RX FOR A BUSY LIFE

Activity overload takes away the pleasure of anticipation. Suddenly the activity is upon you, and you must rush to it. You also lack the delight of reminiscing, for you are immediately on to new activities. People's schedules are so full that it is often hard to see a shared agenda. Friendships that formerly were solidified by shared activities are now divided by activity overload. Ultimately, activity overload leads to exhaustion.

Rx for calming activity overload:

• Re-establish control of your life and schedule. You have more control than you think. Be active in self-examination and intentional in correction. Abandon self-pity. Nobody is locked into anything. You can accomplish the needed changes if you want them badly enough. Live as simply and as slowly as needed in order to make the necessary changes.

• Prioritize activities and commitments. Get your priorities from the Word of God. Look through God's eyes, then act on what is seen. Seek first the kingdom of God, and everything else later. People are more important than things.

• Practice saying NO to good things. Stand in front of the mirror and say no over and over until you get good at it. (Take lessons from a 2-year-old.) Saying no is not an excuse for noninvolvement, laziness, or insensitivity. Instead, it is purely a mechanism for living by your priorities, allowing God to direct your life rather than the world, and preserving your vitality for the things that really matter.

• Consider doing less, not more. Also determine to do the right things.

• Protect open spaces. Don't saturate your schedule. Create space in your day, then guard it against the overloading pressures of the world.

• Prune your activities. You often become involved in new activities without ever intending to. There are always new meetings, committees, concerts, lectures, parties, and sporting events that add themselves to your life. All activities should come up for periodic review and be required to justify their continued existence.

• Guard the dinner hour. Both you and your family must refuse activities that would invade this time. Take the phone off the hook or turn the volume off on the answering machine. Make the family dinner sacred by the time you spend with each other.

• Restore the practice of Sabbath rest. Use the time to rest from busyness and to remember God's great deeds on your behalf. Say no to Sunday activities.

• Fast; lie fallow. Imagine a one- or two-week fast - total shutdown - from activities. Turn off TV and radios. Enjoy the solitude of silence and schedule.

• Remember who it is that gets things done. God is the multiplying co-efficient for your labors. You may do only 50% of all that you had planned tomorrow and yet get accomplished 500% more in terms of eternal significance - if your efforts are sensitive to the promptings and empowerment of the Holy Spirit.