Moving too fast
Aug
27
Written by:
Friday, August 27, 2010
Sometimes old advice is the best advice.
This week has been a busy time in our house. "Meet the Teacher Day" at school was on Tuesday. Also on Tuesday, our middle son left for his senior class trip. On Wednesday our youngest son left on his 8th grade class trip. On Thursday our oldest son moved back into the dorm at Duke. The house has been a flurry of laundry and packing and school supply gathering.
And then yesterday it was empty. The younger boys will be home today, but for awhile things were eerily quiet. And what did I do? I could have read a book or taken a nap or sipped a cup of tea or prayed or just about anything else for hours on end. Uninterrupted. Instead, I ran around like a chicken with its head cut off, frantically trying to get things done. No one was forcing me to be crazy-busy. There were no children to care for, no meetings to attend, no carpool lines to navigate, no deadlines to meet. I forced the craziness on myself.
And I accomplished almost nothing.
So today I am backing up, quieting myself, remembering these words of wisdom. Perhaps you need them, too.
Much of our acceptance of multitudes of obligations is due to our inability to say No. We calculated that the task had to be done, and we saw no one ready to undertake it. We calculated the need, and then calculated our time, and decided maybe we could squeeze it in somewhere. But the decision was a heady decision, not made within the sanctuary of the soul. When we say Yes or No to calls for service on the basis of heady decisions, we have to give reasons, to ourselves and to others. But when we say Yes or No to calls on the basis of inner guidance and whispered promptings of encouragement from the Center of our life, or in the basis of a lack of any inward "rising" of that Life to encourage us in the call, we have no reason to give, except one--the will of God as we discern it. Then we have begun to live in guidance. And I find He never guides us into an intolerable scramble of panting feverishness. . . .
Life from the Center is a life of unhurried peace and power. It is simple. It is serene. It is amazing. It is triumphant. It is radiant. It takes no time, but it occupies all our time. And it makes our life programs new and overcoming. We need not get frantic. He is at the helm.
Thomas Kelly, A Testament of Devotion