Every two weeks, I spend 40 out of 96 hours at the Boston Rescue Mission. Because we work 10-hour shifts, this means that I work 4 days in a row with a three-day weekend. Of the remaining 56 hours, by tomorrow morning at 8:00am, I will have spent 30-32 hours sleeping. That leaves 24 hours over the course of 4 days into which I tried to cram a truckload of things to do. What did I do in those 24 hours? I spent 3 hours cooking [gumbo with kielbasa, rice, tomatoes, onions and celery, and butterbeans for dinner on Monday night; fried biscuits for breakfast on Tuesday and Thursday mornings; some kind of upside down taco pizza that took a minute to heat up in the microwave for dinner on Wednesday night]. It took 2 hours for me to eat the things I had cooked. I lost 6 hours to travel time, which seems like an unreasonable amount of time to be traveling to and from work, but I guess when I do the math and figure 40 minutes to work and 40 minutes back, you get about 6 hours over the course of 4 days. In case you've lost count, that brings the hourly total to 11, which leaves 13 hours. In the remaining 13 hours, I watched some television, studied the Bible, did Pilates, played basketball with an eight-year-old [a story for another time], visited a friend in the hospital, went to Bible study, took showers and got dressed.
I am now waiting expectantly for the next 72 hours, into which I am already planning to pack even more events. I already have something planned for Friday night, something for Saturday morning, something for Saturday night, and church on Sunday. Something will probably happen on Sunday evening, although I'm not sure what it will be yet.
At this point, one might ask, "What the heck is this about? Why is he writing about this anyway?" Thanks for reading this far. The point is this: I think my tendency to gravitate towards being busy reflects something much deeper about myself. First, I think it reveals an insecurity in being alone, wanting to find validation from people and wanting to stay busy in order to be comfortable. Second, I think it reveals an inability to thrive in solitude, to really seek out the presence of the Lord in silence, and be rejuvenated by His presence. Third, I think that in order to be successful, I must necessarily fill up every ounce of free time that I have so that you think I am either popular or independent or successful.
The reality is this - I am insecure about being alone for long periods of time. I do want to find validation from people. I don't have to sit with my own insecurities or shortcomings if I'm not by myself. Eighty percent of the time I do not thrive in solitude. I am lazy, lethargic, and otherwise lustful. I want you to think that I'm popular, that I'm successful, that I have all my ducks in a row, and that I know how to manage lots of different things. And so I pile thing on top of thing until I'm balancing a wobbly Jenga tower by one tile, and wonder why life is unmanageable. The idea of success that I have is a lie - it is the American Dream, the devil's scheme to make us forget our need and learn self-reliance. And so I press on towards the three-day weekend, hoping to remember something about solitude, and finding the freedom to say no to something...anything.
2 comments:
I feel like I could have written this exact post... although I think more time would have been allocated to hair/makeup :)
Thanks for sharing - it was a good reminder and a powerful challange to be different from the world.
pilates...id like to see that
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