I’ve been asking myself how I come to be this busy – not just now but constantly. And have been thinking back to the lesson I should have learned from the man who came to do some wallpapering a while back.
But first things first. Why do I find it so hard to say ‘no’? And, come to that, why do there seem to be so many others with the same ‘ok, I’ll do it’ reflex? Because that’s where most hectivity seems to come from.
Here’s my list of reasons -
We foolishly believe our value is based on what we do or achieve rather than who we are. Deep down and unspoken we feel incomplete, under-loved and undervalued. That may be so ‘deep down’ we don’t even recognise it as true. But the outcome is to try to fill the gaps by piling on the work and achievements.
Which means a useful antidote to such a disease would be to reflect more on the fact that we are cherished and appreciated by the God who made us. And that the value he places on us ought to be speaking to us louder than it does.
The true value of any object has nothing to do with the price tag it carries. The real issue is what someone will pay. And so far as we are concerned, the price God paid for us was the life of was his Son making us, effectively, priceless. I have a sense that if this gripped me more I’d be less driven to ‘do’ in order to gain approval – both my own and from others.
We fail to recognise that saying ‘yes’ to ‘this’ means saying ‘no’ to ‘that’. This is where our wallpaper man comes in but please be patient. The key lesson is that time does not expand to accommodate each new commitment we make.
The reality we too often try to deny – like good old King C trying to hold back the waves – is each day remains twenty-four hours long no matter what. Enter Mr Wallpaper.
He came to give us a quote to spruce up our dining room. We liked the price and asked when he could do it. If I’d been him I’d have said, ‘When do you want it?’ And then said, ‘OK, I’ll find a way, even if the answer had been ‘yesterday’’.
Not him. He’d already figured it was three days to do everything. Out came a diary with days crossed through. ‘I have a gap in three and a half weeks time,’ he announced. Which is exactly what he did – with calm and serenity all over his face.
He knew that days would not grow hours, or weeks grow days, just because he had made a commitment to deliver. What if I were to start working to the same reality?!
We don’t say ‘no’ because we are not clear enough about what we have said ‘yes’ to. Shouldn’t Jesus have been the most driven and overworked person to have walked the planet? So little time. So much to say and do. So many in desperate need of what only he could deliver.
Yet he never seemed to canter or break out into a sweat. How come? After all, think of him as he makes his way steadfastly to Jerusalem. It takes little imagination to reconstruct the possible words of his disciples walking the same road.
‘Master, there is a village close by where many need to be healed.’
‘There is a distraught family, Master, where you could bring such a change. It won’t take long.’
‘Think of the difference you can make! It’s not far out of our way.’
Yet Jesus kept going to Jerusalem. How was that possible? Because he knew what he had already said ‘yes’ to. He knew where he was going. He knew what we need to know – that a need does not always equal a call. And the clearer we are about our own ‘Jerusalem’ the freer we will be to say ‘no’.
Food for thought Peter – guilty of saying ‘YES’ all my life! Have you seen the film ‘YES MAN’ staring Jim Carrey? Good film worth a look… anyway better get on I’ve just said yes to far too much work! Cheers Nick B
Thanks very much; very helpful points, especially – for me – the second two.
Peter, I too reflect on just how Jesus managed to avoid burnout (which, by all the accounts we’re given from the writers of the Gospels, he did). Wanda Nash’s ‘Christ, Stress and Glory’ (is excellent, btw), articulates a couple of helpful things about JC. It appears Jesus was acutely aware of other’s rights to decide for themselves, responding to a perceived need, making a decision and deflecting the glory back to his Father. What this implies is that he didn’t do things out of habit or custom. Yes, he was omniscient, but he seemingly didn’t get caught up on what ‘x’ would do next / think of him.
Also, let’s not forget he had communed initimately with God in heaven prior to his mission on earth. He fixed his gaze intently on only the things which God decided were important / would achieve his Father’s aims (redemption/salvation, etc.). Therefore, his time management was a single-minded focus on his mission according to the priorities he recognised he would need to fulfil it.
Interesting too, that he gave special priority to eating / socialising with friends (he enjoyed a circle of closest friends apart from his disciples). Note – he rarely travelled except on donkey (could’ve hitched lifts by ass, donkey, camel, etc.) highlighting a need for physical exercise (one suppose he strode rapidly from one place to another) to combat fatigue/anxiety/stress. He clearly recognised the holistic health benefits of hydration, physical exercise, sleep (asleep in boat during storm on Sea of Galilee), physical touch (pleasure), food, companionship, solitude (never loneliness, apart from in Garden of Gethsemane) and rest.
Clearly, he chose his 12 disciples (later sends x72 out to spread the message of salvation amongst the Gentiles) as people in whom he was confident delegating too.
Of course, Jesus was simply happy, utterly, ridiculously content (at ease in every way) in ‘being’ himself – which he knew would be enough. One can surmise that he’d spent 30 years apprenticing – listening, observing, learning life lessons – unlike us whose performance is constantly measured against comparative standards of achievement (SATs, exams, career ambitions, promotions, drinking games, driving tests, ‘pulling power, sexual prowess)…is it any wonder we’ve got a deeply warped, screwed-up sense of priorities?
Plus, he totally valued the worth of another to make choices for themselves. “What is it you want?”, he asks so often of those he encountered, as if to challenge others by inviting them to re-evaluate their system of prioritisation.
One suspects he would’ve passed up the opportunity to borrow or own an iPhone, blackberry, or create a personal account on twitter, facebook, bebo or myspace or keep a blog. Shane Hipps in his book ‘Flickering Pixels’ identifies the alarming spread of a phenomenon he describes as ‘anonymous intimacy’ (which relates to a story he retells regarding a friend of his who posted pictures of her newborn on her facebook account, thereby giving access to intimate pictures to 400+ so-called ‘friends’, but bypassing revealing such exclusive information to her closest, longest-standing friend who was half-a-globe away and temporarily without internet access). Pornography works on the same principles in conferring remote exclusivity to people craving intimacy/physical gratification or those with darker motives.
I reckon Jesus might have had an iPod or possibly a credit-card thin iTablet in order to watch repeats of “You’ve Been Framed”, so he could enjoy a belly laugh (however, I think children, Peter and his closest friends provided the bulk of those).
Remarkably for him, not only did he bless God, but he blessed himself, when he met others face to face, his presence replacing hurt, confusion, emptiness, doubt, worry and darkness with healing, love, light and hope.
As far as I know He’s the only one who got the ‘busyness’ (‘hurry sickness’) thing sussed…oh, apart from Stephen Covey and Herr Thatcher.
If you get this far, loads of people would really benefit from you posting the odd viewpoint like this in the Faith Journeys discussion area, at https://www.faith-journeys.com
Best, Rob P-S
Hi
You forgot to mention evangelical zeal and guilt others pile on you. Notices from the front and church rotas are an eg of this.
Joke
Why are the church of England and helicopters similiar?
Answer
If you get too close to either you will get sucked in by the rotas.
Yes, and the types of church meeting which achieves next to nothing, but involves people drinking revolting coffee, pretending to accommodate one another’s eccentricities, and generally involves no agenda, no action points, no deadlines, just a restless collective thumbing through their blackberries putting in the date for the next meeting when nothing particular will happen. A hideously slow form of spiritual constipation…time consuming and profoundly aggravating.
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