Overstretched and Overbooked

Are you too busy to notice that you’re too busy? Are you so busy that you barely have time to tell your friends that you don’t have time to talk to them? “  

 In his very famous book, Walden, Henry David Thoreau wrote, “It is not enough to be busy. So are the ants. The question is: What are we busy about?”                    

 What are you busy about?

 Psychiatrist Edward Howell wrote a book called, Crazy Busy: overstretched, overbooked, and about to snap. In the book Dr. Howell tells a story of how he came to see that his life had gotten out of control and way too busy.                     

Dr. Howell was on vacation where he had no cell phone reception. In the house was a rotary phone—some of you remember those dinosaurs, the phones that you had to turn the dial. One day, using the rotary phone got him frustrated to the point of anger—simply because he had to take time to let the dial come back to start.                                      

His frustration at the phone was a wakeup call, no pun intended. He writes, “What a fool I had become. I had become a busy man in a hurry even when I had no need to be a busy man in a hurry.”                                 

Knowing when not to be busy can be difficult. Many of us are much better at being busy than being still. Many of us are better at running from one thing to the next—rather than slowing down. At the very least, learning to slow down and pay attention to what matters most is a prerequisite to living a God-filled life. 

 Are you too busy? And what are you busy about? Has God gotten pushed to the back seat? We need to take a close look at our lives. Evaluate priorities. Evaluate where we spend our time.     

 We all have certain responsibilities that cannot be shirked. We all have certain commitments that we must keep. The question for us becomes at what point do we begin saying “no” to extraneous obligations? All of us, I suspect, want a full and meaningful life. But the danger is when we step over an invisible line that separates a meaningful life from a life that is too busy—a life that cannot make time for being with God. A life that has lost perspective.

 “It is not enough to be busy, so are the ants.” The question is: What are we busy about?”