“Too Busy” is Becoming Our Story
Right now we’re too busy. We need to slow down. When we work, work and work it’s an attempt to maintain control in an uncontrollable world. Somehow, whipping though a long list of things to do makes us feel like we’re in control. Too much “doing” wipes us out eventually. We have to consciously stop and be silent, exercise, take a hot shower, pray, take a nap, do some yoga or read a good book. If we don’t take the time to stop, our whole life is about doing, doing, doing: hypo manic, workaholic, human doers instead of human beings. We forget our senses and the need to focus on our feelings: letting them guide us, center us and bring us and others peace.
We live in a hyper-anxious world. We don’t stop and make room to breathe. We’re consumed by apps, social networking, texting, driving while talking on our cell phones, emailing and Twittering. Without time to think, our state of mind is clouded: questionable. We lose our battles with what’s valuable in life if we don’t make room for silence, peace and prayer. We need to make time to think and find escape from our long list of “to do’s” so that anxiety, fear, illness and anger doesn’t have the opportunity to grip us. Our world isn’t safe if we’re too busy to stop and consider what’s best for us and others.
Stopping is a battle. Whenever we face the challenge of getting “unbusy” it’s an opportunity to be a part of the battle that’s being waged all around us: the battle out of the hectic, violent clamoring of daily life. What gives us the strength to push back and keep our distance from the anger, violence and craziness of this hyper energized world? At what point does “just do, do, and do” become our identity. When we don’t take time to stop it becomes our identity, our autobiography and our inheritance to pass down to our children and grandchildren. The battle for a more peaceful world is lost one busy person at a time.
We are in the “Busy Battle.” We are driven towards doing instead of being, because our world is so full of stimulation, demands and anxiety. Without a conscious break from running on the hamster wheel we experience societal loss: less and less people on the planet living, and pursuing, a life of peace as their personal story. Instead, anxiety, physical illness, anger, rage and disconnectedness dig its claws deeply into us. We ride on the edge of insanity as we ride the bumpers of the rushing cars in front of us. We need to harness the power to pull together in peace, grace, tolerance, justice and patience. We need our lives to tell the world a new story.
Busyness is a force we have had to contend with for generations. What will bring us down a different road, saving us from what has destroyed so many generations before us? We must slow down and take the time to remember that we will never harness the full potential of every application available to us, we will never fully meet the demands of every email and can’t possibly be engaged with everyone we are connected to on Facebook. We will fall short of meeting all these demands while we haven’t even left the house to meet the demands of our jobs, community and our world. We need to accept that we can’t do it all.
Right now we’re too busy and it’s becoming our story. It’s becoming our legacy for the next generation. Busyness is becoming the force that drives our hearts. If we don’t take the time to stop our whole life is about doing the next thing we believe must be done. We need to stop texting while we’re driving our cars so we don’t injure countless others. We need to stop emailing our grieving friend and visit them with an embrace. Remembering how to forgive must trump our desire to watch the next reality TV show. Our financial resources must be guided away from the drive-thru and redirected to places of graver financial need. If we each figure out how to slow down we can change the world. Then connectedness, peace, health and love will become the story we have to tell. Choose to slow down and then tell the world your new story.
Alisa E. Clark believes in the power of spiritual autobiography. Her website invites viewers to create and share one’s own spiritual memoir and allows readers to learn more about Alisa’s own spiritual autobiography: Dancing in the Doghouse. You can learn more by visiting www.journeyoncanvas.com
