One way to deal with the danger of being too busy it to have checkpoints. If you go X number of days without doing _______, you’re too busy. If you spent less than Y minutes doing _______ last week, you’re too busy. And if you can’t remember the last time you and your wife _______ then you’re way too busy!
These check points need to include all the important aspects of your life, including your walk with the Lord, your relationship with your wife, time with your kids, getting enough recreation, and how much fellowship you have. Also include health issues such as sleep, exercise, and time to eat healthy. Fast food a couple of times a month is one thing, eating it on the run most days is a warning.
It’s easy to lose track when you get busy. You may be aware some things are overdue, but don’t realise how long it has been. If you’re serious about not doing too much, make a list of checkpoints and go through it from time to time. Even better, make a list of check points with your wife, and hold each other accountable.
This is one of seven posts about busyness:
The sin of busyness?
Too busy because too much is too important
Checkpoints
Playing “the kids” card
Employment and priorities
Too busy for good sex
When church/ministry makes you too busy
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I would like to add, on the series of these posts, that one of the things that can easily take over and make us too busy is church. And it can be hard, and indeed make us feel guilty, to say “no” to church requests. But family is a ministry too, and while we can easily use this as an excuse, it is important to not neglect family. Some years ago I was blessed to receive an email from my church minister to say that they had been considering inviting me to stand for the diaconate (i.e. leadership team) of our church (and his email was thus to encourage me) but that they had chosen not to at the time because I had a young marriage and a young family and that they were my primary ministry. Thank God for such an attitude!
Right now, I am on the leadership team at a church (not the same one, job change = move 70 miles away), and we are currently between ministers = very busy! Again, it is so easy to get so tied up in “doing church” that my kids, wife and God lose out. And I think it’s important that we remember that it’s OK, no not OK ,*vital* that we balance time. The words of the covenant prayer say, “Let me be used for you, let me be set aside for you.” Saying “sorry, no, I can’t do that” – even with relation to important church business, is not a sin!
Phil – I agree 100% – going to discuss that on Sunday.
Thanks!
Great practical idea. Really like this one and know it is applicable to all marriages. Thanks for sharing.
Megan