there was a lot of watching). We lived at nature’s pace. Epiphany: this is the pace that God created us to thrive in.
10.  If you don’t slow down regularly, you might not be able to at all. This is a bold statement. Normally, I spend a lot of time in the summers being creative: writing, painting, redecorating, gardening, etc. I had put all those things on my list for this summer, but I’ve hardly done any of them. I’ve slowed down enough to add back in the physical exercise I need, but I still haven’t added back in the creative exercise I need. This scares me. I think I’ve literally been rushing so hard all year that the momentum is still pushing me along as a faster pace than I want. Skid marks streak behind me. I’m still rushing. And I’m running out of time to slow down.

How messed up is that way of thinking?

“Hurry is the great enemy of the spiritual life.”–John Mark Comer, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry

 

 

I’ve got one month left to straighten myself out.

No, that is a hurried mentality also.

Take Two: I’ve got one month left to establish a new trajectory of limiting hurry, creating space, canceling platforms for comparison, and listening to the voice that affirms sabbath.

I have time to change whatever I want to change. Whatever I need to change.

Time does not own me. And I do not own it.

I am an eternal being. No wonder the world makes me feel anxious. I was designed to be timeless.